Close Your Eyes (52 page)

It didn’t really
m
att
er if he wasn’t interested in her after all. Even if he moved on and left for the States, she had to do it.
Matt
had been left behind by his mother once,
and
the scars from
being abandoned
never heal
ed
properly.
She couldn’t compare what they had to such an important event, of course,
but
she would be damned if she let him
leave
believing
that she wasn’t any different than Elisa, however little
that
might mean to him at this point. If she did
,
she would regret it for the rest of her life.

She was still burning with impatience as she arrived at the Heathrow Airport,
where
the rain
was
coming down in sheets, grey and cold. She didn’t call her parents
because she was
not quite sure what to tell them. She had caused enough upheaval in the last month as it was
.
Dropping the bomb
on them
about
what she
was planning
was
not easily done.
Her mom would
have
a heart attack if she knew how
Meg
felt about
Matt
. Or quite possibly,
her mom would
think that
Megan had
moved on to
Matt
to spite Ry
an
and get him back, however twisted
it might sound.

On her flight back home
,
Meg
had enough time to think about
what
her plan
would look like to outsiders
. Her mom would be only one of many
who would assume
she was nothing but an opportunist moving on from one
Harper
boy to the other. They
had always been
the perfect trio.
T
he three of them
had become
a familiar sight in town
throughout their childhood
.
A
fter her breakup with Ry
an
,
her behavior was nothing short of some cheesy soap opera where the main heroine flittered from one male character to the other, keeping it all close in the family.

As she arrived
at her house,
her heart beat
faster in anticipation of the drama that was about to go down.
S
he was tired of acting all cool and proper
and
pretending to be someone else.

The house was empty. She let herself in
through
the wide, elegant hallway
.
O
nly
an
echo answer
ed
from the staircase
answered her when she called out
. She kicked off her soggy shoes,
and
her feet
left
wet footprints on the hardwood mosaic leading to the official sitting room.
The rain pouring down outside had managed to soak her through completely
on her
short walk from the cab to the door. She caught a
n image of herself in the large, crystal mirror with
a
thick,
old gilded frame. Her long dark hair hung down her back in wet
rattails
,
and
her pale face and damp clothes complet
ed
the unflattering picture.

N
obody was
home
.
Her parents’ housekeeper
worked
only
two full days
a week. Suddenly
,
embarrassed with her own scattered brain,
she remembered where her parents were. It was Thursday
. H
er parents
’
game night
would no doubt keep
them out for the whole evening. She didn’t allow herself to
think
back to the last evening like that
,
when she and Ry
an
had gone
on their last official date. She had the house to herself
,
and
that
wasn’t such a bad thing
, e
specially now that she was quite certain she would want to move out in
the
near future.

The pleasure of being alone lasted only
so
long. After a warm bath
,
she prepared herself a snack
and ate over the
kitchen
counter
. She was t
oo intimidated to sit alone at the large, stately table her mom
had
bought
at an antique auction two years ago
. The house felt empty and cold
. T
he silence
weighed
down on her like
an
oppressive boulder.
Hoping to find something to distract her as she wondered what to do next, s
he flipped through the
TV
channels.

One glance outside told her that the rain had stopped even though t
he heavy,
granite
-
colored clouds still hu
ng threateningly low
.
Too wound up to relax properly, s
he needed fresh air, she decided impulsively.
Before
she
had
settled on a plan
, she
had been
too restless to slow down. Her instinct told her to put off talking to
Matt
till tomorrow, if only to allow
herself
to collect her thoughts and get it right the first time.
She had
so many things she wanted to tell him
,
and so much depended on how
well she could express herself
.

She dressed in a hurry, pulling on a pair of jeans and a white shirt. There was no point
in doing
anything about her hair
, which was drying
into a tumbling dark
-
brown mess. She’d just go for a drive someplace calm
to
give
herself an hour or two of peace before her parents returned
and drowned
her with questions. Grabbing the olive
-
green rain jacket and slipping into a pair of old, forest
-
green
W
ellingtons
, she
finished
off
her very unglamorous outfit.

How she end
ed
up at the same restaurant
that
she and Ry
an
had
picked over a year ago for their
‘have some time apart’
talk was a mystery. She had no definite plan
as to
where she wanted to go,
and
the familiar sight
took
her by surprise.
Backed by
the vast marshland,
the restaurant was
nestled among old trees,
and
the sign over the door
was
achingly familiar.
She hesitated briefly before parking her car.

Am I
really ready to go in and order
my
self something to eat?
Each time she had been
t
here
,
she’d been
with Ry
an
, sometimes with
Matt
in tow.
Would it hurt to sit there alone, not knowing how things
were going to
work out in the days to come?

In the end
,
she chickened out
and opted
for a walk
through
the
moor
. The greyish weather had successfully diverted most of the other
walkers,
bird watchers
,
and
joggers. Walking alone under the darkened, stormy sky felt oddly liberating
. She lifted her face
to the moist air in total acceptance. She was here, back in the place that held so many memories, most of them good.
T
he pictures moved before her eyes
like some old home movie
where
Ry
an
and
Matt
were
her constant companions. She could almost see herself again, smaller and braver
,
as she climbed trees with the brothers, none of them willing to admit they were scared to go any further. In the end
,
it was a tie between Ry
an
and
Matt
, with her following very closely. She blinked
,
and another memory emerged
. T
heir
exploration
of the surrounding forest
had resulted
in scraped knees and torn clothes, especially on
Matt
’s part. He never complained
as he tried
very hard to keep up with Ry
an
. And
Matt
did
keep up with him
, whether he knew it or not. He had been an equal in their fraternal relationship, especially in the latest years.