Secondary Colors (28 page)

I glance at her.

“I’m staying in Aurora.”

She grabs my arms and twists me toward her.

“Are you sure you’re not making a rash decision?”

“I’ve given it thought.” I hug myself, clamping my hands on my biceps. “I’ve thought of nothing else for weeks.”

“You’ve been sitting on this for weeks?”

“Had to be sure of what I wanted before I told anyone.”

“What about painting? New York is the center of the art world. You won’t have the opportunities here that you would there.”

“I’m pretty sure we have paint supplies in New Hampshire. Besides, lots of artists live outside major cities. And there is the internet when I need to communicate with her.”

“Evie,” Tay says, “I want you to do what you want, you know that. But you have this amazing offer to work with one of the top names in the industry. She’ll show you the ropes and introduce you to other important people. You’ll be living in the greatest city on earth. You have to weigh your options.”

“You’re forgetting one important factor—” I mumble on an exhale. “If I stay, I’ll be close to Bailey. I missed so much when I was in California. I hated not being able to watch her grow up. I’d come home every few months and she’d change so much.”

“I want your happiness. And if you want to stay to be closer to your daughter, I support you. But is she the only reason?”

“No,” I answer, my line of sight dropping to my arms hugging my body.

“Are you in love with him?”

I face her at the desk, my arms sagging to my sides. “I wouldn’t call it love.”

“What would you call it?”

“It’s—something like love.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It’s that feeling right before love. It’s terrifying, exhilarating, life affirming knowing it’s the most important leap you’ll ever take, aware you’re right on the cusp of something great.”

“So—it’s not love. It’s something like it.”

“Exactly.”

“You should be more certain of your feelings before making any serious decisions about your future.”

“This isn’t about Holt—not completely anyway. I guess being here reminded me I love this place. I’ve missed it.”

“Are you sure you aren’t in denial about why you’re staying?”

“Maybe I am.”

She releases a breath through her nose, her mouth tight.

“Maybe this isn’t the best time to tell you this,” she says. “I’m going to finish out my law degree back in California.”

Tay graduated with a degree in environmental science with goals of becoming an environmental lawyer. She told me she would finish school and take the Bar out here.

I stare at her, my brow scrunching above the bridge of my nose. “When did you decide this?”

“When I was accepted to the law program at Stanford three months ago.”

“You never even told me you were applying there.”

“I did it as a farce. I never thought I’d be accepted.”

“But now that you were—”

“I have to take it.”

I smile, even though my heart’s shattering, and hold my arms open to her. She steps into me and we squeeze each other tight.

“I’m going to miss you,” I whisper, tears clouding my eyes over.

“I’m going to miss you, too,” she says with the same hushed tone, tears evident in her voice.

“Growing up sucks,” I joke.

We giggle.

“Totally,” she agrees.

I rejoin the party in an attempt to forget my best friend’s news and the choice weighing on me, anxious about the inevitable conversation with my parents. I would’ve told Meredith before the party, but she’d bought everything by the time the idea ever came to me. My renewed plan was to speak to her after the party. Then my father showed. Now I have to let him know he wasted his time and effort to come get me. I’m confident my mother will understand my decision. Richard is another story. He isn’t known to handle surprises well.

I manage to evade them successfully, ducking in and out of crowded rooms, until the guests trickle out, thinning my chances of hiding from them. When it’s no longer possible to dodge them, I drag in a jagged breath and ask to speak with both of them, taking the lead into the living room. I shut the sliding doors behind them and take a seat on one of the two chairs across from the couch, which they occupy, separated as far as they can get from each other.

“What is this about?” Richard probes sternly.

Meredith shoots him a deadly side-stare, annoyed with his no-nonsense attitude.

She smiles at me and asks, “What do you want to tell us, baby?”

I wriggle in my seat. Unable to sit, I rise again, standing before them both.

“Recently, I’ve come to an important decision. It wasn’t come to easily. In the past months, things have changed. I thought I knew what I wanted—and didn’t want—but in light of these changes, I’ve decided I won’t be moving to New York.”

“And what do you intend to do?” my father asks with a sharpness, his face redder than the brightest red.

“I’m staying in Aurora.”

“Why, baby?” my mom inquires. “Does it have to do with the land and finances?”

“Partly. I want to know you and the land are alright. But that’s not the main reason I’m staying.”

“Is it Holt?”

“This has to do with some goddamned boy?” my father asks, the muscles in his jaw ticking. He’s teeth-grinding mad.

“No,” I attempt to dispute, but my father cuts me off.

“This is your fault,” he screams, turning on my mother.

“Let’s not get riled up,” I interject, but we’ve entered the war zone.

“My fault?” She jumps up, getting in his face. She always could go toe to toe with him, even though he’s twice her size. “How is this my fault?”

“It’s no one’s—” Trying to mediate is pointless. Once they get going, I completely disappear.

“You’re allowing her to choose a worthless boy, who’ll break her heart, over a promising future. Where will she be then?”

“Please, don’t argue,” I plead, but my voice is barely legible under their bickering.

“No, we couldn’t have that, could we? You’re the only man allowed to break her heart, right, Richard?”

“You left me no fucking choice goddamn it! You crawled into Channing’s bed like some common whore.”

“What?” I breathe, collapsing on the chair behind me. Now I need to sit, my head spinning with his words.

“Richard, don’t,” my mother cries, her hands clasped together in front of her mouth.

“No,” he shouts, slicing his hand through the air. It’s his putting-my-foot-down gesture. His mind is made up. “I won’t take the entire blame for this anymore, Meredith. It’s time she knew what really happened.” He turns to me, his expression hard, but his eyes softer, apologetic. “Your mother—”

“Richard, please!”

He pays no attention to my mother’s cries of mercy. “Your mother was sleeping with him for years. I left because I couldn’t take it anymore. I was tired of being a joke in this town. I was tired of being her second best. When I left her, she told me to stay away from you, too.”

My world shifts. Everything I’ve ever known is a lie.

“How could you?” I scream, but it’s indirect. “Both of you. Neither are innocent! She may have cheated, but you left
me
behind. You could’ve fought for me, you could’ve tried. I did nothing wrong! Do you know I’ve been screwed up since then? I haven’t had a healthy relationship with men because of you! And you,
Mother
, how could you? How could you let me think he was completely to blame? You saw what it did to me!” I can’t be in this house, with these people, with these liars. “You know what? I’m done.” I run out of the room, tears creeping down my cheeks and chin.

Suddenly at my side, Holt asks, “Where are you going?” trying to keep up with my brisk pace.

“I’m leaving,” I snap.

“Evie,” he snags my hand in his, stopping me, “tell me what happened?”

“It’s lies,” I cry, ripping my hand away and running toward my car. Holt, hot on my trail. I reach for the handle, his hand snatches my wrist and he spins me around.

“Evie, would you please talk to me?” His knuckles trace the outline of my face.

“I need space.”

I unlatch the handle with my other hand, opening the door and wrenching my wrist from his grip. Before he can stop me, I slide into the driver seat and lock the doors. Having left the keys on the passenger seat from packing the car, I pick them up and shove them into the ignition with a quivering hand, tears pouring down my face.

“Evie, unlock the door,” Holt says in a placating tone, gently tapping on the window. I sit frozen, my hand on the key, ready to turn it over, crying so hard no noise comes out. “Come on, baby. Think about what you’re doing.”

“I’m not your baby,” I snarl, angry at the kindness in his voice, the understanding. I don’t want to be understood. I want to leave. I want to disappear.

“Evie,” he mutters, his lips trembling when my name crosses them, “I love you.”

“It doesn’t exist,” I retort, turning the key and shifting the car into gear. “Love is bullshit.”

I put the pedal to the floor and take off.

I hear him screaming my name. I stupidly glimpse back in my rearview mirror and spot him running back into the house, probably going for the keys to his truck. He’s going to chase me down, probably catch up to me halfway down Main Street, stop my car in some grand gesture, convince me to open the door, and then kiss me until I agree to come home with him.

But I know something he doesn’t. I’m not going through town.

When my front tires touch the edge of the highway, I shift the shifter into park and set my forehead against the steering wheel. My breathing is sharp and quick, my lungs struggling to drag in a full breath.

You shouldn’t leave him behind. He doesn’t deserve this. He’s a good guy. The first truly decent one you’ve met in a long time. Are you really willing to give him up? He won’t be here when you decide to come back. He’ll move on from here and from you.

Shut up.

If I turn right, I’ll never make it out of Aurora.

If I turn left—

I put the car into drive and turn left, traveling long into the night and early into the morning.

observing elements of an image working together in its entirety, by stepping back

from the piece

I didn’t notice the season change.

I didn’t notice the leaves on the trees turn to flame, wither, and die.

I didn’t notice the bitter winter set in, reflecting the gray cold of the world since she left, until Aurora lies under a thick blanket of white powder. It’s different from the town she left three months before.

It doesn’t feel out of place.

Why should the world be joyous and full of life when I’m not?

I trample through the bare bones of the dead forest, my boots sinking into the silvery ground. The chill of an icy wind bites the back of my neck. I flip up the collar of my wool coat then shove my gloved hands into the pockets.

Max bounces around in the powder, kicking it up into the air. It speckles his black fur as it rains down over him.

“I’m glad one of us is happy,” I rumble under my breath, visible in the cold.

He stops, staring at me with his head skewed to the side and his ears perked up. He lets out a whine.

“I miss her, too, boy.”

We break through the tree line. The little house is picturesque in the snow. It’s really something to see, white on white. It’s hard living here, the place I fixed for Evie, for us, for a future that now seems impossible to imagine. But it’s easier than living in the main house. Everything reminded me of her and the time we spent together.

In the past, I would’ve left this town without a second thought. I’ve contemplated it time and time again. But then I think,
‘What if?’

Banging my feet a few times to knock the snow from the tread of my boots, I enter the house. Max tailing me. I unwrap the scarf from my neck, hanging it on the rack next to the door, and turn around.

“You really should lock your doors.”

I watch him through the reflection-obstructed window of the hardware store. He’s browsing the aisles, paying little to no attention on anything around him. I’m parked across the street in my rented car. I wasn’t one hundred percent the Nova would survive the journey from New York in this weather.

I’ve been home for two days, laying low at a motel off the highway outside of town. It certainly has a cozy, stabbed-in-the-shower-by-a-man-in-a-dress motif to it. I wanted to take time to figure out my plan of attack. But instead of my well-thought-out plans, I’m sitting here in this car like a creeper, spying on the man I abandoned. Before he finishes and has a chance to see me, I pull away and drive down Main. It isn’t long before the back of a familiar figure walking down the road catches my eye. I’d know it anywhere. I’d spent years watching every inch of him.

“Aidan!” I call.

His gait falters for a step before returning to a steady rhythm. I refuse to leave him alone until he knows everything. I drive ahead and pull over, leaving the car door open when I jump out to stand in his path.

“There’s something I need you to see. I deserve at least a chance to explain.”

“You had your chance. You had a chance every time you saw me to confess, but you didn’t. Whatever you say, you lied to me, Evie, repeatedly.”

He attempts to walk on, but I set my hands on his chest, falling into him.

I use my final weapon. Honesty.

“I won’t deny it.” This seems to get his attention. “But I promise if you get in that car, you won’t regret it.”

He shuts his eyes in contemplation whether or not getting in the car is the right choice. He opens them again, makes for the idling car, and gets in. I follow suit.

“Where are we going?” he asks, belting himself in.

“It’s a bit of a drive.”

“Then I guess we should get going.”

He sinks back into his seat, his eyes aimed straight ahead.

We’ve been on the road for two hours. I switched on the radio after the first, unable to take the silence. I pull over once to catch my breath and buy snacks and water. When we cross the state line, my stomach begins to cramp and my heart thumps irrepressibly. My teeth itch.

I can’t simply thrust him into the whirlpool of awareness. I must ease him in step by step. Where do I start?

“Why did you do it, Evie?”

“It isn’t simple.”

“I was a fool,” he mutters, his head turned toward the passenger window. “My timing has never been right with you. I loved you since we played in sandboxes, before a boy was supposed to love a girl.”

“And I loved you.”

“Why didn’t we ever tell each other? Why wasn’t I man enough to tell you I loved you when I had the opportunity? It was so easy with other girls. But with you, I could never find the courage to say what I wanted to say.”

“Aid, it’s not your fault. You have no control over the path your life takes. We think we do, but it’s an illusion of the ego. Sometimes people find us on our journey, people who shape us, our paths crossing for the briefest of moments. The roles individuals play in our life may not be leading roles, but it doesn’t mean their parts were any less important. Our moment may have been fleeting, but it left a lasting impression on me.”

“You never really forgave me for what I did to you. I wouldn’t expect you to. I wouldn’t want you to. I’d hope you have more respect for yourself than that.”

“All these years, I’ve loved you and dreamt of the moment you would call me yours. After that night, it took me years more to get over you. Though a part of me will always belong to you, Holt has changed me and inspired me in ways I’ve never considered possible. I never meant to hurt you, but you deserved to know the truth about it.”

“There are things you don’t know, things you don’t understand. When I woke up on the shore and you weren’t there, my heart shattered. I walked the two miles home in the early morning, cold and lost. I’ll never be able to describe the pathetic sadness of it.” The nearly empty country road we’re on seems endless, no houses or markers for miles. When the house comes into sight, I turn into the driveway.

“I should’ve never left you there alone. I’m a bastard.”

“There’s something you need to know.” I take his hand, clasping onto it with all my strength.

“Is it a good or bad thing?”

“It’s a defining thing.” I suck in a sharp breath. This is it.

Margo and Jim walk out of the yellow farmhouse, our three-year-old daughter clutching her tiny hand about Jim’s finger, pulling him along with eager steps. Her brunette hair up in pigtails, her enormous green eyes wide with wonder.

“Evie,” he whispers, his hand tightening around mine.

“She was seven pounds five ounces. Giving her up was the hardest thing I’ve ever done or will do.”

“She’s ours?”

“Yes, Aidan.”

“What’s her name?”

“I named her Bailey.”

He inspects her through the window, unmoving, unspeaking, and unreadable. His lips tense and his chin wobbles as tears glimmer in his eyes.

“She’s,” he chokes on his words, his Adam’s apple wavering and bobbing in his throat, “the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

“I wanted to tell you. I tried to tell you.”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Your mother.”

His eyes lock on mine.

“I don’t understand.”

“I went to your house my first winter back to tell you everything. She was there. You weren’t. When she realized why I’d come to see you, she told me to get rid of her and offered to pay me off.”

“You didn’t take it, did you?”

“I could never. But it did get me to thinking. Once it became clear I was in it alone, I knew I couldn’t provide her with all the things I wanted. Sure, Meredith would’ve helped me in a heartbeat. She offered it time and time again. We would live with her, three generations of women under one roof. A part of me was drawn to the idea. Another wanted more for our baby, a mother and a father, a life away from the hateful stares of Christina. I wanted her to grow up with a normal upbringing.”

“How did you give her up for adoption? Didn’t you need my consent?”

“Not if the father is unknown. I left the father’s name blank on the birth certificate.”

“My mother convinced you of this, I’m guessing.”

“Yes.”

“I always knew she could be manipulative and conniving, but this…”

“Are you still mad at me?”

“I’m a million things right now. Angry is one. But it’s not at you, Evie. I’m angry at Christina for treating you and our child like you were nothing. I’m angry at myself. If I’d been there, you wouldn’t have gone through this by yourself.”

“I had Taylor and my mother.”

“It should’ve been me.” He watches her play in the snow from behind the frosted glass of the passenger window. She’s laughing and throwing the white powder into the air. “You made the right choice, Evie.”

“You see, Aidan. Our time together may have been short, but it led to something bigger than us, something beautiful. You and I are connected always, because of our daughter. She is the love we never got to share with one another.”

He stares at Margo and Jim chasing her around the yard.

“She has your eyes.”

“She’s pieces of us.”

“How could someone I’ve never spoken to, never knew existed before now become the most important person in my life in the blink of an eye?”

“It’s the only time I’ve ever believed in love at first sight. Would you like to meet her?”

“Can I?”

“They were very understanding about it. They want her to know where she came from, and that she is loved.”

“What if she hates me?”

“How could she hate you? You’re her father, Aid.”

He quickly rubs his hands up and down his thighs, blowing out a forced breath through pursed lips.

We step out of the car, and I meet him around the other side. We hold hands, using one another for support, or we might fall apart.

I lead the way on weak, shaky legs.

When Margo spots us coming, she greets us both with a welcoming yet nervous smile. “I’m glad you made it,” she says, meeting us at the gate. She opens it for us and we step inside, our eyes locked on our beautiful small child, our daughter, playing in the snow without a care.