Page 116 of Never Forever

Finally, I looked at him. I’d seen Matt Sullivan a million different ways. Sad, happy, grief-stricken, angry, stressed out, delighted, horny, worried. Right now, he was as gutted as I’d ever seen him.

“Because we wouldn’t have made it, Carrie. I didn’t know how else to…make you see that.”

“How did you know that? Some crystal ball? Madame Za, maybe? Or did you just chicken out?”

“You really want to fight about this again?”

“Again? We’ve never fought about it, Matt. You showed up, broke my heart and offered to drive me to the train station. There was no fighting. If only there had been. If only we’d been fighting for months or weeks leading up to that day, then it might have made more sense!”

“We’d had our fights, Carrie. What about your mom? You didn’t tell her about us. Not really. We never went to your house. Never spent any time there together. Why?”

“You know why,” I said lamely. “That was about her, not us.”

“Bullshit. You didn’t tell her about Boston because you chickened out too. You want to be mad at me, fine. Be mad at me. I’m mad at myself. But you don’t get to pretend like you were without any blame.”

“You blew up our whole lives because I wouldn’t tell my mom I was going to live with you?”

“Don’t minimize it,” he said. “You didn’t have enough faith in us to tell your mom the truth. Admit it. You hid our relationship for years. And I…” he stopped, a muscle ticked in his jaw and I wanted to touch it.

“You what?”

He shook his head.

“What?” I demanded. What wasn’t he saying? What wasn’t he telling me?

“I did what needed to be done.”

“That’s such a copout,” I said, disgusted.

“We were kids.” he said. “We’re not anymore. I am ready to put all of it behind me for the sake of our baby.”

But not for me.

It was a new kind of pain. Stinging and sharp, because I didn’t even realize I wanted it. I wanted him to put it all behind him,for me.

Which was hilarious, because I wasn’t going to do that for him. Because I was still so damn mad at him.

I took a deep breath and pulled my arm from his hand.

“I have to go. I’m tired.”

I walked back to the house and this time he didn’t try and stop me.

The next morningI was rooting through the kitchen cabinets, looking for the coffee maker, when my phone rang. The sight of my sister’s name twisted something inside me. Guilt. Mostly guilt.

“Hi, Annie.”

“Where have you been?” she cried. “I thought you were dead.”

“Obviously, I’m not dead,” I said. “I’m at the house watching over things.”

Also, I’m pregnant.

The words nearly came out of my mouth. She was the one person I most wanted to share this with, and now I was keeping it a secret.

I couldn’t tell her over the phone. It wasn’t right.

“Are you all right out there?” she asked. “You haven’t returned my texts.”

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