Page 101 of Eleanor & Grey

“I owe you an apology,” he confessed, his voice so low. “For the way I was treated you today.”

“It’s okay.”

“It’s not. I was an asshole, and I’m sorry.” He glanced my way before looking back down to his now empty glass. “I don’t know how to exist around you sometimes.”

“What do you mean?”

“You stand for a period of time in my life when things were easier, when things were better, and that’s hard. It’s hard to look back on a time so good when things are so broken now.”

“Can I ask why you hired me, then?”

He tilted his head my way and looked at me, and I mean truly stared. Before that point, it had almost been like he was always looking past me, looking through me. This time, though, I felt our connection. I felt him lock in. “Because I think the small part of me that isn’t destroyed needed something good to hold on to.”

“I’m a good thing?”

“You’ve always been a good thing, Eleanor, since the first day I met you.”

My heart skipped a few beats, but I tried my best to ignore it. “I’m sorry you’re hurting so much,” I told him.

“How long is it going to hurt?” he asked, his voice so low.

I gave him the same answer he’d given me all those years ago. “As long as it has to.”

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, turning away from me, seemingly embarrassed. “I’m drunk.”

“You don’t have to apologize for feeling, Greyson. I would be just as lost and confused as you are, if not more so.”

He nodded once and stared at the fireplace. The fire sparked repeatedly against the logs, and the flames danced around as if they were going to burn forever.

“Why did you come back?” he asked.

“Hmm?”

“After I fired you…why would you come back here to check on me?”

“Because I owed you.”

“For what?”

“Saving me when I was younger and about to drown.”

“Thank you, Ellie.”

I smiled. “Of course. Here, let me go get us some water to sober up.” I started to stand from the couch with my glass in my hand then paused when he spoke.

“It’s Lorelai’s birthday today,” he told me. He was opening up more and more as the whiskey settled within him. Please stay open, Grey. His finger thumbed the rim of his glass and his eyebrows lowered as he studied it. “She’s six today.”

I lowered myself back down to my seat and turned toward him. “Yeah, Claire told me. I had no clue. We could’ve celebrated. I could’ve made a cake or something.”

He grimaced and rubbed the back of his neck. “I didn’t know how to face today.”

“I don’t under…” I started, but my words trailed away as the pieces clicked into place. Of course, he didn’t celebrate Lorelai’s birthday. “Because Lorelai’s birthday is the same day Nicole died.”

He nodded. “One year ago today, everything changed, and I never recovered from that. It’s bullshit, right? This person I’ve become, the person I am. I’m a monster.”

“Greyson—”

“Don’t, Eleanor. Don’t do that.”

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