Page 41 of Unsaid Things

Chapter Seventeen

Lance sat on the couch, flipping through the channels, feeling restless. He glanced at the time on his phone. Abby should’ve been home by now. What was keeping her? Maybe she had to talk to her professor about something. She didn’t know that he’d left work early today to get home before her as a surprise to kick off her birthday weekend. He wanted to give her birthday present to her now. He’d gotten it last week—a pair of gold earrings made of a cascade of fine chains of different lengths with a delicate leaf attached to each one. They were beautiful, and he wanted to see them on her. She seemed to be getting more okay with his more ostentatious presents, so he was excited to see her reaction. Her present sat in a pretty gift bag on the coffee table.

But no Abby.

The sound of the key scraping in the lock had him on his feet and the TV off. He probably looked crazy just standing there staring at the door. She confirmed that when she walked in and saw him.

She froze, eyeing him to try to figure out what was up. After closing the door, she set down her keys and bag before taking off her coat. “What’s going on? Is everything okay? Why are you home?”

He smiled at her, trying to ease her obvious concern. “Everything’s fine.” He stepped toward her, taking her coat from her and tossing it over the back of the couch. They’d be leaving for dinner soon. He had the whole night planned. Pulling her into his arms, he kissed her, and some of the stiffness went out of her, but she didn’t melt into him like she usually did.

Pulling back, he looked down at her, noting the slight puffiness in her face like she’d been crying. “What’s wrong?”

She disentangled herself from him, moving further into the apartment. “That’s what I asked you.”

Stuffing his hands in his pockets so he didn’t reach for her again, he let her move away from him. Sometimes she wanted him to hold her when she was upset. Other times she wanted space. This seemed to be the latter. “I told you, everything’s fine. I took off early because I wanted to get a jump on your birthday weekend. We have dinner reservations tonight, I thought we could catch a movie if you want, or we can come home and hang out. Did something happen today?”

She shook her head. “Nothing important.”

This time he wasn’t going to let her have that space. Not when she wasn’t being honest with him. He stepped closer to her, sliding his hands up and down her arms that she held crossed over her chest, then pulling her in. She let him, laying her head on his chest, but keeping her arms crossed, not returning the hug. At least she wasn’t pulling away. He’d take it for now. “What happened, Abby? I can tell something’s upset you.”

She sighed deeply against him, and he felt moisture seeping through the fabric of his shirt. He squeezed her tighter against him, rubbing her back. “Abby? Please tell me what’s wrong.”

“Aaron came by today.”

He stiffened at her words. Her voice was muffled from her face pressing into his chest, but he heard her. Forcing himself to relax, he kept rubbing her back. “Came by where?”

“Work. He was waiting in the foreign language office when I got done teaching my last lab.”

Lance pulled back and looked down at her, but she kept her face turned away from him. “What did he want?”

“Money. What else?”

He let her bury her face in his chest again, since that’s all she seemed to want to do. “From you?”

She shrugged.

“Or he wanted you to ask me?”

No response. Huh.

“What does he want money for?”

She didn’t say anything for a long time. But he waited. “He said Mom needs some tests. I don’t know all the details. He wasn’t very clear about what the problem was.”

Pulling back again, he tried to get her to look at him. She still wouldn’t meet his eyes. That seemed … odd. But she was upset, so he let it go. “How much does she need? Did you talk to your mom?”

She shook her head, pulling out of his arms and heading for the kitchen. “No. Um, she wouldn’t answer when I tried calling.”

Crossing his arms and propping a shoulder in the kitchen doorway, he watched her fill a glass of water and drink half of it. He supposed that crying would make you dehydrated. “How much did he say she needs?”

She finally looked at him, a wary look in her eyes. “Uh, a few thousand dollars at least.”

He let out a low whistle. With how much he didn’t have to pay for rent, he had a good amount in savings. He’d planned on using it as a down payment for a house someday. That was the only reason he hadn’t pushed Abby harder on letting him pay all of the rent, or at least a higher percentage. He could dip into that to help out her mom.

“Okay. I can swing that.”

“No.” Her answer came automatically, almost before he finished talking.

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