Page 84 of Homewrecker

I've done enough to prevent the people I love from moving on with their lives. This time I'm going to try being supportive instead. It can't end worse than my trip to North Carolina did. Four weeks I've been home, and still no word from Seth. Although I was tempted to have a rebound fling with someone random, I decided that wasn't what I needed. I'd only be comparing him to Seth anyway. I need time to forget his voice, his hands, his lips. It made me spitefully happy to hear from Dad that Seth seems—how did he put it?—kind of lost. Me, I've got laser focus on what I want, like I never have before. Let him be the sad puppy. I've moved on with my life.

"Yes and no," Hugh says in answer to my question. "It will be interesting to explore a new city, but I'm going to miss you terribly, and you know how I feel about New York."

"You're a diehard New Yorker," I say. "This won't be easy, but it might be fun. And you can always come back if it's awful."

Hugh puckers up his face. "I can come back, but will Raymond come with me? His job is his life."

I pat his arm. "You're his life, too. He'll want you to be happy."

Hugh sighs, and we both silently reflect for a moment.

"I was thinking that maybe we should give you Norman."

"Why?" I ask in surprise.

Hugh gives me a guilty smile. "I feel bad about taking him when I moved out. I didn't really give you a choice in the matter back then. Do you want to keep him for a while?"

Pain hits my chest with the force of bricks as it does any time something reminds me of Seth. He teased me for not having a pet, and now Hugh is presenting me with a chance to have one again. I slam the door on my memories of Seth. He's not going to ruin the little time I have left with Hugh.

"I think you should take him," I say. "You might be lonely at first. He's good company."

Hugh steers both of us around the spit wad a passing jogger has just hocked onto the ground in front of us. I love New York, but sometimes it's a minefield.

"Besides," I tell him, "I'll be moving eventually, too. Norman would be just as stressed out then."

Hugh looks over at me doubtfully. "Do you really think you'll move to North Carolina? You could always start your events company here in the city. Lord knows there's enough money floating around this town to keep every good caterer busy."

"I'm excited about my plan," I say. "I'll be like Ina Garten when she ventured out to the Hamptons to run a gourmet food store. She had zero experience running a small business and turned that one gourmet food store into an empire, so why not me?"

Hugh points out the lemon ice seller, and we stop to order two. In a few minutes, our mouths will be puckered and our tongues numb. We start walking again to the sound of a group of drummers in the park. It's hard not to fall into the rhythm of their beats.

"Believe me," Hugh says, picking up the thread of our conversation, "I have total confidence that you can become the event planning diva of central North Carolina. And you're one hundred percent right that the farm is the perfect venue for weddings."

"It is, right?"

When I told LaTonya about the farm, she had the same positive reaction. She also hooked me up with a friend of hers who runs an event space on Long Island so I could get more information on how to handle things like insurance and taxes.

"I'm just worried about your proximity to the lumberjack," Hugh says, refusing as he always does to use Seth's real name. I think it's his way of punishing Seth for hurting me. "You can say it's all good, and you don't care anymore, but I saw you a few days after you got home. You were..."

"A mess, I know."

I can't help but harbor resentment toward Seth for creating that kind of emotional turmoil inside me. He had no right to judge me so harshly, like he's never made a mistake in his life. At least I told him the truth, a fact I refuse to regret.

"I don't want you to get down there and be miserable living so close to him."

"I'm over him. Completely." I work hard to sound convincing. "He and I don't even have to interact that much, and when we do, it will be fine. I'm going to be so involved with my new business that I won't even have time for him."

Dad and Renata are completely supportive of my event planning business, but they initially expressed concern about the tension between Seth and me. I gave them the same speech I delivered to Hugh, about being completely over Seth. Every time I say it, I come closer to believing it.

Hugh suggests we stop and sit on a bench to finish our ices. The minute we're seated, three pigeons land at our feet and start strutting and bobbing. One of them takes an interest in something near my shoe, and I pick my feet up and tuck them under me, not wanting to be in contact with his nastiness. Scenes from the chicken coop incident flood my brain, and I'm about to tell Hugh the story before I remember that it ends with Seth saving me.

"I think I'm also being selfish," Hugh says. "If you leave New York, you won't be here when we come back to visit friends and family. I guess I can come down South."

The wince that follows this statement reveals his true feelings about that idea.

"It's not as backwards as you make it sound," I say, surprised that I'm feeling a little defensive. "I told you about Jenny and Luisa. There is an LGBTQ community south of the Mason Dixon line."

"I'll keep an open mind," he says, and he sounds determined to try.

---