Page 139 of Here & There

Nadine’s been staying at the inn and has taken her son out exactly one time since she’s been back, and he came home in tears. When I tried to get him to tell me about it, he told me he was fine.

I nearly lost it. Not at him, of course. But he didn’t see it that way.

We’ve regressed. In a bad way. He’s back to eating in his room most nights, unless Annie’s able to coax him out. Yesterday, when he came home from school, he slammed the door so hard a picture fell off a wall. The only good thing that came out of that is that he asked if I could drive him to schoolthe next day. It was the best twenty minutes we’d spent together since Shelby left, even if neither of us said a word.

The car’s definitely pulling into the drive. I rise up off my chair, heading through the house. Nate’s at the top of the stairs. “Is that her?”

“I hope so,” I say. Desperately.

Behind me, back on the deck, I hear the door to the shed opening. Annie’s staying there right now, back in the room that was made for her. It feels weird having her there, even though that was always the point.

As I step out the front door and see Shelby’s Jetta pull in next to my truck, my chest throbs.

Nothing’s changed about the way I feel for Shelby. If anything, I love her more than ever, which I didn’t think was possible, since I was already so gone I had to hide my fucking tears when we were last together in my bed. I love her for everything she already was, but for not faltering during the shit show that was Oysterfest? For putting up with my contained fury at seeing Nadine again when she thought she could sweep back into Nate’s life? She’s a goddamn saint. She even stood strong as Nadine batted her eyelashes at me, then looked all hurt when I told her firmly that I was with Shelby. Nadine’s not a bad person. She’s not cruel or evil or catty or any of those things. She’s just…messed up. She always has been.

I crunch over the gravel to Shelby’s car and open the door. I practically pull her out, wrapping my arms around her so hard she looks up at me with worry.

“Hey,” she says softly. “That bad?”

“Yes,” I say. “But I’m better now that you’re here.”

“Tell me?”

“It’s fine.” I promised myself I wouldn’t dump everything on her this weekend. I promised myself I’d just enjoy our timetogether. I stroke her hair, soaking in her face. “I love you. I just missed you.”

When we kiss, I can almost forget how shitty everything is around me.

Dinner is prawns and steak I made on the barbecue, along with a salad made by Annie and Nate. We eat outside in the warm summer evening. By all accounts, it’s a perfect night, with Shelby by my side, her hand on mine between talking or eating or sipping our wine. She and Annie get along like a house on fire, and Nate’s back to talking like he was before Shelby left.

“So how’s it going with work?” Annie asks. “How was that thing you had to do?”

They talked before Shelby left about the launch event she was going back for.

“It was terrible, actually.”

“What?” Annie laughs.

Shelby tells us about how everything went wrong. How Clientzilla had a meltdown on stage. But how she and her team managed to turn it all around. “They’re incredible, honestly. I was so proud of them. And it felt so damn good to be in the middle of it again. Just like at Oysterfest.”

She looks so happy it hurts.

But something irrational flashes inside me too. A petty jealousy, of the thing that lights her up.

“Actually,” she says, looking at me with something like an apology. “Because of how things went, I’m going to need to stay back there a bit longer than I thought.”

She already told me she’d need an extra couple of weeks to wind things down at work and pack up her place. I offered to come down to help, but she insisted she was fine. “It’s mostlywork stuff, and besides, you’re too busy at the Dinghy. And with other stuff.”

She was talking about Nadine.

But the last thing I want to do is deal with Nadine.

“How long?” I ask, proud of myself for managing my tone so I don’t sound as fucking devastated as I feel.

Shelby holds my hand. “Realistically? Probably another month.”

The table falls silent as Shelby’s news lands on us. Nate scrapes his food across his plate like he’s done eating.

I pull my hand away. I put another dresser in my room. A bedside table with her favorite books. A little potted lemon tree in the corner. I picture staring at those things without her for another month.

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