I was so zoned out I didn’t spare a second to put my music on.I white-knuckled the steering wheel the entire way back to Watford.
I wasangry—pissed in a way I hadn’t been in years. Every minute of therapy I attended over the last few years vanished the minute I saw that Kameron’s car was still there.
I slammed the front door open. Lucas and Kameron were in the kitchen, putting their dirty breakfast dishes in the sink. Both of them jumped back at the sudden noise. Lucas cursed as he spilled hot coffee down the front of his shirt.
“You had no right,” I shouted. Lucas immediately whirled toward me.
“Dude, what the hell is your problem?”
“My problem is you,” I said, stalking towards him. “My problem is you putting your nose into other people’s business. You had no right to say that to her. To sayanythingto her.”
“What are you talking about?” Lucas said, scowling. “I haven’t done anything.”
“The littleconversationyou had with my girlfriend at Watley’s,” I said, using air quotes for emphasis. It didn’t matter that we hadn’t formally put a label on things. She was still my girl, especially where he was concerned. Lucas shook his head.
“I didn’t say shit about you.”
“Whatexactlydid you say to Abbie?” Kam asked Lucas, wary of his answer.
“I told her that her dad would need help from her in order to stay sober,” Lucas said, throwing his hands up in defense. “I meant he would need her support in the coming months, because that’s when shit is the hardest. That’s all I said.”
I groaned, feeling the urge to rip my hair out.
“That was theworstthing you could have possibly said to the daughter of an addict. You think she doesn’t know that? She’s in her own head all the time about how much her father needs her. Add that to the fact that her mother is dead, and she’s responsible for keeping them both afloat financially, and you just reinforced the idea that she can’t have anything for herself.”
Lucas grimaced. “I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Well, she took it as a license to push everyone out. I don’t understand why you opened your mouth. It wasn’t your business.Noneof this is your business.”
“I’m sorry, man,” Lucas said.
Kameron leaned across the counter with his arms crossed, clearly annoyed by this turn of events. No one said anything for a few moments.
“Want to crack open a non-alcoholic cold one?”
Lucas’s suggestion cut through the awkward silence. Kameron’s cough sounded suspiciously like he was trying to cover up a surprised laugh.
I sighed.
“Yeah.”
It’s not like there was anywhere else to go. The last thing I needed to do was alienate the two people I had left.
Chapter 28
Abbie
Myfatherwouldneedto stay in Brighton for at least a week. I was encouraged to go home shortly after my conversation with Connor in the hallway. Given that it was less than an hour between the hospital and Watford, I took that advice.
If my life was going to fall apart, I at least wanted the ability to curl up into my own bed.
It hadn’t been more than two days since I ripped my heart of my chest and stomped on it and done the same to him.
I tried my damndest not to think about it. Not because it didn’t hurt, but because there was no point in expecting things to change.
This is how things went: things were good, something terrible happened, and I put my nose to the grindstone to fix things.
It was back to business as usual.