Page 41 of When I Come Back
“Just one more second,” I say quietly into the phone. I then step out onto the patio right outside the kitchen. The morning is chilly, the weather is finally getting the message that it’s late November. It helps wake me up fully before I face what I know will be a difficult conversation.
“Hey,” I say.
“Carrington.” Seth’s no-nonsense tone greets me. It took me a while to get used to his all-business-all-the-time attitude. “What is going on?”
“Seth, my man. It’s good to hear from you.” Even to my own ears, my attempt at a light tone sounds like complete bullshit.
He sighs. It’s weighted and tinged with disappointment. He’s one of the few people in Seattle who know or remember Thea. For reasons still unknown to me, he never warmed up to her and seemed almost relieved when she left. Based on me being basically MIA over the last week and how I picked up the phone just now, I’m pretty sure he knows what I’ve been doing. The silence following his sigh is almost unbearable.
“Did you need something specific?” I ask.
“That’s what you’re going to say?” He waits for a response. When he doesn’t get one from me, he continues, “I’m going to assume you just pulled yourself out ofherbed, so I’ll keep this brief.” I imagine him shaking his head, and the thought makes me bristle.
“Hey, don’t give me that. You know what this all means to me. I don’t have to explain myself to you.” I’m being a dick, and he doesn’t deserve it. Between the guilt of lying to Thea while also stepping out on a six-year relationship, and the sheer joy I felt this morning waking up with Thea wrapped around me, my head is all mixed up. I know I’ve fucked up epically, but I don’t know how to fix it. It has left me paralyzed. I have no right moves to make. Every single one ends up with someone hurt.
“No, I’m definitely not the one you have to explain yourself to.”Fuck.I hate that he knows exactly what to say to cut me down at the knees. At that, I sink down onto one of the chairs on the patio, and my hand immediately finds my forehead. I look out over Thea’s modest backyard, memories of us as kids seeping in.
“I fucked up, Seth,” I pause, “I fucked up eight years ago, and I haven’t stopped since.”
There’s a long silence and then another heavy sigh from him.
“We’re going to figure this out. You know I’m always here for you.” His tone is softer than before. He disapproves, but he’s being a friend first and foremost.
“Thanks, I appreciate it more than you know.”
“And you guys will figure it out. You’ll work through it. She’d be crazy not to find a way to forgive you.”
“Thanks, man,” I say. “It’s still early there, what’s up?”
There’s a long pause, and then he says, “I wanted to give you a heads up, but I decided it’s not as important as I thought it was. We can talk when you get back in a few days. It can wait.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah, Happy Thanksgiving. See you this weekend.”
“Yeah, see you,” I say.
I hang up and sit looking out over the yard without really seeing it for a while longer. As I replay the conversation with Seth back in my mind, I can’t help but wonder whichshehe was referring to.
I feel wrung out with guilt about what I’ve done, and I’m dreading the fallout from my conversations with both of them. But there is only one woman’s forgiveness I can’t live without.
Slowly, I stand and stretch. Pulling the sliding door open, I walk inside and creep over to Thea’s bedroom. I crack the door and see she’s still asleep. Not wanting to wake her, I walk back into the kitchen. Rummaging in drawers until I find a pen and a notepad, I quickly scrawl out a note to her and leave it on the kitchen counter.
Eight years ago my life derailed when Thea left me and moved back to our hometown. Today, I have to start getting it back on track, and the first step is to go back to my hotel and get a plan together. I have to find a way to leave Seattle in my past.
Chapter Twenty
Thea
“So, wait, you fucked… all over your house basically, ate pumpkin pie naked in bed, talked until five in the morning, and then he left you… a note?” Ripley’s voice booms through the speakers of my car, sounding more skeptical with each word.
“Okay, you make it sound like the note part is bad. Is a note bad? Was it weird to leave a note?” My heart starts to race as I enter my second bout of panic over this today.
“Deep breath, babe.” He gives me a second, listening to make sure I’m doing exactly what he told me to. “A note isn’t necessarilybad. But he’s a chef. Who promised you dinner. And then fucked you instead… so I guess I expected him to wake up and cook you breakfast, not leave you a note.”
I nod along as he speaks; he isn’t wrong. I would have loved a morning-after breakfast. Or even just to wake up next to him, wrapped in his arms. I got neither of those. And for that reason alone, I’m spiraling. Again.
“Tell me again what the note said.”
