Page 119 of Saving Ren
“No, I fucking never. He’d been caught banging a twenty-one-year-old intern, and apparently it wasn’t the first time.”
I watch as she shakes her head, but still doesn’t look at me.
“You want something stronger than water now, coz I fucking do?”
“No,” is all I get as I head back in and pour myself a large bourbon.
Taking the bottle back outside, Lauren has turned and is watching my approach.
“How’d it end?” she asks.
I shake my head. I will tell her; I just don’t want to. I pull a chair out from the table and sit in it, beckoning Lauren over to sit on my knee as I do. She rolls her eyes.“It got weird,” I admit. “I started at college, lost interest, and just didn’t turn up at the motel we used to meet at anymore. She then started showing up outside my college. She didn’t approach me, just sat there in her car watching me, following me home. Then she started leaving notes on my car. I ignored them. I walked out of the pub with a girl one night, and she was there, my truck keyed all down each side, her leaning against it. She took one look at the girl I was with and flew at her.”
I watch as Lauren’s eyes widen, and she opens her mouth to speak a couple of times but changes her mind.
“I had to make threats,” I tell her with a shrug. “Told her if she didn’t leave me alone, I’d not only tell my dad, but I’d also tell her husband. Aside from on the telly or in newspapers, online, or wherever, today’s the first time I’ve seen her since.”
Lauren lets out a long slow breath, I refill my glass, enjoying the buzz from the beer and the bourbon.
Pulling the scrunchy out of her hair, I watch as it falls around her shoulders and she massages her scalp with her fingertips.
“Come and sit with me,” I hold my hand out and ask.
“No, don’t do that. Don’t tell me all of that, then get me to sit on your lap so you can say all the right things instead of answering my questions.”
“What questions have you got? I’ll answer all of them.”
“I don’t know. You had an affair with an older woman, a married older woman. I’m not your first. Is there a pattern? Are there others?”
My eyes meet hers over the top of my glass, and I couldn’t hate myself anymore in that moment.
“No,” she whispers, and I jerk as her legs start to buckle. Her hand shoots out to stop me moving to her, and I relax back in my chair. Only I’m not relaxed, I’m anything but relaxed.
Her shoulders start to shake, but I remain in my seat. She lets out a sob, but I don’t go to her. Her hand comes up to cover her mouth and tears roll down her cheeks and all I do is watch her break.
“I’m not special. I’m just stupid. I—I thought—I’d started to believe—to think that I meant something.”
“You mean everything,” I whisper. “Out of all of them, you’re the only one that has meant anything, andthatanything is everything.”
“Liar!” she leans forward and grits through her teeth. “You’re a fucking liar. How can I believe anything that comes out of your mouth?”
“What did I lie about, Ren? You asked, I told you. Total honesty, remember?”
“You said you’d never hurt me,” she whispers.
“My past is ugly. I can’t give you the honesty without giving you the hurt, babe. You want me to lie to save you from that, then I am more than fucking happy to oblige. But I can’t change the past and make it into something it wasn’t, something pretty, something that won’t hurt you. If I could, it’d already be done.”
She closes her eyes, wraps her arms around her middle, and looks as broken as she did the first night I brought her here.
“How many?” she asks, eyes still closed.
“How many what?”
“Others?” she opens her eyes and pierces with a stare.
I have to close mine against the ugliness of what I’m about to share.
“Just one,” I admit.
