Page 36 of The Bride
Not cool.
“I’m going to get my shoes and drive you home.”
“Fuck you!” she screamed back.
I stepped back inside the house and made my way upstairs. Ellie followed without saying anything, but when I came back down the stairs she also had a pair of cowboy boots on over the leggings she was wearing.
“I’ll follow in the truck so she has her car.”
“It would serve her right to leave it out there. She’ll sober up and realize what an ass she made of herself.”
Then Ellie laid her hand on my arm. “Don’t be too harsh, okay? You guys were together for two years and if it wasn’t for me…”
“Ellie, this isn’t about you.” The truth was I had been procrastinating the whole time with Janet for this reason. I never saw her asthe one. I wasn’t so romantic that I thought magic was waiting out there somewhere for me, so yes, I had considered marrying her and building a life regardless. Except I never pulled the trigger, which I always suspected was my gut telling me to walk away.
“It is,” she insisted. “You don’t know what might have happened if I had gone to the foster home. You wouldn’t have had all this pressure on the relationship. It could have been different. Which is why I’m saying give her a break. She loved you.”
Did she? Did Janet love me? Or did she love the idea of being married to me?
We came out to the front porch and I shut the door behind me. Ellie would be following, so no point in locking up.
Except when Janet saw Ellie it only egged her on.
“Oh goodie! The wife. Hi Ellie! What’s it feel like knowing you stole my future? My life. My children’s lives!”
The closer I got to her I realized what rough shape she was in. Her face was blotched, her eyes swollen. Worse was the anger she wore all over her face. It transformed her from pretty to ugly.
“Not great,” Ellie answered her question. “Sorry.”
“Sorry! Now you’re sorry, you little shit. Why couldn’t you have just fucking gone away?”
“Enough Janet,” I barked. She wasn’t going to do this. She wasn’t going blame Ellie for us breaking up. As much as Ellie wanted to take the blame, I knew better.
She glared at me and turned her scowl in Ellie’s direction. “Tell me, little girl, is he teaching you how to give him blow jobs? Because apparently if you don’t do them right you’re not enough of a woman for him.”
“I said enough!” I shouted. I wasn’t much of a shouter, mostly because I didn’t lose my temper very often. But Janet was currently pushing me to the edge. The point being since I didn’t use that tone very often, when I did it was effective.
She shut up.
“Move over, Janet. I’m driving you home.”
Ellie was already making her way to the truck, which was parked under a portico near the side of the house.
Janet obeyed, thankfully, and as soon as I got in the driver seat I could smell how bad it reeked of tequila. She’d dropped the bottle between her feet and bent over her knees.
“Are you going to be sick? Because if you are I would appreciate you not doing that in the car.”
“No,” she mumbled.
I started the engine and pulled down the driveway, checking to see Ellie was behind me, although she knew where the Carter farm was. A horse farm not five miles outside of Riverbend. Janet had lived there all her life.
We were about ten minutes into the drive when she started sobbing. I had to force myself to ignore it.
“You were everything to me,” she cried.
“What’s my favorite thing?” I asked her before I could think better of it.
“What?”
