Beautiful Dream (2 page)

I look up and try to hide my small smirk, watching as he picks up his menu too. Suddenly, fear hits. There are a good number of people here. Crap, what if they see us?

Thankfully, I relax just as quickly as the fear set on, realizing that this is okay. He’s no longer my teacher. We can be in public now without it being frowned upon. Of course, I’m ignoring the other part of me - the one that’s currently squealing inside because,
holy shit, we’re finally out in public together
!

“Do you want to pick and share?” His low voice interrupts my inner monologue, and when I look his way, he actually
seems
nervous.

Good!

I lay my menu down, my mind a jumbled mess. “Why?” There’s an unmistakable attitude to my voice. “Don’t want the wife to know you had dinner company tonight?” I raise an eyebrow. “This isn’t one of our old lunches. Where we’d laugh and joke, and then you bend me over the island and fuck me.”

He’s acting too calm and comfortable, like he didn’t shatter me to pieces, like he doesn’t have a wife and kid at home, or maybe by now, kids. Plural!

Ugh!

His eyes widen over my brutal words, and he places the menu back on the table. “I promised I would be good,” he sighs, defeated.

“To me or to your wife?” I counter. “Plus, you
have
to be good, and
I
don’t
have
to be here,” my jarring words spill out. “In fact, I
shouldn’t
be here. I don’t even know why I am. Nothing’s changed.”

The hurt in his eyes is unmistakable, and I know it should make me happy to see him pained, just like I am, but it doesn’t.

“Are we ready to order?” The waitress asks, and I’m too busy gazing into his sad eyes that I didn’t even see her come over.

“No,” we both respond at the same time, and I watch her retreat out of the corner of my eye while Josh stares my way, silently.

“You have every right to hate me,” he pleads. “I’m thankful when you saw me yesterday you didn’t turn away, and I’m even more relieved you agreed to go on a date with me-”

“This isn’t a date,” I interrupt, shaking my head. “You should know that I’m sort of seeing someone.”

“You are?” His face falls. “Is… is it serious?”

“No,” I sigh at my natural instinct of wanting to immediately cheer him up, and I curse myself. I should have lied.

“Good,” he relaxes.

“You have no right,” I protest. “Not when-”

“I’m no longer married,” he interrupts, reaching into his suit pocket and throwing an envelope on the table. It slides my way quickly, nearly falling off. “The kid wasn’t mine,” he takes out a second envelope, also sliding it my way. It pushes the other, and they both fall onto my lap.

I shut my mouth, swallowing hard.

“He didn’t look anything like me,” he explains. “I knew it. I saw it in your face when you saw him. I saw it on everyone’s faces, and one day, after she continued to deny it, I saw the guy he looked like,” he laughs quietly. “I was relieved. How fucked up is that?” He’s not looking for an answer, which is good, because I’m too stunned to give one.

“When I told you I filed for divorce I really did. It’s all in there,” he nods at the envelopes. “I never stopped the process. I just didn’t continue it after I found out about her pregnancy. It was a mistake,” he continues. “The paperwork officially went through last January,” he swallows. “That other envelope is the paternity test.”

I pick up the envelopes and push them back his way.

“Don’t you even want to see?” His expression is a mix of shock and worry.

“When did you decide to divorce your wife?”

“The summer I told you,” he answers, his eyes pleading. “The summer before I met you.”

“But you stopped the process when you found out she was pregnant?” It’s half question, half statement.

“I never really stopped it,” he explains, and I give him a doubtful look. “I didn’t push it through. I was waiting until after the child was born. I was waiting until I saw how things settled. I was trying to do what was right for the kid!”

“But you went back to her!” I clench my teeth.

“
After
graduation and for a
very
brief time,” he clarifies. “And
nothing
happened.”

“Right,” I roll my eyes.

“It didn’t work out. It
never could
work out, even after the kid,” he sighs. “I was too into you.”

“I’m not the blame,” I spit.

“No,” he shakes his head. “You’re the reason.”

I don’t even try to understand what the fuck that’s supposed to mean.

“When did you find out the kid wasn’t yours?” I demand.

“September,” he answers, slowly and carefully.

“Of what year?” I match his tone.

“I saw you at graduation in June, and by September,” he whispers, knowing exactly what I’m implying, but I spell it out anyway.

“And you
waited all this time
?” I can’t help the tremble of my lips.

“You have to understand,” he pleads. “You were already in Italy. I knew what would happen! You would have come back,” he looks at me, confirming that yes, that’s exactly what I would’ve done, saving me years of heartache. “And after what I did to you how could I let that happen? How could I be
that
selfish? To have you throw away the rest of your life, after how I treated you?”

“How dare you decide that for me!” I slam my fist on the table before lowering my voice. “How
dare
you not even tell me?” I take a deep breath and run my fingers through my hair, desperately trying not to cry.

“When I heard about you getting into school last minute, and being able to go to Italy for the semester, I was so happy for you,” he leans forward. “And then when you returned, you went to Boston. It sounded like you had a life.”

“How do you even know what I’ve been up to?” I demand angrily.

He looks at me carefully before answering. “Gracie.”

“What?” My voice is a breathless whisper.

“I’d find her in the hall and ask about you,” he confesses. “She agreed to tell me things as long as I promised not to reach out. She said I don’t deserve you, that I hurt you too much.”

My jaw is practically on the floor.

That’s it! I’m going to kill my sister.

“It’s okay,” he shakes his head. “She’s right in that I don’t, and I only hope that one day you can forgive me,” he sighs. “Just know that I didn’t mean for things to play out the way they did.”

“Did you put her up to asking me to come into school yesterday?”

“No!” He jumps. “That was pure fate,” he sighs, his mouth turning up into a small smile. “Wonderful,
wonderful
chance.”

“So you’ve spent all this time fishing Gracie for information and
not
contacting me?” I clarify.

“Would you have even talked to me?” He points out, and I sit back in my chair to think.

Yes.

No.

Yes
.

“I dunno,” I shrug quietly.

“You always said that you were the one so obsessed with me, but you had it all wrong,” he implores. “It was me, who was always so consumed by you.”

I feel my eyes tearing, so full of hurt and anger, and yet still so full of need for things to just go back to the way they were. I look down at the ugly, stark white tablecloth. “And if we didn’t run into each other yesterday?”

“I was planning on calling you,” he admits. “I finally just got your number from Gracie only the other day.”

I give him a look. I am
so
going to murder her. Or thank her. Or thank her, and then kill her.

“I…” he hesitates. “I requested for her to be in my class this year. I guess we sort of became friends.”

I give him another look.

“Not like we were friends!” He shouts his clarification. “Gross, Luci, she’s your
little
sister
.”

“Well, what am I suppose to think?” I shake my head, knowing full well it’s not what I think at all. “You had a wife the whole time, yet still...”

“Luci,” he sighs. “I wasn’t lying when I told you I never touched Holly while you and I were together. Shit, I wasn’t even living with her! I was staying at my sister’s! Even after she told me about the pregnancy!”

“But you failed to mention the fact that you even had a wife
,
or that she was pregnant!” I point out.

“Can you stop referring to her as my wife?” He pleads. “And I only found out about the pregnancy
after
things got serious between us.”

I give him a look of disbelief. He still found out about it, yet continued with me anyway, leaving me blindsided.

“I know how bad it looked-”

“It didn’t look bad!” I practically shout. “It
was
bad!”

“It’s the worst, most self-serving thing I have ever done,” he agrees. “Believe me when I say I didn’t want to give you up.”

“But you did,” I spit. “You chose the path that didn’t involve me.” I stop talking, regretting my words immediately. Of course he’s going to choose his wife and kid over some fling with a high school girl. Still, it hurt being second best.

“I was trying to do what was right for everyone involved,” he places both hands on the table, and I look down, not meeting his eye.

I can’t continue this fight. I’m over it. I’ve moved on. I take a long, deep breath.

“You said we were friends,” I spit, “but you and I? We were never friends.”

“No,” he smiles sadly.

“You and Gracie had no right.”

“Don’t be mad at her,” he persuades. “It was
me
. All me.”

“No, I’m
upset and mad
at her,” I whisper. “But you?
I hate you
.”

“I know,” he admits, flinching at my words, and we both fall quiet.

“But the problem is,” he sighs, and when I look up his sad eyes are eclipsed with a devilish gleam. “I still have feeling for you.
Very
strong feelings.”

“How?” I exclaim, utterly shocked. “It’s not poss-”

“If I’ve learned anything,” he laughs quietly. “And I have, please believe that I have… It’s that from here on out, I’m going to be nothing but up front and honest with you.”

“But you can’t still have strong feelings for me!” I accuse. “Not after waiting all these years, and from here on out? This,” I point between us. “This is a one time thing-”

“You were just coming out of high school! What did you want me to do, Luci? Fly to Italy and beg you to come home? Can you see how selfish that would have been? Or did you want me to wait until that winter, when you moved to Boston? When would it have been right for me to beg you? And then what? You would leave everything
for me
- your entire life and future, after what I did
to you
? That’s not fair to you.”

I don’t answer, because yes to all of the above. That’s what I would have wanted. That’s what would’ve made me the happiest. I don’t care about a single place I’ve been. I could’ve done without it all if it meant him.

“It doesn’t matter now,” he sighs. “It’s over and done, but we’re here now, and I’ll spend every single day fixing this.”

I start to protest, but he stops me.

“And I’ll wait, Luci, because I know right now you don’t want to admit it, but I have no doubt that you still have feelings for me too… and more than just hate,” he adds, still so cocky. “Although I’m sure that’s there as well. But how can you not still feel something, after what we had?”

Before I even get the chance to reply, he raises his hand, calling the waitress over to take our orders.

“What’ll we have?” She asks, and he motions for me to go first.

“Wow,” I exclaim sarcastically. “Thanks
so much
for letting me make my own decision!” It’s a mean comeback, but I have to say something, since apparently he decided so much that
involved me
all on his own.

“I can come back,” the waitress hesitates.

“It’s okay,” I offer her a small smile. “I’ll have the ravioli, and he’ll have the chicken parm with angel hair instead of linguini.”

He’s staring my way as the waitress walks away, half mad, half smirking.

“Maybe I wanted the veal.” He’s biting his cheek, hiding his amusement.

“Maybe you need to learn you can’t make the decisions you did on behalf of someone else,” I swallow. “And maybe I’m a different person now. One you can’t possibly still have feelings for.”

“No, you’re still the Luci I know,” he insists.

I give him a look of disbelief, only to be met by his challenging smile.