Picking up the Pieces (5 page)

CHAPTER 8

LUKE

Watching Emmy walk away from me was one of the worst nights of my life. Staring back into her beautiful gray eyes, watching the tears well up in them, was like dying a thousand times. The one person in my life that I never wanted to hurt was the one that I kept hurting over and over again. She was still the most beautiful girl I’d ever laid my eyes on. Those eyes could always look directly through me, seeing everything I never wanted her to see. Her hair was still the perfect chocolate brown, not marred by highlights or any type of coloring that women seem to love so much.

Everything about her was pure. I always thought she was naturally beautiful when we were growing up, and she’d only gotten better with age. I hated putting that sorrow in her eyes and I didn’t have a clue how to remove it. Everything I said or did was wrong.

I’d spent the past few days beating myself up and getting nowhere. I had been back home for two and a half weeks and had managed to put off the one thing I dreaded doing. Today there was no excuse. I wasn’t working. I had no errands to run, and I needed to give Emmy a few more days before I attempted to talk to her again. My decision was made; I was going to see my mom. I hadn’t seen her since moving back, and although we emailed, it was always sporadic. It was time I saw her face-to-face.

I didn’t bother knocking, knowing that the door wouldn’t be locked. Most of the time she was too drunk to even remember where she put her keys. I opened the door and called out for her. “Ma. You here?”

“In the living room,” she called in that raspy smoker voice. Making my way into the living room, I noticed that nothing had changed in the eight years I’d been away. The entryway wall was still covered with my school pictures from elementary all the way through high school. The walls, originally white, were now a gross shade of beige from years of cigarette smoke. I rounded the corner and spotted my mother, sitting on the end of the couch in her bathrobe, cigarette in one hand and a glass in the other. I knew her well enough to know that what was disguised as iced tea was actually one part tea, three parts Jack.

The woman sitting in front of me looked so much older than her forty-six years. The alcohol and smoking had aged her by at least a decade. I remember seeing pictures of my mother as a young woman before my father had broken her spirit. She’d been so beautiful once. I got my green eyes and black hair from her. We had the same facial features as well, but it wasn’t the outward things that concerned me. Everything I was on the inside, I’d gotten from my dad. That was one of the main reasons I pushed Emmy away like I did. I knew there was a large part of him in me and I couldn’t stand to think of her broken like my mother. If she hadn’t gotten pregnant with me at eighteen, she never would have been stuck with that miserable bastard. She would probably be happy and healthy. I didn’t want that for Emmy.

“There’s my boy.” My mom stood from the couch and walked over to me, wrapping me in a tight hug.

“How you doin’, Ma?” I pulled her small frame into mine and squeezed.

“I’m good now that my son’s home safe.” She looked up at me with such a genuine smile, I could see some of the beauty from her past. “I’m so glad you finally had a chance to stop by. I know how busy you’ve been.”

Mom was what you would consider a functioning alcoholic. She’s been drinking for so long that, other than some slight slurring and her glassy eyes, you really couldn’t tell she was drunk. “I’m sorry I haven’t come by sooner.”

“Oh, no need to apologize. Come, sit and stay for a while.” She led me over to the couch that had been in this house for as long as I could remember. It was not holding up well. Cigarette burns marred the floral pattern in several places, and it sunk down in the middle where the springs became worn with time.

Maybe I should buy her a new couch
.

“If I’d known you were coming, I would have tried to get to the grocery store to pick up something for dinner.”

“No, it’s okay, Ma. I’m not going to be able to stay that long anyway.”

Her faced dropped, and I instantly felt horrible. I knew she’d want to make my coming over a big deal, so I’d intentionally stopped by without advance warning. It’s not that I was opposed to her making me a home-cooked meal because I wasn’t. Being drunk all day every day never diminished my mother’s skills in the kitchen. She still cooked some of the best comfort food I’d ever tasted. I just couldn’t stay in this house much longer. The memories of the past weighed too heavily, and I could feel them sucking the life right out of me.

“How about you let me take you out to dinner, Ma? It can even be some fancy place where you get all fancied up and I have to wear a jacket.” I really did want to spend time with her, just not in this house. I knew she wouldn’t take me up on my offer though. Considering the whole town knew our dirty little secrets, Mom wasn’t all that comfortable going out in public.

“Oh sweetie, I’d love to, but I’m feeling a little under the weather right now.” I knew what under the weather meant for my mother. Some things really hadn’t changed much in the eight years I’d been gone.

I spent a little while longer with Mom before making the excuse that I had errands to run. I hated how strained things were between us, but I wasn’t sure if the damage could be undone. Too many years and too many bad memories to wade through to get to the other side. Of course, I loved her; she was my mother. But I wasn’t above admitting I held on to a massive amount of resentment toward her for allowing that angry bastard to make our lives miserable for so long. Hell, the fucker had been gone longer than I could remember, and she was still letting him ruin her life.

For the millionth time, I started thinking that maybe it was a mistake to move back after so long. There was only so much damage one person could inflict before people couldn’t forgive it any longer. Was I at that point?

The last thing I really wanted to do was go back to that empty apartment…
alone
. Eight years ago, I’d left behind everyone I ever cared about. Now I was back, living in the exact same town and seeing those people every day, and I’d never felt more alone in my life. Deciding to kill as much time as possible before dragging my ass back to my place and into bed, I stopped off at the store to do some much needed grocery shopping.

I guess subconsciously, I figured I’d be eating most of my meals at Virgie May’s. Since that clearly wasn’t going to happen, I needed to buy food. I hated shopping… of any kind. As if being in this store wasn’t bad enough, when I turned down the next aisle, I ran smack into my own personal judge, jury and executioner.

“Well good evening, Deputy Dickweed.”

“Savannah,” I responded curtly. “Just how many more clever little nicknames you got stored up in that arsenal of yours?”

She scrunched her nose like she was thinking and tapped her chin. “Considering there’s a shit-ton of curse words that start with “d” I think we got a while.”

“Brilliant.”

I tried to push my cart around her, but she side stepped back in front of me. “You shouldn’t have come back, you know.” She was really starting to piss me off. I prided myself on how I spoke to women, but damn if this chick wasn’t pushing all the wrong buttons.

“That’s not really your fucking call, now is it?”

She shoved my cart, causing the handle to ram into my stomach. “Why don’t you just head back to wherever the fuck it is you’ve been. No one wants you here, Luke. Or are you just too stupid to figure that out.”

That was it. She’d hit the wrong damn button. Stepping around the cart, I made my way to her, not close enough to actually scare her, just enough to intimidate. “What the hell is your problem, woman? You PMSin’ or is this just your normal level of bitch?”

“You’re my problem, asshole,” she hissed as she jabbed her finger into my chest. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a bruise tomorrow.

“Jesus Christ! I get that I fucked up, Savannah, but it was eight years ago! How much longer you gonna make me pay for the sins of my past, huh?”

Something flashed across her face. It was there and gone before I could figure out what it was I saw. Taking a step back, she looked at me like I was the most disgusting thing on earth. “What you did was so much more than a simple fuck up,” she whispered with so much hatred I could almost
feel
it. “But you’re too self-absorbed to even care, aren’t you? She’s lived in hell, Luke… absolute hell. She finally gets to a point where she can feel happy again, and you breeze back on in and fuck it all up. You can’t do that to her again. You need to leave... for Emmy’s sake.”

Before my brain could even form a response, she was gone, leaving me reeling. I knew that seeing me with Allison all those years ago was going to hurt Emmy, but I never thought it would be to such an extent. I didn’t take our night together lightly, at all. I knew she gave me a gift when she asked me to be her first. But how long could a woman—or a town for that matter—hold on to that much hatred?

CHAPTER 9

EMERSON

“Okay, woman, you better start spilling right now.” Savannah and I were laying out in my backyard working on our tans. And by working on our tans, I mean lying out on my back deck in shorts and tank tops drinking from the pitcher of margaritas I’d just blended.

Priorities.

“I know not of what you speak,” she replied,
sucking down more of her drink.

“Like hell, bitch. What happened to you after Jeremy dragged you away the other night?” It had been a few days since my latest disaster with Luke, and this was the first time I’d been able to nail Savannah down long enough to get the scoop.

“What makes you think something happened?” She started gnawing on her bottom lip again, so I knew there was a story there. She was just going to make me drag it out of her.

“Uh… because I know you.”

She took another healthy gulp before spitting out “Ibroughthimhomeandwehadsex.” The sentence fell out of her mouth so fast, I could have sworn I misunderstood. I
prayed
I misunderstood.

“Say what now?” I asked in shock.

“Oh shut up! You heard me, don’t act like you didn’t.”

“Savannah! What the hell!” Like shit wasn’t already bad enough in this little town. Now Cloverleaf was at risk of being hit by the tornado I’d so lovingly nicknamed “Jervannah”.

“What? Why do you automatically assume this is a bad thing? What if we got back together or something?”

I twisted in her direction and started ticking the reasons off on my fingers. “First, I know you two didn’t get back together, because when I saw him today, he didn’t have a perma-grin. Secondly, you didn’t call me from the bathroom
right
after it happened to tell me all about it, in sweaty, gory detail. Third—”

“Okay, okay,” she interrupted. “I get your point, ass face. We didn’t get back together.”

I dropped my head into my hands. “Ohhh, this is going to be so bad.”

“Why does it have to be bad? Why can’t things just go back to normal?” I knew she knew better than to think that. She was grasping at straws.

“Because you know him, Savannah!” I yelled. “You know exactly how he’s going to get. He’s going to hold on to this for a few days, thinking he’s got a chance at getting you back, and when he realizes that’s not going to happen, he’s going to grow a vagina and go all chick on you. There’ll be silent treatment, then public blow ups and potential physical fighting once you get pissed off to the point of punching the shit out of him!” I wanted those two back together almost as much as Jeremy did, but not this way. Savannah wasn’t ready and this wasn’t going to destroy him. I couldn’t stand the idea of Savannah doing something that couldn’t be undone.

“Well, what the hell did you expect me to do? Did you
see
him the other night? He’s never talked to me like that before. Hand to God, Emmy. I about had an orgasm when he went all alpha like that.” It was another classic example of Savannah acting without thinking about the repercussions.

“Ugh. You’re sick, you know that? You’ve got serious problems.”

“
Admit it!
!” she screeched.

“Fine!” I admitted in defeat. I threw myself back down on my lounge chair and crossed my arms over my chest indignantly. “It might have been just a
little
sexy seeing him go all he-man on your ass.”

“Thank you!”

“Savannah,” I started, getting very serious. This wasn’t a joking matter. “You’re going to break that man. You know
how he feels about you. Keeping him on a string like this is just cruel. You can’t keep giving him false hope, sweetie.”

“I’m not stringing him along,” she demanded.

“You are…”

Before I could finish my sentence, she was on her feet and sliding into her flip flops. “Why don’t you just stay out of my shit and take care of your own, Emmy! This is none of your business.”

I jumped up and followed after her as she headed to the gate leading to my driveway. I couldn’t let her leave mad. “Wait a minute. I didn’t mean to upset you, Van. I’m just worried.”

“I don’t need you worrying about me, Emmy. I’m a grown-ass woman and I’m more than capable of taking care of myself. You’re not my mother.”

She was at her car with her keys in her hand. I was thoroughly confused at the turn of events. I had no clue what I said that set her off. “I’m not trying to mother you. You’re my family. I care what happens to you.”

That took some of the wind out of her sails. Her shoulders visibly relaxed and she took a deep breath. “Look, I’m just in a shitty mood right now, okay. I must be premenstrual or something. I’m sorry I took it out on you.”

I went to her and wrapped my arms around her, pulling her into a hug. “Hey, it’s all good. Just don’t be mad at me, okay? I hate it when you’re mad at me.”

She hugged me back tightly. “I’m not mad. I’m just gonna go home. I’m not really in a margarita kind of mood anymore.” I knew she wasn’t okay, but I also knew if I pushed her any further, this thing would go from bad to worse. So I just let her go. Standing in my driveway, I watched her taillights disappear around the corner wondering to myself just what the hell was going on with the people in my life.

The next morning I was standing at the counter at Virgie May’s, stocking the pastry cabinet when I felt a pair of arms come around my waist and a body bang into my back. “I’m sorry about yesterday,” Savannah spoke into my back, squeezing tightly. This was just one of the many reasons why I loved her so much. We both hated it when our relationship was strained in any way. We loved each other so much that I wasn’t surprised she was hugging me and apologizing less than twenty four hours later.

“I was a bitch and I hate fighting with you,” she continued.

I reached behind me and wrapped my arms around her as best I could and squeezed her back. “We aren’t fighting. It was just a little disagreement. And if you keep calling my best friend a bitch, I’ll kick your ass.”

We released each other, and I turned to face her. “We cool?” she asked.

“We’re always cool. And I promise I won’t give you anymore shit about Jeremy.” What happened between them still bothered me, but I was willing to put blinders on if it made Savannah happy. She’d done so much for me in my life already. It was the least I could do in return.

“Love you.”

“Love you, too. Now enough of this Hallmark bullshit. I’m short a waiter so you’re up.”

She reached under the counter and grabbed an apron as she grumbled, “Sonofabitch. I knew I should’ve waited for you to close up before apologizing.”