was too scared to ruin our friendship. I knew he didn’t like me the same way. I knew how he thought of me, and it wasn’t romantically. And then one day, he had sex with my friend and I got so mad, it killed what I thought I felt. Literally, the next morning, I woke up and was just over it. I know now it wasn’t his fault. He hadn’t known how I felt, but anyway.”
Jonah was full-on frowning at that point, eyes totally thoughtful and narrowed. His whole body was tense.
And I started to regret being this honest. Maybe I should have just… skewed the truth a little. Oh well now.
“I graduated a year early because the Olympics were coming up and I wanted to try my best to be able to compete in them. I went straight on ahead with training; he stayed in school to finish like normal. That summer I came home for a weekend because I’d been at the big training facility they have in Colorado, and out of the blue, he told me he was leaving for Oregon. I talked to him on the phone every two or three days for months before that, and he never hinted that he was thinking about leaving. He never said a word. I felt so betrayed. I trusted him, and he kept that from me, you know? I didn’t keep anything from him. I wouldn’t have cared if he’d just said something, fucking anything, but it was like he kept it a secret on purpose to hurt me. Then a few weeks later, I slipped and broke my wrist the day of the opening ceremony.”
I had to roll my eyes as I thought about how much I had cried, thinking I was getting away with hiding my heartbreak even though apparently Peter and Grandpa Gus had known from the fucking beginning. I’d been so stupid. Of course they had known.
“He left, and he never reached out to me once he was gone. Not even a fucking picture message after he’d spent every other weekend at my house for just about fifteen years. He came back for Christmas break, and I made it a point not to see him even though he went by Maio House almost daily. Grandpa Gus and Peter were both on my team, I realize that now, and lied for me every time. And when that following summer rolled around, I saw him, but by then, I was going full steam ahead with competing, and I was taking a couple classes at the university, and he’d quit judo, and that felt like another kick to my fucking balls. And that next year, he called me twice in twelve months, can you believe that? Twice.
“And, I guess to wrap the next ten years up, I think he grew up a tiny bit and realized what he’d done and tried his best to be my friend again, but I was over it. It was the beginning of the end. Four years after telling me he was going to leave, he broke my fucking rib when I came home again from Colorado, like a dumbass, and even though I know it was my fault for putting myself in that position, I was still mad at him. I know I’m a hypocrite. Our friendship was never the same again. I tried to be there for him when I could, but it was totally different.
“And you know the rest. I went to France and came back pregnant. Grandpa, Peter, and I decided to keep it a secret for the first few months, and then one day, when I realized I wasn’t going to be able to hide it anymore, and I was scared as hell and sad and pretty fucking pissed off at you for ghosting me, I finally put on a tight shirt that showed off the whole grain loaf I was baking in the oven and everyone saw.
“An hour later, he showed up while I was in the office doing some accounting work, and just… tried to rip me a new one. How the hell could I be pregnant? How could I do something so stupid? Why wouldn’t I tell him who the dad was? Where the hell was the dad? Why would I do this to him? Blah, blah, blah, like he had any say in my life. I almost went to jail that day, Jonah. I was going to rip his nipples off and stuff