“But mine were worse.”
“Yeah, they were.”
She chuckled at my easy agreement before her expression turned serious. “I’m sorry that I just showed up at Bentley and Maisy’s wedding like that. It wasn’t fair to you.”
“Yeah, a head’s up would have been nice.” I grinned.
She smiled back. “If you had a head’s up, you wouldn’t have gone.”
“True.”
Her smile dropped a little and she scooted her chair closer to me. “Beau, I miss you.”
“Rachel,” I pulled my hand away, not wanting her to get the wrong idea.
“I’m not…I don’t mean I miss you romantically. I mean, I miss you. My friend. My best friend. We grew up together. We talked every day for over ten years. I know that we’re never going to get back together, but I hope, that someday, you can find it in your heart to forgive me and we can be friends again.”
“I do forgive you, Rachel.” It had taken a long time, but I actually did. I didn’t say anything about our friendship, mainly because I didn’t see it happening.
She nodded as she stood up and I could see that she was about to start crying. When she opened the door, she paused before walking through it and turned back with emotion brimming in her lids. “Thank you for hearing me out, for talking to me, and for being so understanding. For what it’s worth, I am so, so sorry. I would do anything to go back and change what I did. I would change so much. But I can’t, and I’ll live with that, with what I lost, for the rest of my life.”
As she left, I realized that I wouldn’t change anything. Because the truth was, Rachel and I didn’t belong together. I’d tried to make that relationship into something it wasn’t. I’d grown up with this romantic fantasy of meeting my true love at a young age and growing old together and when it turned out not to be the case with Rachel, I’d done everything I could to force it into being that.
I didn’t miss the irony that I was doing the exact opposite with Sasha. All week I’d been trying to talk myself out of what I felt for her. I’d tried to downplay it and discount what we had because it didn’t fit into what I thought a relationship should be.
Maybe it was time I stopped trying to predetermine what things were, be honest about what I was feeling, and see where it went. I just wished I’d had this epiphany before her ex had shown up.
Chapter 29
Sasha
“The hardest decisions are the ones you have to make when all your choices are as rotten as expired milk.”
~ Barbara-Jean Nelson
“Sasha!” Drake called out as he caught up to me.
I walked faster, not wanting anyone to capture our interaction on film. I didn’t trust myself not to say something that I didn’t want to end up on social media and gossip sites.
“Sasha wait!” He reached out to grab my arm but I pulled it away as I walked up my grandma’s driveway.
“Why are you being so cold? I love you, I want to make this work!” Drake called out loud enough that anyone in the general area could hear him.
Infuriation bubbled up in me. All week, he’d been going on shows playing the victim. And that was clearly the narrative he was trying to perpetuate in this little stunt he was pulling.
The temptation was strong to turn around and sock him in his face, but I didn’t take the bait and remained silent until we got into the house. After he walked in, I shut the door behind us and turned toward him. His thick dark hair was styled, every strand in its messy place. His five o’clock shadow was just long enough to appear not to be groomed, but if you looked closely you could see evidence that it had been shaped. He was wearing his gray sweats that had been featured in US Weekly Soap Star Sweat Season and his Notre Dame ice blue T-shirt that perfectly matched his eyes. It was the same look he had when he went to Starbucks and had “accidental” paparazzi sightings. He called it casually disheveled chic. He’d shown up here expecting to be photographed.
“I seriously can’t believe you.” I shook my head in disgust.
“Me? What about you?”
“What about me? You cheated on me.”
“I don’t know what you think you saw—” He started to walk toward me, but I lifted my hand.
“Are you seriously going