The Secret of You and Me - Melissa Lenhardt Page 0,103
me against him. What’s next? You leaving us for that dyke?”
“I’m not leaving you, Logan. I will never leave you.”
“No, you’ll pretend we’re a happy family for all these years. So much for only lying about your drinking. You lied about why you were at Nora’s, didn’t you?”
I nodded. “I’m telling you everything now, so I don’t have to lie anymore.”
“Dad’s right. You’re manipulative.”
I held myself upright and immovable, afraid if I moved I would shatter into a thousand pieces. “When did your dad say that?”
Logan squirmed, realizing she’d told me something she wasn’t supposed to.
“Logan?”
“He says it all the time.”
I gritted my teeth to keep from screaming. I’d long suspected Charlie undermined me with Logan, now I knew it for sure. That fucker. Any qualms about what I was doing vanished.
“Why should I listen to anything you say?”
“Because I’m risking the most important relationship in my life by coming out to you. Because if you’re going to hate me, you need to hate me for all of it, not just for the end.”
Logan looked toward the door, then over her shoulder at the bartender, who’d stopped talking to the two bikers and was watching us with mild interest. Willie and Waylon sang about Pancho and Lefty. Reluctantly, Logan sat down.
The story poured out of me like whiskey from a new bottle, in fits and starts at first, before finding its rhythm and sliding into an ice-filled glass.
When I stopped, Logan stared into the distance with an unreadable expression. The bartender brought two fresh Cokes and a basket of boiled peanuts. He nodded to me in understanding, glanced at my stunned daughter and walked off. I was reasonably sure the music had drowned out my story from the men at the bar, but I suppose he’d seen enough in his time to know a confession when he saw one.
Logan wouldn’t look at me.
“Say something.” My stomach was in turmoil. “Do you hate me?” I said my voice barely above a whisper.
Logan sighed. “Yeah. Maybe a little.”
A sob burst from me. Every one of my deepest fears was coming true.
“Did you think I would say, ‘Yay! My mom is gay! My whole family is a lie! Let’s get some pancakes’?”
“Your family is not a lie. My sexuality doesn’t change the fact that your father and I love you. Loving you, not wanting to fail you, is the only thing keeping me from taking that bartender up on his Jack and beer back offer. All I want to do is to get drunk and forget this conversation ever happened.”
“Fine. Let’s go eat pancakes. Anything to get out of this shithole, and you away from the booze.”
* * *
Only a few tables were occupied when a waitress led us to a booth in the main room of the Magnolia Cafe.
“Coffee,” I said, as we sat.
The waitress looked at me full-on. Her brows furrowed slightly, no doubt at my red eyes, but being the professional she was, she ignored it.
“Same,” Logan said. “Black.”
“Coffee?”
“I feel like I’ve crossed over from childhood in the last hour. Might as well start obtaining the vices of an adult.”
“Keep it to coffee, and you’ll be good.”
“I will.”
My alcoholism, my lies, my many failures, my secrets hung in the air between us.
The waitress brought us the coffee. “Ready to order?”
“Gingerbread pancakes and crisp bacon,” Logan said.
“Same.”
“Short stack?”
“Nope,” Logan said. “We’re living it up.”
“You got it.”
Logan drank her coffee and grimaced. I chuckled. “Want some cream?”
“No. I’m good.” Her voice was strangled. “That’s terrible.”
“By the time we leave here, you’ll be used to it.” I drank my coffee, set the thick ceramic mug down and twisted it around on the table. “So. Ask.”
“Ask what?”
“Don’t you have a million questions?”
“I probably will later, but right now, I have two.”
“Okay.”
“Did you only tell me because you were afraid Dad would?”
“No. I decided Saturday that I couldn’t live a lie anymore, but I, um, couldn’t work up the courage to tell you, or your Dad, that night. I should have.” I reached across the table and grasped her hand. “I know you have no reason to trust me, but I swear I’ll never lie to you again.”
She raised her eyebrows, and I knew she was going to ask a question to test the theory. “Would you have married Dad if I hadn’t come along?”
“Probably not. I don’t think Charlie had any idea of marrying me either. We found comfort in each other, and when you came along, we named it love.”