Break Your Heart (15 page)

He was quiet for a long moment. Then he got up and moved in front of the desk, a foot or so away from me. He leaned his backside against it. “Megan, you need to talk to your dad again.
Immediately
.” Tension threaded in his voice and drew my attention to his dark eyes. “If your mom comes back to work here, there’s a safety liability. Not to mention if the president gets wind of it . . .”

He didn’t have to finish the sentence. I knew what he was saying. The heavy weight in my chest grew heavier. My parents would get fired from the job.

Probably even sued over it. I couldn’t imagine it was legal for her to show up under the influence of drugs.

In which case, I’d have to leave the school. No Smythe-Davis graduate school education for me. There was no way I could continue going here when my mom had messed up so royally. My reputation would be damaged in the aftermath.

This whole time, I’d been worried about the relationship with Nick doing me in when it could be this shit with my mom that struck the death blow on my future at Smythe-Davis. Unreal.

I dropped the paper at my feet and rested my head in my hands. “This is so messed up.”

He went down on his knees and cupped my cheeks, tilting my face up. His gaze poured with empathy. “I’m so sorry this is happening to you, but thank you for trusting me with it. I’m going to stay quiet about this for now and give you a chance to handle it. But . . .” He cleared his throat and his eyes skittered away. “I can’t sit on it for long, Megan. I have an obligation as an employee of the school to ensure the safety of everyone on campus.”

I nodded miserably. The sensation of his thumbs stroking my cheeks couldn’t ease the burden in my heart.

Somehow I had to convince my dad to fire my mom from the one thing she loved most, other than her family—her work. It was the right thing to do, the only way to save the business, and maybe even save her. Because if things were this bad, she needed to go into an outpatient program or something.

But God, this might be the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. I knew she was going to be furious with me.

How
furious, I had no idea.

“T
his party needs more ice cream,” Amanda declared as she scraped the bottom of her ice-cream bowl. “Okay, not really, because I’m stupid full right now. In fact, I might never eat again.”

Kelly laughed and put her mostly empty bowl on the coffee table. She tucked her feet under her legs. “I’m glad to see you guys don’t skimp on the good stuff.”

“Only the best for our guests.” Casey was in a chair, a pillow over her stomach, the stereo’s remote control in hand. She got a mix loaded up with ambient music. “Give it to me straight, guys. What do you think of this song?”

We paused and listened for a couple of minutes. I nodded my head to the rhythm. Casey was so talented. I should try something artistic, as well. How long had it been since I’d pursued anything other than academics? Far too long.

“This is gorgeous,” Amanda breathed. She shifted in her seat and tilted her head. “Did you make this?”

Casey nodded, pride clear on her face. “I’ve been working on it for a couple of weeks now. Something wasn’t quite clicking, but it came together for me last night. So I stayed up late to finish it.”

The two of them continued talking about how she made music.

Kelly, who was on the end of the couch closest to my chair, leaned over. “So did you talk to Muramoto after class? About your midterm grade?”

I nodded. “While I can’t redo it, he did say my other homework scores were strong enough that this wouldn’t impact my overall grade too strongly. I just have to bust ass and do amazing on the final.”

This afternoon, I’d lingered in his office for a while after confessing about my mom. We’d worked in silence, me studying for tomorrow’s exam in algebraic number theory and him grading papers. Somehow he’d sensed I didn’t want to be alone and had graciously shared his space with me.

I wasn’t sure why I hadn’t thought of doing that before—us working together. For some reason, I’d been able to push aside my anxieties and finally focus on the books. Maybe it was his quiet, soothing presence. Or how he’d given me space to voice my concerns about my mother.

Whatever it was, it worked.

Kelly gave me a comforting smile. “Well, I’m glad. I know you were upset. It
was
a hard test, so don’t feel too bad. I’m pretty sure Dallas bombed it even worse than you did. He looked like he was going to cry when he left the room.”

“I’m sure that sucked.” I did feel a bit bad for the guy, even if I didn’t like him like that.

“So has he tried to ask you out again?” Kelly asked me.

“Has who?” Casey said, peering at our side of the living room with interest.

“That guy I went out with before Valentine’s Day,” I told her. “When I came home early.”

She shook her head. “Oh, the bad date, right? I’m assuming he’s not the guy you’re seeing right now, then.”

My heart froze and I stiffened. “What do you mean?” I hadn’t told a soul about seeing Nick. Had she guessed? Seen something?

Casey gave a laugh. “You’ve been MIA from our apartment for a few weeks now, and I can tell it’s not because you’re going to parties. Like I wouldn’t notice you weren’t around? It gets quiet when I’m here by myself. . . .”

Kelly’s brow quirked. “Whoa, dish it, girl. Who are you seeing? Have I met him? What’s he like? Does he go to our school?”

My brain scrabbled for the right approach to this. I should play it cool, act like it wasn’t a big deal. Obviously I wasn’t going to get far by pretending there wasn’t anyone. I just needed to downplay it all.

I waved my hand, affecting an air of nonchalance I hoped was convincing. “Just some guy I met at a party off campus. He’s a good way to kill time when I’m bored.” Oh, it hurt my heart to say that, but I didn’t have much of a choice.

Casey didn’t seem convinced. “Been bored a lot lately, huh?”

My cheeks burned. “He’s quite entertaining.”

“What’s his name?” Kelly asked.

“Brett,” I made up. “And no, he isn’t a student at our school or anything.” In that much I could at least be true.

Of course, my phone chose that moment to chime on the end table; I’d set it there since I didn’t have pockets in my yoga pants. I knew without a doubt in my mind it was Nick.

It was so hard to not snatch the phone up; my hand shook with the effort to make my movements smooth. If anyone saw his name on my phone, the gig was up. I should change his name in there tonight, just in case.

I tucked the phone under my thigh without looking at it.

“Aren’t you gonna see what Brett wrote you?” Kelly teased. “Do you have pictures of him? Can I see?”

My lungs squeezed. “No pics,” I forced out. “It’s not like that.”

Casey’s eyes lingered on mine for a long moment. Then she turned her attention to the stereo remote and clicked forward a couple of songs. “Okay, if Megan wants to talk about Brett, she will. What do you guys want to listen to? I have a massive music collection, so hit me with some requests.”

I shot her a grateful smile as the conversation turned away from me and on to our favorite bands. I cleared our empty ice-cream bowls and lingered in the kitchen to wash them. My stupid hands were trembling from the near brush of confrontation. The phone was pressed in the waistband of my pants, out of sight and on vibrate.

Why hadn’t I pieced together a cover story before now?

Because arrogantly, I’d assumed no one would care what I was doing. I didn’t hold myself accountable to others for the most part—I was an adult, and I did what I wanted. But I should have known Casey would notice.

She was a quiet person in general, though opening up more and more every day. She saw things others didn’t see. I needed to be more careful around her, or else I was going to slip up.

After I finished washing the bowls and spoons, I dried my hands and checked the text.

This guy had worked his way into my heart with devastating speed. I was so falling for him, and there was no way for me to stop it. And if I was being honest with myself, I didn’t want to stop it.

All the secrecy, all the anxiety, was worth every second of being close to him, even if it was chewing away at me more and more each day. Because I knew there was an end date in sight. I just had to hang in there until then.

I was thinking about you too,
I wrote back.

My phone buzzed a moment later.
Hopefully good things. ;-)

I laughed under my breath.
Don’t forget to wear your tweed jacket. You wanna make sure you fit in with the other uptight profs. . . .

A moment later, I got a pic back of Nick with a pipe clenched in his mouth.

Uh, because they’re awesome??
I wrote back. Not that I’d used one before, but they seemed distinguished anyway.

My heart softened. An echo of what Casey had said to me earlier about the empty apartment, but with a different connotation altogether.

I missed him too. I just saw him this afternoon, but I wanted to see him again. It was so tempting to show up at his place, but I didn’t want to be a creeper. Not to mention smothering him would only make him grow tired of me.

I typed,
Let’s do something fun this weekend. Maybe we can drive out of town for the day. Go to Pittsburgh? Columbus? Detroit? What do ya say?

I smiled, tucked the phone away and dried the dishes, my heart soaring as I listened to the girls talking and giggling in the living room.

 

“Order up!” the fry cook called out.

I shuffled over to the kitchen window and took the two plates, loaded with sandwiches and fries. When I put them on the table, the customers gave me a grateful smile. “Let me know if you guys need anything else,” I said. “Enjoy!”

They began to dig in with gusto. I stepped away and busied myself with straightening up around the shop for the next twenty minutes. Almost off my shift for the day—and it was Friday afternoon too, which meant I had a relaxing evening ahead with no homework on the horizon, nothing to make me feel stressed out.

And tomorrow, Nick and I were driving to Detroit for a day of exploring. I was so excited to have the opportunity to walk around with him, holding his hand, kissing him . . . not having to worry that we’d get busted by someone we know.

A chance to see what an open relationship would feel like with him.

When my shift was done, I tucked away my apron, gathered my purse and left. I dug into the pocket on the side and felt for my phone. Tugged it out, ready to send Nick a message saying hi.

I saw I had a voice mail.

From my mom.

My stomach clenched so tight, I thought I was going to throw up. There could be only one reason she’d called me. Yesterday I’d spent an hour on the phone with my dad, discussing at length what had happened with Mom. The research I’d done online about pill abuse and its slippery slope that often led to other drugs being abused.

When I’d dropped on him that he had to let her go from the job site, he’d sighed heavily and said he knew. He had an engineer friend he could approach and ask to take over. I could hear the pain in his voice, and I knew this had to be causing him no small amount of agony.

Apparently it had happened.

My hands shook so hard, it was difficult to navigate my way to the voice mail. The message was a terse “Call me, Megan. Immediately.” That was it.

I spent the whole walk home trying not to drown in anxiety. She sounded angry.

I waited until I got inside the apartment and in my room before I called her back. She picked up immediately.

“Seriously? I cannot believe you.” Mom started in on me without even saying hello. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d heard this much anger pouring from her voice. It nearly singed me through the phone line. “How dare you go behind my back with your father like this. You are a child—”

“Excuse me?” I interrupted. Anger made my hands tremble now, not fear. “Last time I checked, I was an adult. Not a child. And I’m free to do whatever I think is right. How dare
you
show up to work drugged out of your mind! Do you even realize how wrong that is, how you could have endangered yourself, other contractors, even students? Yet you’re blasting me about your mistakes? What if you’d been caught? What if you’d caused someone to get hurt? Did you ever think about that?” The words rushed out of me, fast and loud.

“You have no idea what’s going on,” she shot back. “You made a snap decision without taking the time to evaluate what the consequences were.”

“So fill me in. Why did you have a bunch of hidden pills around your house, Mom? Why are you taking medication that isn’t in your own name? I’d really like answers.” My voice wobbled with emotion.

“Do you realize I’ve been fired? By your father—who’s
my own husband?
And he replaced me with some idiot who doesn’t know anything about this project. I’ve put countless hours into the plans, only to have it yanked away without even a discussion. Total bullshit.” The fact that she was busting out curse words meant she was good and worked up. “Instead of talking to me about it, you colluded with him, and you’ve caused serious damage, both to my career and to my marriage. I hope you’re proud of yourself.”

That last comment stung. I blinked back a rush of tears. “Actually? I am. Because I see a woman who needs help and won’t admit it. And at least I did something about it.”

There was silence for so long, I thought maybe she’d hung up or put the phone down and walked away.

“Mom,” I continued in a quieter tone. It was hard to keep my voice even when I was feeling so ragey, so upset. “You’re stronger than this. I don’t understand it at all.”

“I don’t have a problem. You have no idea what you’re talking about. And I don’t have to justify my actions to you or anyone.” She sounded mulish as she spoke.

I sighed. What could I say in response? She was determined to shut down everything I said. “I just need you to listen to me, to talk to me. Without getting defensive. Please.” I pressed the heel of my other hand to my brow, where a headache was starting to form.

The coldness in her voice chilled me. “You crossed a line, Megan. I’m furious with you. I can’t believe you’d betray me like this. I don’t know if I can ever forgive you for what you’ve done to me.”

The line clicked, and the call ended.