Sidelined (12 page)

Exhaustion crept over me on the drive home, and beside me, Jude tried to stifle his own yawns. I couldn’t wait to get into the house, order a takeout, and snuggle with my man.

Apparently, someone had other plans for me.

As we pulled into our driveway, I spotted Kayla standing by the front door, arms folded, head down.  Her bike leaned against the wall beside her.

“Were you expecting Kayla?” Jude asked, as he stopped the car.

“No. Jesse said they were spending the afternoon cooking and then taking some food over to Freya’s.”

Kayla lifted her head and right away a chill ran through me. That wasn’t the face of the girl I’d spent a morning modelling with. Her cheeks were tear-stained and her eyes were dark.

“That is one pissed off teenager.”

I’d never seen Kayla so mad before and nerves took hold of me. I couldn’t even begin to guess what had made her so angry, especially on a non-school day she’d spent with her brother.

Jude and I got out of the car, and Kayla straightened.

“Hey honey, what’s up?”

Kayla pulled an envelope out of her pocket and held it up in the air without explanation. Didn’t need to explain. I was close enough to realise the handwriting belonged to Taylor.

That girl really loved to write.

“What does it say?” I asked, letting out a weary sigh. I’d read enough of Taylor’s ramblings to last a lifetime.

Kayla eyed Jude like she wished he’d disappear. Instead of being offended he gave her a small grin. “Come on in. I’ll make you both a drink then get out of your way.”

True to his word, Jude made hot chocolate for us before leaving us alone. We sat at the kitchen table, holding our mugs and watching the steam rise in swirls. I didn’t want to ask about Taylor’s letter. I wanted to fling it out to sea like I did with her journal. Whatever was inside had caused Kayla to rush to my house and hurt her enough to make her cry.

“What happened today, Kayla?”

She slid the envelope across the table. “I found this in the mailbox. Taylor must have mailed it yesterday, before-” Kayla paused. “Before.”

“You really want me to read this, huh?”

“Yeah. I need to know if the things she said are true, and then I have one more thing to ask. But read first.”

If Kayla was a little older and I thought she’d understand, I’d have refused, and explained all the reasons why I didn’t want to hear anything else from Taylor. Her green eyes, wide with desperation, wouldn’t let me back away. I loved her too much to ignore something that obviously meant so much to her.

I opened the envelope and pulled out the letter, holding my breath, braced to read more unflattering words about me.

My eyes scanned over the writing, chest tightening with every word. Everything I’d told her in confidence about my past had been laid out on the page but with some major Taylor-style embellishments, including how I’d stolen money from my foster families, lived on the streets
as a
hooker
, and how I met Jude while trying to steal his car,
but
he felt sorry for me so he took me in instead of handing me over to the cops. She conveniently left out the part where two guys tried to rape me.

And then the final blow.

Bree is a nice person but I don’t think she’s getting to know you for the right reasons. She told me she’s in love with your brother and she’s trying to get close to you so she can get closer to him.

Oh, Taylor was smart. All the time I’d worried she would expose my secrets to the wives of Jude’s teammates but where would the fun be in that? Most of them had made up their minds anyway. A letter to those people wouldn’t have changed anything. But telling Jesse I loved him and trying to make me sound like a psycho to Kayla? That was the kind of damage I should have been afraid of. She’d attacked me right in the places it would hurt most, targeting the people I’d grown closest to. The people Taylor knew I’d relied on over the last few weeks.

Ha. Her journal entry said she’d always liked me. What a joke. She didn’t treat me any better than she treated the people she hated. She wanted to take from me the way she’d tried to take from Radleigh.

She’s gone now. It’s over.

Except it wasn’t. I still had to clear up the mess she left me with.

“Bree, is everything in the letter true?”

I placed the letter down on the table and slowly slid it back towards her. “What do you think?”

Kayla’s gaze shifted from the piece of paper to me as if she hadn’t expected a question. “I remember you said you moved around a lot when you were younger. I didn’t ask why because it’s none of my business.” She shrugged. “I don’t believe you were a hooker. You told me you were a virgin when you got married and I don’t think you lied about that.”

“I’ve never lied about anything. If you want to know the whole truth about my past, I’ll tell you. There are so few people I’ve trusted with it. The list is real short. Mostly, nobody asks because where I came from. I don’t think it matters as much as where I am now.”

“Yeah? Well, I wouldn’t have believed any of it if I hadn’t seen you trying to kiss Jesse yesterday.”

She spat the words at me and every one of them hit me hard in my chest because that was all me. The only part of this I couldn’t blame on Taylor and knowing Kayla saw only strengthened Taylor’s bitchy claims.

I ran my hand through my hair, leaning my forehead down on the table. “I’m sorry you saw.”

“Me too.”

“Did you tell Jesse? Does he know about the letter?”

“He doesn’t know. And I didn’t talk to him about you trying to kiss him. I… I was surprised. You ran out so fast. I thought you were embarrassed or something. I was scared if I made a big deal out of it you wouldn’t come over anymore. But then I got Taylor’s letter.”

I raised my head to be met with the same angry gaze. Still there, completely unfaltering. I paused to remind myself she was a kid because her stare totally intimidated me.

“You honestly think that’s who I am? That I’d use you the way she used Jesse?”

“I didn’t think you would, but Taylor sure went to a lot of trouble to tell me everything bad you ever did.”

“And some stuff I never did. God, I can’t believe her.”

I can’t believe she’s dead.
I know I should have regretted slapping her but I couldn’t. Even as the thought crossed my mind, it hurt my heart to feel that way. But if her journal taught me anything, it was that she had nothing better to do with her time than make other people miserable. I’d wanted to find a glimpse of a good person within those pages to prove I hadn’t been completely fooled by her. To prove the decent person I’d seen within her was real, not a role she played to get her way. The good person just didn’t exist.

“Which parts are true?” Kayla asked, halting my thoughts.

“I can tell you but first you have to answer something for me. Deal?”

She gave a single nod of her head, and I let out a sigh. Tired, weary, hurt.

“Does anything I did before matter to you? Does it matter as much as why you really came here? To find out if I was using you?”

Nothing changed in Kayla’s expression or posture as if she hadn’t even heard me. She didn’t speak for something like a trillion years. To distract myself, I twirled my wedding ring around on my finger. Of everything I owned, my wedding ring was my most treasured thing. A symbol that someone wanted me around forever and I wanted them right back. Forever. Not until I had a total freak out and attempted to jump on another guy. My wedding vows weren’t just words I got through so I could call Jude my husband, and my ring wasn’t just a pretty accessory that came with the marriage. It all meant something to me. Knowing I’d been so close to throwing it all away scared me more than anything else that had ever happened to me. It was my fault. Taylor hurried the process along but I gave her everything she needed to take me down.

And that’s why Jude wanted you to be sure about the make-up course.
Obviously, learning a new skill was never going to ruin my life but I did act too fast sometimes. Fast enough to land myself in trouble.

“I don’t care about what you did before,” Kayla said eventually. “I can’t imagine you ever doing anything bad. You’re too nice. If you did bad things, maybe you did them because you had to, like when homeless people steal food because they’re hungry.”

I didn’t mean to giggle but the way she rambled sounded a lot like me when I tried to puzzle something out.

“I never stole a thing. I did meet Jude when some scary people were trying to make me steal his car but I couldn’t and they attacked me. Jude pretty much saved my life. At the very least, he saved me from getting really, really hurt.”

“What about Jesse? I mean, are you in love with him?”

“No. I’m not. I don’t wanna talk down to you like you won’t understand but it is sort of complicated. Things have been weird between Jude and me, and Jesse took care of me. I did a stupid thing last night, but your brother is pretty awesome and he didn’t let me see it through.”

“What about me? Were you being nice to me because of him?”

Her eyes glistened and I shuffled my chair closer to hers so I could hold her hands.

“Kayla, I fell in love with you way before I thought I had feelings for Jesse. You know that, I know you do. Remember when he was in London, and Freya and I took you ice skating? You were spinning around and doing fancy tricks, and I kept falling down! I thought you were pretty cool back then.”

Kayla’s face broke into a small grin. “You were terrible. And then Will came and tried to sneak up on Freya, and they both fell down because he scared her.”

I’d actually forgotten. I’d seen Freya and Will fall down in a drunken heap several times, but never on ice. I’d never seen them laugh so hard either. The memory made me giggle and I made a note to remind them of it next time I saw them.

Remind Freya. I can only remind Freya.

The ache of losing Will set in again, but I forced it down as Kayla squeezed my hand.

“I liked Will a lot.”

“Everyone did. He was a good guy.”

“I’m sorry, Bree. I’m sorry I let Taylor’s letter ruin everything.”

“It’s okay, sweetheart. Thank you for coming to talk to me instead of believing all the crap she wrote.”

“Thanks for not calling me a brat and telling me to go away.”

I love this kid so much.
“You’re not a brat.” I let go of her hands, stood, and leaned down to hug her tightly.

Kayla circled her arms around me too and for a moment, everything felt right in my world, even though lots of things were still really wrong. Taking care of Kayla gave me a mini escape from the grief and tiredness. But it was a school night and she couldn’t stay. Plus, I had to face up to reality sometime.

When Kayla left, I trudged into the living room, where Jude sat on the edge of the sofa, bolt upright and staring into space.

“Hey you.”

Jude slowly turned his head at the sound of my voice. Instead of the smile I’d expected, the corners of his mouth were turned down slightly, his brows lowered. “So, when were you planning to tell me you kissed Jesse?”

Chapter
12 – Stupid, Selfish, Not Worth It

For the whole time I’d known Jude I’d never once seen his eyes blaze with so much hurt. I felt it wrapping around me, creating a coldness that rippled down my spine and nestled inside my stomach. I wrapped my arms around myself. For the first time ever I had no idea what to say.

“You kissed Jesse.”

The part of my brain that usually rattled out words at a scary speed had frozen. I had to tell him what happened but I couldn’t form words. Couldn’t even make them form inside my head. All day my emotions and thoughts had bashed against each other. Now, when I needed them, they’d all dried up.

“I’d have thought Kayla would be happy about it. You’ve spent so much time at their place you’re already like one of the family.”

The word “family” slammed into me and knocked me breathless. Whether Jude realised or not, my issues with family were a big part of the things I’d done. He had every right to be upset with me but the reminder of why I’d gotten swept up in Jesse’s world stung.

“You were listening?”

“I walked by the kitchen and heard.”

“I didn’t kiss Jesse.” I took a few steps towards Jude, standing in front of him then kneeling on the floor so we were at the same level. “I made a big mistake. I tried to kiss him yesterday, he backed away, and that’s all. Once I got out of his house, I realised I’d been an idiot.”

Jude stared at me, pain still etched in every part of his face, from the frown on his lips to the small lines around his eyes. Like I’d carved them there with my selfish, messed up actions. The chill inside me dropped another couple of degrees. I wanted to reach out for his hand, to feel his warmth, but I knew it wouldn’t be there. I didn’t deserve his comfort; didn’t know how to comfort him.

“You think that’s enough of an explanation? You’re my wife, and whether you kissed him or not, you obviously wanted to or you wouldn’t have tried.”

Yeah. I couldn’t counter that point. Talking around it, making excuses? A waste of time. I
did
want to kiss him at the time.

“You’re right. I wish I could tell you I didn’t know what I was doing, but I’m not going to lie to you, Jude. I never have. I’m not going to start now.”

He bowed his head for a second and I swear his hand moved towards mine then stopped. He rested both hands on his knees and let out a slow breath before looking up at me again. “So, what is this thing with Jesse?”

“There’s no ‘thing’. Not anymore. I mean, it wasn’t ever really a ‘thing’. Nothing happened. I just… I thought I had feelings for him.”

“You
thought
you had feelings for him? I’m guessing you more than thought you had feelings for him or we wouldn’t be having this conversation right now.”

He wasn’t going to make this easy. No reason why he should but dammit, it wasn’t easy for me to explain. Not without making him feel worse, and it wasn’t his fault. My feelings
were
partly tied to Jude’s actions, though.

“Did you even notice I was unhappy, Jude? The last few weeks we’ve been living in this house like roommates for the most part.”

“I noticed. I tried to talk to you last night, remember? You shut me down.”

“I needed to think.”

“You were thinking about Jesse.”

“I was thinking about us!”

“You slept in the spare room. You didn’t even want to share a bed with me, Bree. I know things haven’t been good between us but I didn’t think it had to do with you having feelings for someone else.”

‘Did I do this to us?’
I’d forgotten Jude said that the night before. At the time I didn’t understand, or have the energy to figure it out. Since we were having a serious conversation I had to ask.

“What did you think it was about?”

Jude shook his head. “Doesn’t matter now.”

“You thought it was your fault.”

“Right. But it’s not. It’s not my fault you want someone else.”

“I don’t! I don’t want anyone else, and I don’t want to be anywhere else. I… I got confused. You stopped listening to me, and Jesse-”

“That’s all it took?” Jude stood up, walking towards the window and pushing his hands through his hair the way he always did when frustrated. “I’ve given you everything you wanted, and because I wouldn’t listen about a damn make-up course, that was enough for you to decide you don’t want me anymore?”

“I never decided I don’t want you, and it’s more than just the make-up course! Jude, I’m twenty-one years old, I’m already married, and I have everything I could ever need. I’m lucky. I’m so lucky but I’m too young to sit back and spend my life waiting for you to come home, or waiting for my friends to finish work. This house is spotless. There isn’t even anything I can do in here. Everything has been taken care of. I don’t want to keep on living day to day watching the clock. I want to do something I love, like you do. Everyone around me has these amazing jobs, and they have things to talk about. What do I have, huh? I can tell them I cooked a meal for you, or I spent the day on Rodeo Drive but those things don’t lead to a conversation.”

A stabbing pain radiated through my stomach because of the way I sounded. Every reason I’d wanted to avoid this conversation weighed down on my already heavy heart. I wasn’t ungrateful for anything I had, yet I still sounded like a whiny child who couldn’t get the one toy in the store I wanted. But I’d have swapped every designer label I owned and lived in rags for a chance to try something for myself.

Jude slowly turned to me and the stabbing inside me sharpened, thrust deeper. Tears scorched the backs of my eyes when he fixed his gaze on me. “Do you regret marrying me?”

I wrapped my arms around my stomach again, trying to hold myself together and keep the ache under control. If I turned away, I may as well have packed my bags and walked out on him. I had to stay focused. Had to make him understand.

“Jude.” His name caught in my throat and I swallowed hard to push away the sobs threatening to escape me. “I love you. I love you so much. I don’t regret a single second of the time we’ve been together. Well, I regret some of the last few weeks, but marrying you? I’d do that all over again every day if I could. “

His shoulders loosened a little but words were nowhere near enough to make up for my stupid, stupid mistake.

And it
was
a mistake. I knew as soon as it happened. No. Before. My feelings for Jesse were real, but they were more about what I wanted in the life I already had, not a desire to throw everything away and start again.

Ha. If my life were a Facebook status, it would read: That moment when you realise everything you always wanted, you already have.

“I can’t shrug this off, Bree. I won’t pretend it doesn’t matter that you tried to kiss Jesse. But I can’t blame you for everything. I had a part to play in this, too. I’ve been a… what’s that word Leah uses to describe Radleigh when he pisses her off?”

“Pillock?” I choked out a laugh, not expecting even a second of lightheartedness when he hurt so much.

“Right. I’ve been a pillock. I shouldn’t have made such a big deal out of the make-up thing. You weren’t asking for anything crazy or reckless. You told me what you wanted to do and I shut you down. It’s not because I don’t think you’ve got it in you. I live with you, Bree. I know what you can do with some lipstick and an eyelash curler. Also, I’m a guy. I shouldn’t even know what the hell an eyelash curler is. I do listen to you.”

“I know you do.”

“I got scared. I always knew it was a risk when I married you that at some point, you might wonder why you settled for me.”

“Jude-”

“You deserve to have everything you want but when you said you wanted to do the course, I thought it might lead to you realising what you could have if you weren’t tied down with me. I was being selfish because I didn’t want to lose you but I just made you run faster. I wanted to tell you this last night. When you said you wanted to sleep somewhere else, I thought I was too late. I thought I’d already lost you.”

I took a couple steps towards him, needing to be closer, a
lot
closer. I wanted to wind myself around him and hold him until he didn’t hurt anymore. I didn’t deserve for him to hold me back. Not when I was the one who did this to him.

“You haven’t lost me. I’m here. I want to stay. If you want me to.”

The pause before he spoke again crippled me. My legs turned to jello and I held my breath while I waited. Waited to hear if I’d ruined our marriage.

“Last night I didn’t know what would happen with us. I didn’t know if you wanted to be here, and I didn’t know how to stop being scared of losing you. Then today, when I heard about Will, everything I’d worried about seemed insignificant. Freya lost the one person she loved and there was nothing she could do to stop it. I realised if you wanted to leave, you’d leave, and me stopping you from going on the make-up course wouldn’t make any difference. You could realise at any point you want something else. I just didn’t expect Jesse would be the thing you wanted.”

“I wanted what he represented. He has this incredible, warm family, and his parents live in a cute house that’s the perfect size. When you weren’t listening to me, Jesse was. I love your family but I’ve never felt like I could call your mom and go out to lunch with her, or talk to her if I had a problem. And this house. It’s so beautiful. But when I’m here alone, it’s too big. Too empty. You know I spent so much of my life living in cramped bedrooms, and sometimes out on the street. I don’t need much in the way of material things. It’s not that I want more. I sort of want… less. Whatever I was thinking about Jesse wasn’t because I fell in love with him. I just really liked being around someone who understood what I was trying to say. I handled it all wrong.”

I had no idea if what I’d said made things better or worse. Or if it made any sense. I was sure I’d missed something out but I’ve never been good at putting the right words in the right order during important conversations. Words got lost, mixed up. I couldn’t afford to mess up with my marriage on the line, but more than that, I couldn’t say anything other than what I felt. My heart squeezed hard inside my chest, causing a real, physical pain at the idea Jude might not appreciate my honesty. Might think I was trying to find a way to tell him we were through.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t give you the kind of family you need.”

My legs weakened a little more and I stumbled towards him, planting my hands on his chest, desperate for him to understand. “You did. You
do
. I’m so sorry about what happened with Jesse, but I know what I want now.”

Jude stared down at me, eyes still moist. “Would you have reached the same conclusion if Jesse had kissed you back?”

“Yes. I would. As soon as it happened, I realised what a dumb move I’d made. Jude, please. I never meant to hurt you, and I never meant to make you think you aren’t enough for me. You are. You always have been.”

I pressed my forehead against his chest, gripping handfuls of his shirt and silently praying everything would be okay. I couldn’t lose him, not now.

“Bree. Everything about today has been awful. The only thing getting me through is you. I don’t want to lose my best friend and my wife in the same day, but I need some time. I can’t think straight right now. Last night you asked me for some space. Now I need to ask you for the same thing.”

Squeezing my eyes shut for a moment, I lifted my head. When I opened my eyes, Jude’s image was nothing more than a blur. “You want me to sleep in the spare room again?”

His hands rested on my cheeks and he wiped tears away with his thumbs. “No. I’m the one who wants space. I’ll take the spare room. We’ll talk in the morning, okay?”

I nodded. The last thing I wanted was more distance from Jude but I had no business demanding to stay by his side after the way I’d acted, and what he overheard.

I released my grip on his shirt, and as he walked away I sank to the floor and let everything pour out of me. The crushing agony of maybe losing my husband because of my bad choices. Regret for the way I left things with Will and the pain of knowing I could no longer change them.  Grief for Freya’s loss. Anger at Taylor for everything she ever did to my friends and me, and guilt for being angry with someone who had lost her life.

If you’d asked any of my friends they’d have said I didn’t have a selfish, unkind bone in my body. Nothing I’d done lately, minus taking care of Kayla, proved that. I’d bumbled my way through self-centred, petty actions over and over, to the point where I might have lost the only person I’d ever loved, and allowed to love me since my parents died. I wanted to follow Jude upstairs, crawl into bed beside him and hold him until he understood how sorry I was and how much I loved him. But just as he’d respected what I needed, I had to do the same for him.

**

“Not good enough.”

“Stupid.”

“Selfish and ungrateful.”

I stared up at the ceiling, at the limp, hanging bodies of my mom, Taylor, and Will. All of them dangling in a row from light fittings in my childhood home. Mom wore her usual jeans and polo shirt, but with an apron over the top like she’d just finished baking. Taylor was dressed in her favourite pink mini dress, fully made-up, and Will wore his Warriors training clothes. Although their skin was pale, they somehow seemed so vibrant, like clowns at the circus. Their eyes were empty, dull, but their mouths twisted upwards into morbid grins as they spat the words at a teenage me, watching them, frozen to the spot.