The Reason I Stay (25 page)

I tiptoe to the kitchen, get a glass from the cupboard, and fill it with water from the tap as quietly as I can. Despite my best efforts not to wake him, Matt speaks. “Bad hangover?”

I turn around to look at him and nod, making my head pound again. “Yep. It feels like there’s a train inside my brain, and sand in my throat.”

“You’re in luck. I have the best cure for that.”

I narrow my eyes at him, and he smirks.

“So . . . why did you sleep on my couch?”

“Too tired to go to the inn, and this very annoying cat,” he looks down at the black furball on his chest and pats her head, “hissed at me when I tried to move her so I could crash in your bed with you. Five minutes later, she came over to sleep on me.”

I laugh, because that’s so unlike Snow. Normally, she hates people—
all
people—who aren’t me. I’ve never resented her for it until this moment. I really wish she had just moved, and let him sleep there with me.

Matt picks her up from his chest and places her on the floor. She meows in protest again, but he ignores her in favor of scratching Cash’s flopped year. “The dog, I like. He pees a lot—woke me up twice to be let out—and he’s probably the ugliest mutt I’ve ever seen, but he’s a good dog.”

“He is.” The mushy tone in my voice nauseates me, but I can’t help it.

He gets up from the couch, and walks toward me. We keep our eyes locked the entire way, until he stops right in front of me and says, “Hi.”

I smile at him. “Hi.”

Matt runs a hand down my messy hair and I lift up on my toes for a kiss, which disappointingly gets delivered to my forehead. “I need coffee to heal your hangover, and then I’ll need to borrow your toothbrush. I really want to kiss you, but I think something died inside my mouth.”

I giggle, and that makes my head pound. Wincing, I drop my head on his chest. He hugs me and kisses my hair a few times. When I finally disentangle myself from him, I turn around and get the coffee, anticipating the magic concoction he promised. I hand the container and a filter to him.

“You can use mine if you want, but there’s a new toothbrush in the cabinet under the bathroom sink. You can use that one, and then leave it here if you want.” I try not to sound too eager, but I do, and silence, deafening silence, follows as he watches me with a big grin that screams “fifth date?” It makes me relax a bit. I mimic it and raise a brow that screams “yes.”

Matt laughs, and hurries to get the coffee started. He dumps about six generous scoops of powder in the coffeemaker, as I gather the ingredients to make us chocolate-chip pancakes. I didn’t have them this week, and since they’re really great hangover food—and he’s never had them—I’m making some. I get the batter going as he runs to the bathroom. I can’t help but to smile when I hear the cabinet doors creak open and closed.

A few minutes later, I hear Matt’s still booted feet reentering the kitchen, and before I notice, the whisk is out of my hands and my back is against the fridge. Things blur out from that point on. All I know is that my headache stops bothering me as his lips fall on mine, and my hands press against his bare chest, and my leg comes up to circle his hips, and . . . Oh. My. God. I don’t know what I’ll have to do to have them, but I need more mornings like this. I need all mornings like this.

Something vibrates in his pants, and I pull back from his lips. I look from his face to his jeans with a raised brow. “Are so happy about a toothbrush you’re actually vibrating?”

“Damn right I am.” He winks, and swats my butt as I lower my leg.

Matt fishes the device from his pocket, looks at the screen, and curses under his breath. I pull my brows together in worry, but he shakes his head and kisses my forehead.

“Dennis,” he informs me flatly. It takes a second for the name to sink in, and then it does.
His dad.
Matt smiles a fake smile, and takes a few steps away from me. “I need to get the final ingredient to your hangover coffee from my car. Be right back, okay?”

I nod as he grabs his keys from the counter and walks out of my house. The moment he steps out of my front door, I hear him answer the call. The rudeness in his voice causes my gut to twist in a knot, and increases the pounding in my head.

Considering that his car is probably parked behind mine, which is exactly ten steps from my front door, I find it weird that I’m pouring my second set of pancakes when Matt’s voice approaches the house again. It’s even weirder that he doesn’t enter. However, he’s told me about his difficult relationship with his dad, so I guess he needs some privacy to talk about whatever it is they need to discuss. For that reason, I try not to focus on his conversation.

Unfortunately, his voice is loud enough that I can’t help it.

“I thought you wanted me to take responsibility for my actions. Wasn’t that what you told me to do? Think about my mess of a life? Well . . . that’s what that was,” he says, and then he stays quiet for a while. When he speaks again, his voice is really close to yelling. “That’s such lawyer bullshit. Responsibility is responsibility. Not being the kind you think is right doesn’t make it wrong, Dennis.”

I flip the pancakes as a thumping sound comes from outside my house, and is followed by a loud curse. I rush to the door and see Matt shaking his right hand, the one he most likely punched the side of my house with. He looks at me with embarrassment in his eyes as he tells his father—a man I already hate—to wait a second.

“You okay?” I ask, trying to convey concern, and not a drop of judgment.

He takes a deep breath and nods, which makes me smile. That is until I look past the parked cars and the road to see nosey Mrs. Crane peeking from her window again. I signal for Matt to come back inside and wave to the house across the street
.
Her drapes instantly fall into place.
Fucking hag.

Looking even more embarrassed than before, Matt walks in and places the bottle of Jack Daniels in his hand over the counter. He looks at me and fidgets with his phone, seeming as uncomfortable as if he were lying naked on a bed of nails. I hate to see him like this.

In an attempt to minimize his discomfort, I point to the door leading to the back porch. He takes a breath, thanks me, and walks in that direction. I go back to my pancakes.

For the time it takes for me to cook two more sets of pancakes, Matt speaks in a voice too low for me to hear, and then stays silent for a while as Dennis speaks. Then, just as I turn off the stove burner, he says, “Fine. If that’s how you want to play it, I quit.”

I freeze and look out the living room window, through which I can see Matt pacing back and forth. I watch with horrified fascination, feeling bad for him and extremely happy for me, which makes me a really terrible person. I know it’s selfish, but quitting his job, a job he hates, means he may not leave, ever, and that’s the best news for me.

“Fuck you right back, asshole,” he yells, and then the door opens.

I turn around and open the fridge for some eggs, trying to look busy, but he doesn’t seem to notice. He walks right by me, and starts opening and closing the cupboards, looking for something— I’m guessing coffee mugs. I consider pointing to the right cabinet, but he’s so mad he doesn’t even look at me, so that would be pointless. Besides, I guess having something to focus his energy on is a good thing right now.

I let him do his thing as I pour the eggs in a pan and bring them to the stove. When he finally finds the mugs, he gets a couple, and pours coffee, sugar, creamer, and a large amount of Jack in each before he looks at me. After a deep breath, Matt offers me one. “This will cure your hangover. It’ll probably get you a bit drunk, too.”

I smile at him, take the mug from his hand and bringing it to my lips. After one tiny sip, my eyes close, and my face twists at how strong—in both the booze and coffee categories—this is. He looks at me with an expression completely different to the one he had before the call. He’s got lines on his forehead, bags under his eyes and tension on his shoulders, which makes me feel sad and worried for him, but still his lips flutter in a smirk.

He walks to my little dining table by the window, and plops down in a chair. “Well . . . I’m unemployed.”

I turn my attention back to the eggs. “I’ve heard.”

He groans. “Was it that loud?”

“No,” I lie. “Just the ‘I quit’ and ‘fuck you, asshole,’ parts. Both were well said, by the way.”

Matt smiles, but it’s forced. “Thanks. I meant it.”

I laugh as I turn off the burner. I place the eggs in a bowl and bring them to the table, along with the plate of stacked pancakes, filling the room with a mouthwatering combination of melted chocolate, maple and and a sublte saltiness. After retreating back to the kitchen for plates and silverware, I take a chair next to him.

“Do you wanna talk about it?”

The smile falls from his lips, and I hate myself for asking. “Not really,” he blurts out in a tone that makes me remember the first day he came to the diner.

His shoulders are tense, he’s short-tempered and grumpy as hell, and I know he’ll bite me if I push him. And though I want to ask more, because I feel he’s keeping something in and want him to open up to me, I don’t.

“Okay.” I smile, and start serving the food. “Dig in.” And he does.

We eat and drink our hangover-curing-and-inducing coffees, and talk about random things meant to make him relax. It doesn’t really work, though. He’s still tense, and though he listens to everything I say, and nods his head as if he’s paying attention, I can see his eyes go in and out of focus. Whenever I ask him something that requires words to come out of his mouth, he replies in short, defensive sentences that some would consider rude. And though it’s unpleasant, I get his bad mood, and therefore keep trying to make him relax.

Once we’re done eating and our conversation has ceased, I pick up the plates to go wash them. Matt, slouched in his chair, takes an audible a long breath, and says, “He’s cutting me off, and though I have savings, I know they won’t last forever.”

I’m with my back turned to him, so I allow a smile to break through. I love that he’s talking to me now, but then the thumping sound of something heavy falling to the table echoes around me, and the smile is wiped right off of my face.

I turn around to look at him with his head pressed against the tabletop, his hands clasped behind his neck, and my heart breaks for him. I walk toward him and sit back in my chair, running my fingers through his hair a few times, hoping to soothe him. “Do you regret quitting?”

He shakes his head, but doesn’t look at me. “Absolutely not. I’m tired of him telling me what to do. I hate that he keeps meddling with and controlling my life, like I’m still a child. I’ve never minded much before, but I do now.”

He turns his face to look at me, but doesn’t take it off the white wooden surface. I bend my body and rest my head down beside his. Our noses are a palm away from each other, our eyes are locked, and the corner of his lips pull up slightly in a barely there smile.

He brings his hand to my hair, and tucks a strand behind my ear. “Aside from screaming at me about a bunch of shit he had no right to, he also wanted me back in Seattle by the end of the week. I told him about you, and that I belong here, with you. He didn’t believe me, so I quit.”

I melt, and smile, and touch his face. He closes his eyes and smiles at me in return. This is undoubtedly the most incredible and romantic thing anyone has ever done for me. It is also concrete proof that whatever this is, it’s more serious than I could ever have imagined. We’re together—for better or worse, we’re together. I like that.

Matt sighs, and continues, “It’s funny that when I had this planned, stable life I had nothing to live for, and now that I have you, I have no goddamned clue what to do to support myself.”

“Don’t worry about that. We’ll figure things out. The important thing is that now you get to choose the life you want to have, the job you want to have.”

Matt narrows his eyes at me, so I explain, “Well . . . if you want to continue to be a lawyer, you can. Mr. Johnson, the town’s lawyer, is a regular at the diner, and father to a girl I was friends with in high school. I can introduce you two. If I know him well, which I do, he’ll be happy to have a partner. But if you don’t, then you can think about something else. Something you’ll have fun doing. I’ll help you.” I study his face, trying to gauge his reaction, but it’s the same as it was before: blank and hurting. “Besides, Jolene has no shortage of opportunities. People keep moving away, so we basically need everything.”

For the longest time we sit there at my dining table, our cheeks pressed against the wood, just staring at each other. For a few minutes, Matt’s eyes go in and out of focus, as if he’s weighing things up in his brain. I wonder what they are, but I don’t ask him. And then the star-filled skies in his face focus on me. We gaze at each other as if this is the first and the last time. It makes a breath get stuck in my throat, and for the first time I don’t find it all that uncomfortable. In fact, it’s exciting to feel that anticipation, that connection to someone so strongly that you can barely breathe.

After what feels like forever, he whispers, “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, Lexington Amelia Blake.”

I blush, and as my insides turn to mush and tears tickle my eyes, I reply, “So are you to me, Mathew Ian Rogers.”