Ugly Love(62)

I turn away from him because I’m embarrassed at how angry his words are making me. I’m embarrassed it’s hurting me like it is, but everything with Miles hurts. It hurts because I know how good our good moments are, and I know how easily the bad moments would go away if he would just stop trying to fight this.

“Tate,” he says with remorse.

I want to rip his voice from his throat.

His hand meets my shoulder, and the car isn’t moving anymore. “Tate, I didn’t mean that.”

I push his hand away. “Don’t,” I say. “Either admit you want me for more than just sex, or take me home.”

He’s quiet. Maybe he’s contemplating my ultimatum.

Admit it, Miles. Admit it. Please.

The car begins moving again.

•••

“What did you expect would happen?” Cap asks, handing me another tissue.

When Miles and I arrived back at the apartment complex, I couldn’t bear riding up that elevator with him, so I took a seat next to Cap and let him go up alone. Unlike the hard exterior I try to show Miles, I completely break down while spilling all the details to Cap, whether he cares to hear them or not.

I wipe my nose again and drop the tissue, adding it to the pile next to me on the floor. “I was being delusional,” I say. “I told myself I could handle it if he never wanted more. I guess I thought if I let him take his time, he’d eventually come around.”

Cap reaches around to a trash can at his side and places it between us so I have somewhere to toss my tissues. “If that boy can’t see what a good thing he could have with you, then he ain’t worth your time.”

I nod, agreeing with him. I do have a lot more important things to do with my time, but for some reason, I feel as if Miles can see what a good thing he has with me. I feel like he wishes he could make this work between us, but something bigger than him or me or us is holding him back. I just wish I knew what it was.

“Have I told you my favorite joke yet?” Cap asks.

I shake my head and grab another tissue from the box in his hands, relieved at the change in subject.

“Knock, knock,” he says.

I didn’t expect his favorite joke to be a knock-knock joke, but I play along. “Who’s there?”

“Interrupting cow,” he says.

“Interrupt—”

“MOO!” he yells loudly, cutting me off.

I stare at him.

Then I laugh.

I laugh harder than I’ve laughed in a long damn time.





chapter twenty-two


MILES

Six years earlier

My dad says he needs to speak to us.

He asks me to get Rachel and meet him and Lisa at the dining-room table. I tell him okay, that there’s something we need to speak to them about, too.

Curiosity flashes in his eyes but only for a brief second. He thinks about Lisa again, and he’s not curious anymore.

His everything is Lisa.

I go to Rachel’s room and tell my everything that they want to speak to us.

We all sit down at the dining-room table.

I know what he’s going to say. He’s going to tell us he proposed. I don’t want to care, but I do. I wonder why he didn’t tell me first. This makes me sad but only a little bit. It’s not going to matter after we tell them what we have to tell them.

“I asked Lisa to marry me,” he says. Lisa smiles at him. He smiles at her.

Rachel and I aren’t smiling.

“So we did,” Lisa says, flashing her ring.

So.

We.

Did.

Rachel gasps quietly.

They’re already married.

They look happy.

They’re looking at us, waiting for a reaction.

Lisa is concerned. She doesn’t like that Rachel looks so upset. “Honey, it was spur-of-the-moment. We were in Vegas. Neither of us wanted a big wedding. Please don’t be mad.”

Rachel begins crying into her hands. I wrap my arm around her and want to console her. I want to kiss her reassuringly, but my father and Lisa wouldn’t understand it.

I need to tell them.

My dad looks confused that Rachel is so upset. “I didn’t think either of you would mind,” he says. “You’re both leaving for college in a couple of months.”

He thinks we’re mad at them.

“Dad?” I say, keeping my arm around Rachel. “Lisa?”

I look at both of them.

I ruin their day.

Ruin.

“Rachel is pregnant.”

Silence.

Silence.

Silence.

DEAFENING SILENCE.

Lisa is in shock.

My father is comforting Lisa. His arm is around her, and he’s rubbing her back.

“You don’t even have a boyfriend,” Lisa says to Rachel.

Rachel looks at me.

My father stands. He’s angry now. “Who’s responsible?” he yells. He looks at me. “Tell me who he is, Miles. What kind of guy knocks a girl up and doesn’t have the balls to be with her when she tells her own mother? What kind of guy would let a girl’s brother be the one to break the news?”