"Turn around." She shakes her head. "Dammit, Evie, talk to me,” I growl.
She whirls, her hair fluttering around her to land over her shoulders in long waves. Her deep blue eyes are full of fury, like a storm out to sea. "Now you want to talk to me?” Her voice is raised, drawing the attention of the barista behind the counter. “After I've texted you repeatedly and gotten no answer except the one time you thanked me. It was a basic thank you. Haven't heard from you since. And now you want me to say something?" She's about to keep going, but a cup of iced coffee is placed on the counter behind her. She grabs it and takes a sip. "Maybe the caramel was worth it,” she mutters. I have no idea what she's talking about. "I have to go," she says. "I have a job interview. Hopefully, it goes better than this encounter has."
I don't get a word out before she turns and walks toward the door. Her suit jacket hugs her slim waist and covers the top of her ass, but I've seen her in many different outfits and know the shape of it well.
Seconds go by and I'm still standing in the middle of the café, watching the door she left through as if she's going to come back any second.
"Cy?" Tasha asks softly. I forgot she was here. The moment I saw Evie, everything and everyone else faded away.
"Sorry," I say and sit back down across from her.
"You still keep in touch with her?"
"Yes. No. I don't know."
Fuck. I can't answer her because I don't really know. Yes, I was talking to Evie a little. Yes, I spent the night in her bed after she saved me from ending my life. How do I define what Evie is to me, to someone other than myself? She's everything to me and no one I deserve, but I can't voice that, especially not to Tasha. They had a falling out after high school. Plus, Tasha was never subtle in the fact she wanted to be a part of my group of friends. I ignored her because of Evie. She was one of her only friends. If she had started hanging with my group, she would have left Evie in the dust, and no way was I going to be responsible for that.
"You don't have to tell me," she says solemnly. "I messed up with Eve. I was an awful friend." My mouth remains shut. "Do you think she'd talk to me again?"
I bark out a laugh. "You're joking." She frowns. Okay, subtlety was never my forte. "I think a lot happened between you and Evie. If you want to try making amends, then by all means, do so. She has a heart bigger than both of us combined."
She decides to drop Evie, for now, and goes on to tell me all she's been up to since high school. I nod along, sipping my coffee, pretending to give a shit, but all I can think of is Evie and how she's angry with me. How she's off at a job interview now because of me. It's my fault she is unemployed. Shit. Does she have enough money to pay her bills? Her parents aren't here anymore, so she can't stay with them. I just keep fucking up her life.
"Cy? Did you hear what I said?" Tasha asks, breaking through my thoughts.
"No, sorry. I have a lot on my mind."
She looks down at her phone to check the time. "I should be getting back. My mom's appointment will be over in a few minutes." I nod and stand. We toss our cups out before walking to my truck.
We ran in to each other at my psychologist's office. Tasha's aunt passed away a month ago, and her mom is having a hard time dealing with it. Tasha thought it would be a good idea to move back to town to be with her. She made an appointment for her mom to talk to someone. I saw her in the waiting room as I was leaving my appointment. We got to talking and decided to grab coffee, while her mom had her appointment. I didn't tell her the specifics of why I was there; just that I was dealing with some shit. She didn't pry, for which I am grateful.
Pulling into the parking lot, I come to a stop and wait for Tasha to get out. Sure, I'm being rude, but after what happened with Evie, I want this to be over. I need to figure this shit out in my head, and think of how to get Evie to understand that Tasha means nothing. We were only killing time. Since I have my own business fixing computers, I can basically work whenever I want.
"Can I see you again?" Tasha asks.
"I don't think that's a good idea."
"It's Eve, isn't it?"
"Tasha, it isn't like that with Evie and me."
"I saw the way you looked at her, Cy. You don't have to explain it to me. All those years, I thought you hated her. You were so cruel, but now, now I see how wrong I was. Treat her well. She doesn't deserve any more pain."
"If only I knew how."
"You'll figure it out. She's a good person. One I didn't realize how lucky I was to call a friend until the damage was done."
"Thanks, Tasha."
"Anytime."
She opens the door and hops down from my truck, closing it behind her. She waves as she walks back to the building.
I sit in the parking lot for a few minutes trying to wrap my head around everything. I wanted to kill myself. End the pain I had lived with for many years, but then Evie appeared. I moved in with Parker. He helped me see there are people who care about me, especially Evie. We talked about her, and he knows she means something to me. He made a point of saying that if I end my life, I'll never get to know her better. I'll never find out if there could be something between us. All these years of her always being on my mind would be gone, without me even trying to have a relationship with her. That realization alone was enough to make me seek professional help. The psychiatrist prescribed me medication and started me on the path to feeling better. The psychologist is a great help as well. I see him twice a week and talk out everything I'm feeling. With each visit I feel a little lighter.
Don't get me wrong; I still have my dark moments. Very dark ones at that. I know I can go into Parker's kitchen and find a knife, or a bottle of pills, and end it all, but then I think of her. Evie. The way her face lights up when she smiles, or how fierce she looked when she pulled me from my home. Parker told me she pointed a gun at Everett and threatened him. The gun she wouldn’t have if she hadn’t taken it from me. I was floored she'd do that for me. She risked it all. Everett could have called the cops on her for pointing a gun at him in his own home, but then that would open a whole other can I doubt he wanted opened.
How do I treat her? How do I thank her for all she's done for me? I ignore her. I say nothing to her, outside of a thank you for bringing my truck to me. Then she sees me with Tasha. I can only imagine where her mind went. My past is full of one-night stands with women I had no feelings for. But this is different. She saw me with her ex-best friend. Fuck.
I should apologize, but that's not what I'm going to do. Evie doesn't deserve a mess like me in her life, no matter how much I want her to be in mine. It's better this way. Better for her to be away where my toxic bullshit can't touch her. I can only hope she gets the job today. That would make me happy. Then maybe I wouldn't feel as guilty about her quitting her job because of my mom. A job I'm sure she was getting paid exceptionally well for. My mom might be the world's biggest bitch, but she always paid her assistants better than most.
Instead of going to her apartment and waiting for her to get back, so I can apologize like I should, I'm going to drive my ass back to Parker's and do some work. I'm weeks behind as it is. Luckily, my customers are all understanding. Of course, it also helps that a lot of my customers are friends I made in high school who still keep in touch. Well, friends aren't exactly the right word. More like acquaintances. They've been keeping me busy, though, them and their families. I love working on computers, and it allows me to waste time on something other than my own fucked-up mind.
* * *
"Dude, you gotta talk to Eve. I think you really pissed her off today," Parker tells me when he walks into my bedroom at his cabin. Thankfully, he's allowing me to stay here free of charge. He's the best friend I have. The only one I trust. Outside of Evie that is, but I've never admitted that to anyone. I can assume Parker knows, however.
"I can't," I mumble, while putting a new hard drive in a laptop.
"You can't or you won't?"
"You know as well as I do that I need to stay away from her."
"No. What I know is you're too much of a chicken shit to talk to her and actually have a normal relationship with her. I didn't say you had to go over there and fuck her up against a wall. All I'm saying is for you to ease her mind. She thinks you're fucking Tasha. Are you?"
I turn and give him a nasty look. "There's no way I'd ever touch Tasha like that. Even if she were on her knees with her mouth open, I wouldn't do anything. She's been off limits since the day I realized she was Evie's closest friend."
"But she's not anymore. There would be nothing stopping you from going after her."
"I don't care what she is. All that matters is it would hurt Evie if I did."
"So, you finally admit you care about hurting Evie?"
I shake my head. "I was foolish back in high school. I should have never done that to her."
"Now you can right your wrongs, yet you're still sitting here sulking, hurting her all over again. You just need to tell her the truth. That's it. You don't need to do anything else. I think she's accepted the fact that you don't want to talk to her. But this shit with Tasha, it’s not right. Just tell her it's not what she thinks, or I will."
I stop what I'm doing. "How often do you talk to Evie?"
"It's not like that and you know it."
I raise an eyebrow. "Do I? All I'm hearing is how my best friend is talking to my girl behind my back."
"Now she's your girl?" He laughs. "You should fill her in on that. I might not want to date her, but someone will. You've gotten lucky all these years that she hasn't settled down and found someone serious. It's only a matter of time, though."
I scrub a hand over my face. "You aren't telling me anything I haven't already thought about."
"Well, then there's not much more I can say, except if you want her, if you consider her yours, then make it known to her before it's too late."
I grumble something unintelligible and turn back around to the laptop. The thought of Evie with someone else is enough to drive me wild with rage, but at the same time, her being with me won't do her any good. I’ll only end up hurting her. She's mine and has been since day one, freshman year when I first saw her. She didn't know. No one did. They still don't. The fact will never change. As long as I'm breathing, she's mine, even if she doesn’t know it.
Maybe that's the problem. If I'm gone there will be less toxicity in her life. I shake my head to rid my mind of the thought. No more thinking about suicide. I've come too far these past few weeks. I don't want to go backward. Only forward.
Forward right now is focusing on work so I can contribute to bills around here, even if Parker doesn't let me. My truck is paid for. The insurance is covered for the remainder of the year. I have zero credit card debt. No student loans. I'm not doing bad financially, thanks to my mom paying for everything all my life. There is also the money, which was left to us when my dad died. I'd rather have him here than the money. If he were here, I would never have gone through what I did with Everett. I could’ve had a childhood like everyone else did with parents who loved and cherished them. I’d like to think that even if I were never abused at Everett’s hands, I still would have found Evie. There’s something about her, like a magnet always pulling me in.