Haley was about to press Scott’s doorbell when the door opened and she found herself staring into David’s blue eyes.
His face switched from surprised to coy in a heartbeat. “Hello, Sunshine,” he greeted her.
“I’m here to see your brother,” Haley said.
“State the obvious, won’t you?”
“Is he home?”
David shook his head. “Nope.”
“We were supposed to meet here at 3,” Haley explained. “Can I wait for him inside?”
David smiled that infuriating smirk of his and opened the door wide, presenting the inside of the house to her. “Come on in.”
“So you guys live together?” she asked as she took off her scarf and coat and draped them on the back of an armchair in the living room.
“Unfortunately. My parents refuse to pay for separate accommodations.” David closed the door and walked back inside the apartment. “So yeah, I’m stuck with my virtuous younger brother as a roommate.”
“Why do you always have to do that?”
“Do what?” David raised his eyebrows.
“Speak as if you mean the exact opposite of what you say.”
“Oh, that.” David chuckled. “It’s called sarcasm.”
“I get it; you have it in for Scott. But can’t you get over it?”
David’s eyes blazed. “Get over what, exactly?”
Haley lowered her gaze, unable to meet his eyes, as she whispered, “He told me about Brigitte.”
“Oh, yeah?” David gritted his teeth. “And what exactly did he tell you?”
“He told me you both liked her in high school, and that she chose him.”
“That’s rich!” David’s nostrils flared wide as he stared at the ceiling.
“What’s rich?”
“That little tale my brother fed you.”
“You’re doing it again: hinting at some mysterious, hidden truth and never saying what’s on your mind!”
“I hate to break it to you, Princess, but with me what you see is what you get.” He pointed down at himself. “I don’t pretend to be good when I’m not. And I don’t pretend to be a righteous son-of-a-bitch when I’m not.”
“Again, you don’t say it, but you’re implying Scott does pretend to be something he’s not.”
David shrugged, apparently calm again. “Your words, not mine.”
“And what would he be lying about?”
“Ah, see.” David’s smirk was bitter this time. “To lie outright wouldn’t be Scott’s style. He prefers to omit. That Brigitte story, he conveniently left half of it out so he wouldn’t look bad.”
“What did he leave out?” Haley asked.
“I’m sorry, I can only give sarcastic, half-true answers… So why don’t you ask your boyfriend.”
David put so much hatred into the word “boyfriend” that Haley recoiled. She wondered how it was possible for the two of them to live together without either of them having killed the other yet.
She refused to let David provoke her. “You’re just trying to screw with my head.”
“Tell yourself whatever you need to sleep at night.”
“I don’t need to tell myself anything,” Haley snapped.
“Good for you.” David walked back to the door and opened it. “I trust I can leave you here without you scavenging the place, yeah?”
Haley sat on the couch and crossed her arms over her chest, glaring at him. “I’ll wait right here.”
“Perfect. Don’t wait up for me.” He slammed the front door as he left.
Haley wanted to scream. She shouldn’t let him get to her. How did he manage to get under her skin so easily and so quickly?
To distract herself, Haley studied the room, taking in details of the house. Definitely a guy’s apartment. The couch was brown leather with plastic compartments to hold glasses or beer cans. She swiped a finger over the rim of one. Everything else screamed model-house as if this were the apartment they used to show for visits; it was all plain furniture. The only personalizing touches were basketball-themed items casually propped here and there around the house, and a huge flat-screen TV.
She wondered what the bedrooms looked like. Could she get away with taking a quick peek? But what if Scott came home and found her snooping in David’s room? She’d be so busted. Haley checked her watch; he was supposed to have been here fifteen minutes ago. It couldn’t be much longer until he arrived.
As if on cue, Haley heard a key turn in the keyhole and the door opening. She got to her feet.
“Haley, you’re here,” Scott said. He seemed surprised to find her inside. “I’m so sorry I was late, I was reading and lost track of time.”
“It doesn’t matter. David let me in.”
Scott’s face immediately darkened. “I’m surprised he was here. He’s usually never at home.”
“He was headed out,” Haley said. “Said not to wait up for him.”
Scott looked wary. “Is that all he said?”
Haley considered how to answer. She didn’t want David to stir up problems between her and Scott, which had clearly been his intention, but she was too curious about Brigitte to let it go.
“We had a bit of an argument actually,” Haley said, hugging herself.
Scott took three quick strides across the room and braced his hands on her shoulders “Did he do something to you?” he asked, looking at her with a worried expression.
“No.” Haley shrugged free and sat down. “He didn’t do anything. He said things.”
“What things?” Scott sat next to her.
“He said you haven’t told me the whole truth about Brigitte.”
Scott massaged his temples with his fingers. “What else?”
“Nothing. That’s all he said.”
“All right.” Scott sighed and faced Haley. “David has this idea in his head of how things happened that’s not true.”
“Okay…”
“Listen, you shouldn’t let him get to you like this.”
“I know. But I can sense you’re not telling me something, and it feels like David’s trying to use that against us.” Haley was tired of Scott’s instant semi-muteness whenever David or Brigitte were mentioned. “So what’s the truth?”
“I don’t like to talk about that period of my life.”
“I get that,” Haley said. “But if you don’t tell me, I’ll never know which one of you I should believe.”
Scott scoffed. “See? You’re already starting to doubt me. That’s exactly what he wants.”
“And also why we’re talking about it,” Haley insisted. “Listen, you can’t tell me David’s got the wrong idea without telling me why or about what.”
Scott sighed. “All right. I’ll tell you everything.” He leaned his back against the couch and spoke, looking at the ceiling. “Brigitte was my first. The first girl I loved, my first everything. She was beautiful, playful, and she had this impossible-to-resist French accent that would make any guy lose his mind.”
“Okay, you don’t need to be that specific,” Haley joked.
“Sorry.” Scott smirked. “Anyway, from the first day she set foot in our school, David had his eyes on her, and so did I. But I was shy and inexperienced and he was not. They started dating almost immediately.”
“Then what happened?”
“She was my age, a year younger than David, so we had a lot of classes together and we started talking. She had a compelling personality. It was impossible not to fall for her, especially for a shy guy like me. At one point she started complaining about my brother, said their relationship wasn’t working. Finally, one day she told me they’d broken up.”
“Was it true?”
“I believed her. I wanted to believe her so badly.”
“So, she was lying?” This Brigitte character wasn’t growing on Haley. The opposite, in fact.
“Yeah.”
“And you couldn’t tell?”
“No.” Scott shifted position and finally met her gaze. “I never saw her with David anymore, and I had no reason to assume she was lying.”
“So you two… what?”
“Exactly what you think. We were together while she was still seeing David.”
“I don’t understand. What did David do?”
“He didn’t know.” Scott shook his head. “Brigitte told me we had to keep our relationship a secret. She explained it by saying she didn’t want to hurt David’s feelings, that it was too soon for us to date openly… blah, blah, blah. I was young and in love, gullible enough to go along with it if it meant I could be with her.”
“It didn’t last, I take it.”
“No. David found us together.” The shadow of a bad memory crossed Scott’s face. “We got into this huge fight, and then we told Brigitte she had to choose.”
“And she chose you,” Haley finished for him.
“And that, David will never forgive.”
“So you stayed with her, even after she lied to you like that?”
“As I said, I was young, stupid, and in love.”
Haley put the last pieces together. “David doesn’t believe you didn’t know.”
“No, I don’t think he does. And the fact that I kept going out with Brigitte afterward was proof enough for him.”
Haley honestly could not blame him. “How long were you with her?”
“At the end of the year she moved back to France, and David moved on to college. This wound between us has been festering ever since.”
“Well, at least now it makes sense why he behaves like that.” Haley’s head was spinning with all this new information. “Haven’t you tried to explain to him how it really happened? It seems to me this Brigitte person was pretty awful.”
“In hindsight, she was,” Scott agreed. “And I’ve tried to talk with my brother a million times, but he won’t listen.”
“I’m sorry for dredging all of this up.” Haley squeezed Scott’s upper arm. “But I needed to know.”
“And I’m glad I told you the whole story.”
“Come here,” Haley said.
She opened her arms to hold Scott to her chest as she leaned back on the couch. Haley stared at the ceiling, enjoying Scott’s weight on her. But as she stroked his hair, she couldn’t help but feel sorry for David.