Page 108 of The Write Stuff

“He doesn’t love me, though.”

“Please, he loves you so much he can’t see straight sometimes. You just frustrate him.”

“Have you ever considered that he frustrates me?”

“Yup.” I smiled because I couldn’t help myself. “I get it. He’s stubborn and set in his ways. He doesn’t see things that are right in front of him until years down the line. I mean … he swears he didn’t know I had a crush on him.”

That had her making a face. “He knew. I told him.”

“He didn’t believe you.”

“I always knew you had a crush on him,” she complained. “I always knew he had a crush on you, too. He was so blind to it.”

I debated what I wanted to say. “In some ways, I wish he had figured it out back then. We would have had more time together. In other ways, though, I’m glad that it took him so long to figure it out. We probably wouldn’t have survived if we got together as teenagers.”

“Probably not,” she agreed, crossing her arms over her chest. She wanted me to know that she wasn’t comfortable with this setup. I didn’t blame her.

“We didn’t mean for it to happen,” I said. “In fact, the first night we saw each other again, it didn’t go well.”

“Was he mean to you?”

“He brought up the Klingon.”

She smirked. “The Klingon really did get him going.”

“Yeah. I know.” I couldn’t help but smile at the memory.

“How did the two of you get together?”

Was she warming up? It certainly felt like it. Maybe I was just being overly hopeful. “One night, at one of our events, a guy was paying me too much attention,” I started.

“He got jealous?”

“He got worried. The guy kept insisting that he was going to walk me home, even though I didn’t want that. Huxley intervened and said he was going to walk me home.”

“He’s always been chivalrous without even realizing it.” She didn’t smile, but there was affection in her voice.

“We had shrimp and fries on the river that night … and some ice cream.” There was no containing my smile. “And we talked. We agreed — at that time at least — that we could keep the same friend group and it wouldn’t be a big deal. We would be friendly acquaintances and nothing more. We didn’t start dating right away. I want you to know that. He was loyal to you.”

Eleanor made a disgruntled sound. “I don’t want to keep him from you. I just hate your mother. After what she did to me —”

“I’m pretty sure you guys did things to each other,” I countered pointedly.

“She didn’t want Mick.”

“Did you ever really want him, or did you just want Mom not to have him?”

That question seemed to stymie her. “I … cared about Mick a great deal.”

I didn’t say anything and waited her out.

“I thought I loved him,” she said finally. “I really did.”

“And when you realized you didn’t love him, it was too late,” I assumed.

“If I had told him that, if I’d admitted it, I would have had to admit the rest of it,” she said. “I just couldn’t do that.”

“I’m guessing that it was the guilt you felt over keeping him and Mom apart for so long that fueled your meltdown in Austin.”