Page 14 of The Version You Hide

God, why does my life have to be so complicated?

Even now, after finding Kristen and Henley, Pamela and Ben, I still feel out of place. Like I haven’t quite found a home.

“Hey, look. Here’s another set of brushes and a blank canvas. Everything you need to make a masterpiece.” Pamela holds the art supplies out to me. “There’s even an easel. It’s still in the box.”

“Thanks, but I’ll pass,” I say, with a shake of my head as I pick up a box to relocate it to the other side of the room. I am grateful for the offer but I’m feeling less than inspired right now.

“Oh well,” Kristen sighs, tossing it onto the pile. “Hopefully someone else can make use of it.”

I feel Pamela’s eyes on me, and I know she’s sensed my mood change. “How are things going at the tavern, Mackenzie,” she asks.

“Yeah, good,” I reply, not caring to elaborate.

“And how’s Dylan?” Kristen says in a tone I can’t decipher.

“He’s a pain in the ass,” I reply, my face void of expression, remembering the weird comment he’d made after I walked under the ladder by mistake yesterday. “Next question.”

“He’s a hot pain in the ass though.” Kristen slaps me on the forearm, her left eyebrow wiggling up and down. I stare at her with dead eyes. When I don’t give her the reaction she’s hoping for, she points a finger at me and adds, “You can’t deny it.”

“He’s my boss, Kristen,” I state flatly.

She eyes me sceptically, a devious smile stretching across her face. “But you’re not denying it.”

I shrug. “I don’t see him that way. I don’t see anyone that way.” I turn my back to the two of them as I move to the other side of the room, my arms laden with yet another box.

“Oh, come on now, honey!” Pamela exclaims. “I’m almost forty-ni-. One. Almost forty-one. And even I can see that boy is damn fine!”

“Mum!” Kristen gasps. “Dylan is half your age! Your real age. Not the age you tell everybody.”

“Well, he is,” Pamela shrugs as she dives into yet another storage box. “That golden brown hair and those deep chocolate eyes. Don’t even get me started on that body and those…”

“Okay, Mum!” Kristen shouts, cramming her hands over her ears. “That’s enough!”

I reach into the box in front of me and try to focus on its contents, pretending I can’t feel Kristen’s gaze boring a hole into my soul.

“You can’t shut everyone out forever, you know.” There’s just enough sympathy in her tone to shatter my composure.

I pause, leaning on the edge of the box, swallowing my emotions down. “I can try.”

I don’t look up as I reach inside and scour through the contents, but I know Kristen and Pam are sharing a look. And I know what they’re thinking. That I’ve closed myself off from the world. That I’ll never be happy until I open myself up to possibility.

But I know they’re wrong. I let someone in once. Someone I thought was one of the good guys. Someone I never imagined would hurt me in a million years.

I can’t trust anybody. Not ever.

I know the mental health professional in Kristen is just dying to pick apart my psyche, but she lets it go, not saying another word.

We work for another hour, slowly shifting things around the loft until we’ve created a decent space for Pamela to set up her yoga space. There’s even a good amount of natural light pouring into the loft now through a window that had been previously covered up by two large stacks of storage tubs.

“Thanks so much for your help girls. All we need to do now is cart this stuff downstairs.” Pamela wipes the dust from her palms onto her thighs while Kristen and I glare at the pile exhaustedly.

I lean into Kristen and jokingly mutter the words, “Your mother is a slave driver.”

She lets out a giggle before Pamela screeches, “Hey! I heard that, Mackenzie!”

My muscles are already fatigued from unpacking that pallet at work yesterday, but I hoist a box up over my right shoulder and begin shifting it down the stairs. Kristen and Pamela follow suit and after four loads each we’ve successfully emptied the loft of unwanted things.

“Okay, I’m beat.” Kristen huffs out a breath, then turns to me. “You ready to go home?”

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