Page 62 of Good Guy Gabe

“You spent days on it!”

“It’s a quilt!”

The way Cora says it the second time makes it sound like I’m talking about a baby, but I shake my head firmly. “No, I make quilts every day of my life. I’ve given away more than I’ve kept, and if I throw out exactly one quilt in my life, that sounds like a good record. I don’t want it, And I don’t want it to be some shitty symbolic thing for Gabe. Whether he thinks it’s a peace offering or a petty tease, I don’t want that. And it meant too much as I was making it to sell it or give it away.”

“But . . . homeless people?” Tilly attempts, which has me reaching over to a storage cupboard. It’s giant, an old wardrobe that I pulled the rod from and filled with shelves. I open it, revealing a stash of quilts from my streaming classes that are so tightly packed in that one shelf explodes, spewing half a dozen small quilts at my feet.

“Jesus,” Cora whispers.

“Donate those,” I tell Tilly. “Every single one of them can go to the homeless. I’ve already donated an entire truckload to the women’s shelter. I’ve been worried that if a bunch of homeless people are seen with my quilts, people are gonna come at me for encouraging panhandlers to come out to the suburbs, but honestly, they come at me for everything I do. Bring it on. But that quilt needs to be thrown out.”

Tilly’s sunny disposition dims through my rant until tears are pooling in her eyes at my final command. I should feel bad, but I don’t. Misery loves company and all that. She nods and squeezes that gift-wrapped quilt to her body as she heads toward the door.

Cora taps her foot angrily, and I stare her down. I’m not apologizing, I’m not easing back. I’m taking my life back. We’re going to angrily break down this tree, we’re going to go get lunch, and then we’re going to come back and get work done.One of us is going to have a silly thought and share it with the group, and then we’re all going to have a laugh, and life will be good again.

I’m sure of it.

We hear Tilly yelp outside. She darts back in a second later, hands empty.

I tilt to look around Tilly’s shoulder, confused about why, if she’s scared, she’s left the door open behind her. “What was that?”

Cora anchors her fists at her waist. “Is it that stupid raccoon?”

I frown and head toward the door. “Please don’t throw quilts at Jerry.”

Tilly half-heartedly attempts to block me from passing her. No less than twenty feet away, on the lawn between the barn and the back of the house, Gabe bends down to pick up the Christmas present that was just hurled at him.

There’s another man with him, and they’re both dressed in jeans, steel-toed boots, work gloves, and duck cloth jackets. The stranger has a leather tool belt on his hips and a tablet and stylus in his hand. Usually, I’d consider him to be a big guy, but then Gabe straightens up and dwarfs him by about half a foot and a hundred pounds.

I got used to how big he was when we were together. He seemed like the perfect fit for me, like we were made for each other. It hardly ever crossed my mind that my eyes hit his chest, because he was so natural at keeping us level in every way that mattered. And it took not even a month for him to be impossibly big again, a whole other evolution of man. The next step in those charts where every iteration of humanity is larger than the last.

And that patch I sewed over my heart? The one that was supposed to be my next evolution? Gabe rips the seams right out of it by simply meeting my eyes.

We’re too far apart for me to see the pretty hazel that so captivated me when he hovered over me in the studio that first day, but I can see the longing. I can feel it within myself because my heart doesn’t care that he is not what he seems. My heart doesn’t get that he might not be the monster Brian was, but Brian at least recognized me as more than a means to get what he wanted. As anathema as it is, these weeks have forced me to admit that Briancaredabout me, so much so that he went to incredible lengths to make sure that I would still have something if his vile habits ruined us.

I see Gabe’s lips move. I know he’s saying my name, but I can’t hear it.

“I told you to never come back here.”

I’m not sure if my voice is any louder than his, but he jogs up to us, and bless their hearts, Cora and Tilly step in front of me to block, like they’re anything more substantial than bowling pins to him. But he stops before he gets too close and nods to them both, acknowledging them. Respecting them more than he ever respected me.

“And I told you I’m going to take care of my child. So—”

“So I guess I’ll see you in July,” I bristle.

Gabe glances between Cora and Tilly as he formulates a response. He points at my belly. “Now. Just because they’re in there doesn’t mean they don’t need to be taken care of.”

My spine straightens as my temper flares. “Are you accusing me of not being able to take care of them? Do you think it’s my fault I miscarried?”

Tilly and Cora pull in more tightly as Gabe has the audacity to roll his eyes and say, “Of course I don’t,” enunciating slowly like he thinks I can’t understand basic English. He gestures to the man who wisely stayed behind. “That’s Jeff. I’m contracting him to build a new balcony here and install a door there where it used to be.”

That has me pushing right through my friends and slamming the heel of my palm into Gabe’s chest. A month ago, he would have stepped back, pretending that I’m able to move him, but he stands his ground unflinchingly.

“You think you can just do what you want to my home? You lost the right—”

“I’m making it safer!” he roars, his volume enough for me to stumble back.

And that, of all things, has him flinching.

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