Page 62 of Lose You to Find Me

“I already found someone to help me,” she replies. “Leon Applebee.”

After racking my brain for the familiar name, it clicks. “Applebee? Your neighbor?”

She nods absently, looking at something behind me. “I appreciate the offer, but I think you and I have more than enough on our plates. We don’t need to add business to ple—”

Pleasure.

A faint shade of pink coats her cheeks. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Of course not,” I murmur, brushing off the sting of rejection that has no right settling into my chest cavity. “Why him, anyway? The man is a hermit. I didn’t even know he spoke to you before.”

All she asks is “Why not him?”

Why not him?The question is innocent, but it strikes me the wrong way. Because I used to think that’s how she thought of me whenever her parents would ask her why we were together. “Why not Caleb?” she’d asked her mom.

“I would have helped you if you’d asked me to,” I tell her.

She huffs out a quiet laugh. “Would you have? Because I’ve tried talking to you without much luck before. We’ve gotten good at fighting but not much else.”

“I’d say there’s one other thing we’ve gotten good at,” I press not needing to point out the times we’ve spent alone. The color of her cheeks says she’s thinking the same thing. “A lot has changed for us, trust being the biggest reason I couldn’t answer your texts or figure out what to say when I should have talked instead of pointed fingers. But one thing hasn’t changed. I’d do anything for you, Raine. If you really needed me.”

Chapter Twenty-One

RAINE

I’d do anythingfor you, Raine.Those words echoed in my head all day. The only thing that snapped me out of it was Mom asking me where I was going a few hours after getting home from work.

“I’m going out,” I tell her, taking my jacket off the hook by the door. “Need anything? I saw we were low on creamer, and I know how you get when you don’t have any for your morning coffee.”

One of Mom’s eyebrows pops up. “Why are you trying to distract me from telling me where you’re going?”

I pause with my jacket halfway on. “I’m not trying to distract you. But the last time you ran out of creamer, you went on a rampage for the entire day, and I wasn’t sure any of us were going to make it.”

She gives methe look. The unamused one that most mothers give a handful of times in their lives. “It was a limited-time pumpkin cheesecake creamer that the store ran out of. I had reason to be upset.”

Popping my lips, I offer a solemn nod. “I suppose. Anyway, I’m—”

“You haven’t gone out this late since you were dating. Is this abouthim?” she asks, this time giving me pause as I untuck my hair from the jacket.

I know who she’s asking about, but I play dumb anyway. “Who?”

Pushing off the table, Mom walks over to me before I can open the door. “I know it may seem tempting to go back to what’s familiar to you, but you’ve got your whole life ahead of you. Plus, you’ve got a puppy who’s only partially house-trained. What am I supposed to do with him? I told you already that he’s your responsibility, not mine.”

Gripping the strap of my purse as I haul it over my shoulder, I turn to my mother, trying to keep calm. My mood has been everywhere lately, along with my mind, and patience hasn’t come as easily, especially when Caleb is the topic of conversation. I went back and forth on meeting up with him tonight, and truth be told, I’m not sure why I am. I swore to myself that I’d cut him out of my life cold turkey.

For him. All for him. What will it take for him to understand that?

The truth, that pesky voice mocks me.The one you refuse to tell him.

I’d rather he assume the worst of me, that I wanted to try seeing other people instead of settling with him, than let him know the real reason. I don’t want to admit that I saw Cody, that he got me pregnant, or that I suffered a miscarriage, and I don’t want to relive all the moments after—the doctor appointments, the bad news delivered by the specialists.

I want this choice to allow Caleb and me to grieve but to be grateful in the long run. Because maybe someday we can both be happy, however that unfolds in our respective lives.

Shaking out of the thought, I say, “Sigmund is sleeping in his crate with his stuffed duck that you bought him. I took him out already, and he’s got food and water, so he’ll be fine until I’m back.”

Mom lets out one of her heavy sighs. “I still can’t believe you named him after that weird man with the mommy issues. He’s too cute for that. It’s almost cruel.”

I roll my eyes at her theatrics. She was against having a puppy around until she saw Sigmund’s face. She fell in love the second his tongue darted out to give her a sloppy kiss. “He’s one of the most famous psychologists in the world, Mom. Even if a lot of his psychoanalysis theories have been discredited, his studies have done a lot for modern-day therapy. We wouldn’t be where we are if not for his work.”

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