Page 98 of Perfect Mess

“Putting a medal around someone’s neck requires advanced hand eye coordination. If she wasn’t looking at him, she could have poked his eye out or something.”

“She hugged him.”

“Janet is a friendly person.”

Gary wasn’t just looking at me, he looked through me. Watching every breath. Analyzing every blink. Across the pool, a green and blue dragonfly lazily hovered over the water. Across the yard, a bright red cardinal hopped along a tree branch. In the sky, a large white cloud shifted into the shape of a hippopotamus wearing a tutu. Or maybe it was a giant mushroom wearing a top hat. Or maybe it was just a shapeless blob of white, fluffy nothingness. Like my soul.

“Mary.” Gary’s voice brought me back to reality. “How long have you known?”

As much as I wished I could transform myself into a dragonfly or a cardinal or a fluffy white cloud and just fly far away, I knew I had to own up to what I did. I had to tell Gary the truth.

“Since the beginning,” I confessed. “They connected at the high school reunion, and it was my fault.”

If Gary was surprised, he didn’t show it. He only nodded, as if what I was saying made any kind of sense. Really, he looked numb. Mentally numb. Emotionally numb. At the time, I thought that was our lowest point. The level of trust between two people sinking to somewhere between zero and negative infinity. Little did I know there was still a long drop ahead.

“I made her go to the reunion because I was trying to give her a distraction, take her mind off her ex. Things sort of fell into place. Or out of place, I guess.”

It was like I had pulled loose the first stone in the dam. Once the first lie had seen the light of day, they all came rushing out at once. “They’re not right for each other,” I blurted. “Janet should be with someone kind. Someone caring. Someone like …” I looked back up into Gary’s eyes. “Someone like you.”

For a moment, his eyes softened. His jaw was no longer clenched. The color in his cheeks, his lips, his nose all came back. Maybe there was still a scrap of our tentative friendship left.

“So you were using me to get her away from Jack.” It wasn’t a question. He stated it as fact.

“Yes.” A wave of shame washed over me. The guilt of everything all hitting at once. The staging at the grocery store and book signing farce. Using a children’s charity event for my own selfish needs. If my conscience had been a little green bug sitting on my shoulder, it would have bitten me on the earlobe, and then kicked me in the nose. “I’m sorry.”

“Mary.”

I kept staring into the water. I couldn’t even look him in the eye. Maybe if I was lucky, a giant octopus would reach up and pull me down into the depths.

“Mary, look at me.”

I did.

“Why are you sorry?”

Why was I sorry?I wasn’t sure I heard him right. I had tried to use Gary to wedge my best friend apart from the guy she was seeing. A guy I wanted for myself. Of course I was sorry. What kind of person wouldn’t be sorry? What kind of person did Gary think I was?

“Why should you be sorry?” Gary said, his voice rising. “Jack Thompson was an asshole. No. Jack Thompsonisan asshole. Guys like that never change.”

The intensity in Gary’s voice gave me pause. Jack Thompson was an asshole, sure. No one would argue that. But Jack had changed. When I talked to Jack at the driving range, he apologized for what he had done to me back in high school. He bared his heart and his soul. He’d been sincere; I was sure of it. People change. Jack had changed.Hadn’t he?

“You were just trying to protect your friend,” Gary said. “Honestly, I don’t blame you. I would have done the same thing.” Elbows still propped on the pool deck, Gary’s hands curled into fists. The anger was plain on his face.

“Gary?” There was a darkness in his eyes.

Gary took a deep breath, clenched and unclenched his hands. When he turned back to me, the darkness was gone, replaced by pain.

“Gary, are you okay?”

“You weren’t the only one he humiliated, you know,” Gary said. “Back in high school, Jack and his football buddies liked to have their fun. None of us were as big as he was. None of us were as strong. I guess the kids like me were easy targets. The chess kid who played dungeons and dragons. The kid who made the mistake of wearing his Eagle scout uniform to school.”

“You wore your uniform?”

Gary nodded.

“To school?”

Gary nodded again. “Right after I earned my final badge. It was something I was proud of. Until Jack saw me wearing it.” Gary trailed off. Now it was his turn to stare into the pool.

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