Page 80 of Problematic Summer Romance

She replies without turning. “Um, I’m just going up to see if the babysitter Lucrezia recommended is doing okay with Kaede, I’ll be right…” She cuts off. Because I’m standing in front of her, and it’s obvious, even in the shadows, that her cheeks are tearstained.

It’s not the first time I’ve seen Minami cry. She did so at my dad’s funeral, and at least a dozen times more in the following years. This is different, though, and I doubt it has anything to do with the announcement she just made. The pinched tension in her face is closer to anger than sadness.

“I just…” Her fists tighten. She shakes her head, as if talking herself out of something.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes. No. I’m…” She screws her eyes shut, then finds the closest bench, elbows on her knees. Takes several long breaths before saying, “I just need a minute.”

I take a seat next to her, patting her shoulder with my hand. I think I know what set her off, but…“Is this…Is it what Avery said?”

A nod. “I—I adore her. I’m so happy she’s at Harkness. Before she came on board it was a fucking sausage-fest in those rooms, and I…” She straightens up. Her throat works. “I’m tired of being dragged into this. It’s been over a decade. Everyone assumes—even Eli is so sure that one day I just fell out of love and irreparably broke Hark’s heart. But that’s not…” She wipes at her cheek. “This is probably Hark’s fault. I wish I knew what the hell he tells people, when they ask why we broke up.”

“That he asked you to marry him. You refused, and then it was over.”

“Is that what…?” She scoffs. “Of course.”

“He doesn’t blameyou, Minami.” The last thing I want is to create trouble between her and Conor. But maybe it’s too late. There are several parallel lines on her usually smooth brow.

“Cool. I mean, it’s true. But does he saywhyI rejected him? Did he explain that he was absolutelyunknowable? That I had to pry every word out of him? That he was so damn secretive and shady about his upbringing, for a long time I suspected he’d spent time in juvie for setting an orphanage on fire, or some equally abominable thing? Did he tell you that my biggest issue in our relationship was the total lack of communication about his wishes and needs? Please, tell me he at least bothered to givecontextwhen he said that we broke up becauseIrejected his proposal.”

I blink at Minami, before calmly replying, “He didn’t say any of that.” She rolls her eyes, but her demeanor changes when I add, “But he did mention that he thought it was his fault. That he was broken to begin with.”

Her expression softens, head falling back to look at the sky, chest heaving deeply, once. “I could really use a shot, right now.”

“I’m sure Axel has something in his room.”

She laughs. Breathes for a few moments, following the rhythm of the cicadas. “Really, Iamsympathetic to Hark’s rich-white-boy trauma. His family, they messed him up good. Hark’s mom…for some reason I truly cannot fathom, this lady actually loved her cruel, cheating, abusive piece of shit of a husband. And Hark’s younger brothers—they should be preventatively locked up before they start a scammy memecoin or run someone over in a meth-fueled bender. And his father, of course, was a sadistic, manipulative shithead who treated his family like cattle. Hark’s lifelong mission statement isDon’t Be Like Dad, and he’s a control freak about that. But maybe because his mom was this fragile, ever-suffering woman, that’s how he sees his partners. Someone to nurture and take care of, but…”

“Someone to protect, as opposed to someone to share a life with?”

“Yes! For years, he was holding back on…pretty much every single level. If something happened in his life, I was the last to know. The only emotion he felt comfortable displaying was anger, and he just poured it into his work. And for a while I told myself that it was fine, but then I realized that all this love he professed to feel for me was just…convenient. He wanted to be with someone who wouldn’t rob him of his control, like his dad had robbed his mom. He wanted to live with someone he could live without.” She closes her eyes. “Still, I told myself, I can fix that. I can fixhim. But I couldn’t. He had to fix himself. And when I told him that it wasn’t working for me, that I couldn’t continue that way…”

“He asked you to marry him,” I conclude. Becauseof coursethat would be Hark’s response. What a fucking joke.

“He grew up in mountains of privilege, but his childhood was so affectively bankrupt, he never had examples of functioningrelationships in front of him. He’s unable to get in touch with his feelings and to meaningfully engage with his desires.” She rubs her face, exhausted. “It’s not true, what he told Avery. That he can’t be with her because he’s still in love with me. Because—he simplyisn’t. Either he was lying to her, or he’s lying to himself.”

There is a third option, of course: that he was referring to someone else altogether. But Minami has no way of knowing. In fact, no one does.

No one but me.

“I’m sorry for venting, Maya. I—please, don’t repeat any of this. The kicker is, most of this stuff about his family, I only know from Tamryn. He never even told me himself. He’d hate it, if he found out.”

I nod, reassuring. Pull her in for a hug, and don’t bother telling her the truth: That everything Minami had to fight and scrape and beg to learn, every little detail about Conor’s family, I knew already. He told me when we first met in Scotland. He told me over countless late-night phone calls over the past three years. He told me when I asked, and he told me when I didn’t.

Because one day, Conor Harkness decided that he wanted someone to know him. And he choseme.

Chapter 25

Three years earlier

Edinburgh, Scotland

Maya:Sorry I didn’t pick up, half of my mouth is asleep.

Conor:Ouch. Cavity?

Maya:Yeah.

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