Page 56 of One More Time
He was asked about his Grammys and where he kept his platinum records. Chloe offered further details on the honeymoon. Brandon spoke about the Hamptons. Devin said something about a marathon. Nicky couldn’t seem to hold on to any of the threads of conversation.
He knew he and Lucy had to get the song stuff out in the open. Intellectually, he recognized it as a barrier. A fixed stopping point to anything more that he might hope to have with her. He just really didn’t know how to bring it up. Or, to be honest, what to say.
Nicky was beginning to suspect that the song meant something to Lucy. He had felt her stiffen next to him when Sam brought it up, couldn’t help but note how her eyes had closed as though pushing it away. And it scared the shit out of him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
LUCY
The whole bizarre circus that was Lucy’s family said their many, many goodbyes in a little atrium outside the restaurant. Beyond their strange bubble was a shopping area chock-full of luxury brands and the tourists ready to indulge in them.
Lucy had hugged all of her exes, save one. As Brandon finally approached her, she heard Jenna tell him that she was going to pop into Bulgari and for him to meet her there.
‘Have a minute for a quick chat?’ Brandon asked, more to Nicky, who was standing behind her.
‘I’ll just …’ Nicky said, pointing a thumb over his shoulder toward the riot of color and checkerboard in a MacKenzie-Childs shop window. He walked away, looking back at her twice.
Brandon eyed Nicky, then gazed back to Lucy. Her ex-husband looked different, younger. His brown hairhad lost all traces of gray since meeting Jenna. His face was smoother, more relaxed. Either he had a very talented plastic surgeon, or Jenna and the new baby on the way were a calming influence. Her money was on the surgeon.
Brandon took a deep breath, inhaling like he was preparing to say something, while smoothing the lapel of his perfectly tailored linen jacket.
The words Lucy was expecting didn’t come, though. Instead, Brandon just exhaled loudly and shoved a hand in the pocket of his sportscoat.
‘Maybe we should, uh, sit down,’ he said, tipping his head toward a bench nestled into a planter filled with tropical plants.
Usually, Brandon didn’t talk so much as confidently instruct. His gentle tone and stuttering speech had piqued Lucy’s curiosity. ‘Sure, okay,’ Lucy replied.
When they were seated on the bench – and Nicky had moved to keep her in his line of sight – Brandon said, ‘I’m sorry.’
‘For what?’ Lucy asked, shocked. Brandon didn’t apologize much. Or,at allthat Lucy could recall.
‘I think when we met, I was looking for Jenna.’
Wow, didn’t see that one coming.Lucy feared the sudden shift to the distant past had given her whiplash.
She said, ‘Well, Brandon, I hate to tell you this, but if you had found Jenna instead of me back in the old days you’d be in jail, because you’d have found her in a kindergarten classroom.’
‘No, I don’t mean Jenna specifically. I mean—’ Brandonlooked down at his perfectly polished bespoke loafers. ‘Look, when we split up, I was angry.’
‘I noticed,’ Lucy tutted.
‘But I’m realizing now, aftermanylong, expensive hours with a therapist, that I wasn’t really angry with you. I was angry that you couldn’t be what I wanted. I see now, it was on me. My expectations were unrealistic. You were you, and I was me, and neither of us was going to change.’
Lucy was stunned. She didn’t know what to say to that. Brandon was in therapy. He had afeeling.
He continued, ‘I’m sorry that I was an asshole. While we were married and after. You didn’t deserve it.’
Lucy sighed. As much as she’d love to bask in her ex-husband’s contrition, it wouldn’t be honest. Lucy said, ‘It wasn’t just you, Brandon. I probably should have known that I wasn’t that girl. The one who wanted to stay home with the kids and summer in the Hamptons and do the whole Wall Street wife thing. I tried. But I think deep down I knew, even before we got married, that I wasn’t going to love it.’
‘We were so young and naïve,’ he said with a half-smile.
‘We were.’
A long moment of silence passed between them, maybe a nanosecond for every year they’d been angry with one another.
‘For what it’s worth, I like him,’ Brandon said, nodding toward Nicky who seemed to be studiously inspecting a black-and-white checkered espresso machine.
Lucy muttered, ‘Oh, it’s not—’ but then couldn’t decide how to finish the sentence.
