Page 56 of Sea La Vie
Liv continues to sob into my chest and wipes at her eyes. When she looks up with mascara stained eyes, she looks pitiful. I will never love Liv the way I thought I did, but she’s still human and regardless of how badly she treated me. I’ve come to realize that her cheating on me was honestly the best thing that’s ever happened to me. So, I let her cry and use my t-shirt as her snot rag for a few more minutes.
Finally, she pulls back and rests her forehead on my chin. It's unnervingly intimate and feels weird. From the wrong angle, it could look like something it’s not. “I’m sorry, Tate.”
I look around, trying to think of the quickest, most polite way to wrap this up and send Liv back on her way to Charlotte once and for all. Except when I do, something in the distance catches my eye. It’s Lainey, staring at us wide-eyed. She doesn’t say anything, just blinks back tears, then spins on her heel and starts jogging back toward the diner.
“Wait! Lainey, please wait!” I yell after her. I whirl around to find Liv, staring between the two of us, doe-eyed.
“That’s her, isn’t it?” Liv's voice comes out small, not quite angry, but defeated. My brows furrow, trying to recall a time I ever told her about Lainey.
“The girl you told me about the night we first met in that little bar downtown. You were already three beers in when you said you loved her but she didn’t know and she never would, becauseyou never got the chance to tell her. I thought when you went home with me that night, maybe I could change your mind. But I never did, did I?” Liv bites the corner of her mouth, and I glance toward Lainey, who’s becoming smaller and smaller in the distance.
“I’m so sorry, Liv,” I say. “I never meant to hurt you.”
“I’ve been trying to live up to a girl you never stopped loving.”
I sigh, realizing she’s right.
“Go,” Liv says suddenly and waves a hand at me.
I cock my head, confused. I want to chase after Lainey more than anything right now, but the last thing I expected was Liv’s blessing.
“Go,” she says again. “Please.” She gives me a weak smile. “I’m done trying to live up to her. I hope she’s everything you’ve been missing and more.”
Liv’s eyes meet mine for a brief moment before she turns them to the ground. “I’ll have my things packed up by the weekend.”
“Stay,” I blurt. “I mean in my condo. I’ll come pack my things up. We can work out something with the lease.”
Liv considers this briefly, then nods with a small smile. “I always did love that apartment.”
I glance behind Lainey again, looking for any sign of her, but all I see are the moths dancing in the glow of the streetlights.
“Bye, Tate,” Liv says. She offers a small wave then walks toward her car. Something flashes out of the corner of my eye, and I turn around to find Lucille with the curtains pulled back, staring daggers at me through the window. She points hard in Lainey’s direction, mouth set in a straight line. “Go find her,” she mouths.
So I run.
I run down the sidewalk and past Shuckin’ Hucks. I run down to the boardwalk and scan the docks when I see a boat’s lights turn on to my right. Finally, I catch up to her right as soon as shesteps onto her boat. She doesn’t look up as she begins untying the ropes. “Please leave,” she says.
“I don’t know what you think you saw, but I promise nothing happened,” I say, my chest still heaving from jogging to catch up with her. She still doesn’t look up but continues to busy herself with the boat. “Are you going out right now?” I ask. The sun has already set, and the stars are already sprinkling the sky. I always hate the thought of her going out there alone but especially now, in the dark.
“I need to be alone,” she mutters, then wipes a hand along her cheek.
I jump down into the boat and gently take the rope she's holding from her hands. “Liv came and found me,” I begin explaining. “And she asked me to come back.”
Before I can continue, Lainey looks up and her eyes meet mine. When they do, they are full of sadness and tinged with worry. “Maybe you should go back,” she says, setting her jaw. She nods as if not only to convince me, but herself too. “I was stupid to think I was enough to make you stay in this nothing town when I never was before.”
I sigh, my shoulders slumping. “Lainey, you’ve got it all wrong. I loveit here. I love the sunrises, the sunsets, the beaches, the town, the crazy people….you. I’m sorry for never calling you back the day we had that big fight all those years ago. I should’ve done more to find you, but I was a kid…I didn’t know what to do. And you had just broken my heart. I truly didn’t think you wanted anything to do with me. And you told me I was going to turn out like my dad. And that worried me, Lainey. I knew the potential was there for me to become an alcoholic, just like him. I didn’t want to put you through that. I thought maybe you were right and that you deserved better than someone like me.” I wait for her reaction. A single tear spills down her cheek, and her lower lip trembles. I take a deep breath and muster up thecourage to continue. “I should’ve never let you go that easily, and I’ll regret that for the rest of my life. I love you,Lainey. I know I’m kind of a fish out of water here, and I’m nothing like the locals. I can’t work on my own car, I can’t fish, I can’t even wear swimming trunks here without showing my butt to the entire beach. But I’d stay anywhere if it meant I got to stay withyou.”
Lainey smiles despite the hardness in her eyes. Then, her bottom lip trembles. “I know you could never be anything remotely close to your father,” she says softly. “But, I saw you kissing her.”
My heart breaks in half at Lainey’s vulnerability. I know she only lets certain people see this side of her, and to know that I’m one of those select few and she thinks I betrayed her is killing me. “I think what you saw was her resting her head on my chin. And I know that doesn’t sound much better than a kiss but let me try to explain, okay?”
Lainey works her jaw, and her brows furrow. “Please?” I ask. Finally she nods. “She came and found me to ask if I would come back. I said no, obviously. She started crying, and I hugged her because I can’t stand when women cry.” I say, pleading with my eyes for her to believe me. “After she stopped crying, she rested her head on my chin and I was trying to figure out a way to get her to leave when you saw us. When she saw you, she realized I had never stopped loving you. You were the one I could never get out of my mind, and she knew that, Lainey. She knew I was never in love with her, and I think tonight, she realized she was never in love with me, either.”
Lainey chews on her bottom lip, mulling this information over. “Youthoughtyou loved her though, Tate. You bought an engagement ring.”
I sigh, knowing she has a point. How can I make her understand? “I was afraid if I didn’t propose, I’d be throwing my life away. I know it’s stupid but I was so afraid of living lifethe way I’d always known, traveling from one place to the next, never putting down roots anywhere. I should’ve never planned on proposing to her at all because of a stupid idea I had in my head.”
Lainey frowns then crosses her arms. “I don’t fit into your checklist. I don't think I’lleverfit into your checklist.”
