Page 83 of For Butter or Worse
“You? Too proud?”
She eyed his hand with the IV tube like she wanted to hold it. Part of him wished she would, because feeling the weight of her hand would be a much better option than the itchy hospital sheets.
“You didn’t have to come,” he offered. “No one knows I’m here, so there’s no publicity angle we need to play.”
“Come on, don’t be like that. I wanted to come,” she said cautiously. She sat on the bed and reached tentatively for his hand, but he didn’t reach back. “Also, you turned your phone off, apparently. I tried to reach you. I called. I texted. So now I’m here. I want to apologize—”
But he didn’t want to be broken up with while he sat in a hospital bed. He was too tired and drained from realizing she wasn’t into him. So before she went on a tangent about how it wasn’t him, it was her, or explained that she’d never really gotten over Charlie, or took the time to remind him that they were just friends, nothing more, he decided to make things easy.
“This isn’t working,” he interrupted her, ripping off the Band-Aid. “We should call it off.”
She looked surprised, but he was dubious. Why was she suddenly scowling? Shouldn’t she be doing a victory dance that she’d finally be rid of him?
“Call it off?” she repeated.
“Don’t act like you aren’t relieved. I know you’ve been counting down the days. And this situation hasn’t exactly been easy on me.” He didn’t want to get into the specifics, like the fact that seeing a photo of Nina and Charlie together had essentially sent him to the ER. Details like that would definitely affirm that he’d fallen for her, and he already knew she didn’t reciprocate.
“I know I messed up today...” She stood and began to pace the short length in front of the bed. “But it was a silly text. I don’t want to call it off because of that.”
She stopped in front of the bed and swallowed hard. “Do you really want to end this?” Her voice had turned soft. He didn’t say a word in response. But, no, he didn’t. He wanted to wrap her in his arms and feel her wavy hair falling around his face, the cinnamon scent of her overpowering him. He would forever give up watching rom-coms if it meant he could leave this room, take her home and disappear into his bedroom for the next week. He wished he could erase the image of her with Charlie.
“I was coming here to explain that the text you saw was a mistake,” she continued. “I feel terrible that you saw that. I meant to send it to Charlie. He wouldn’t leave me alone—”
“But you were just with Charlie,” he said, cutting her off.
Her jaw twitched. “I wasn’twithhim. He told me he’d leave me alone if we went to lunch. He just wanted to talk.”
“It seems to me like any time Charlie shows up, you do whatever he says. He’s on your porch, you kiss him. He asks you to lunch, you go.” Leo was hurt. He knew he was taking out his frustration on Nina, but he didn’t know how else to react, or what she wanted from him. “You won’t even respond to my texts, but you’re willing to spend the afternoon with your ex?”
“How can you say that to me?” she said.
“I can say that to you because I thought we had something.” The words felt hot and rancid in his mouth. He wanted to take them back, because here he was, being vulnerable in front of Nina, when he knew she’d played him. But he couldn’t stop himself.
“And my ex practically stalking me changes that?” She was shouting the words. “If you are looking for an out, that’s fine. I know all you wanted was something casual.”
“What do you mean by that?” he quickly demanded.
But she waved him off. “Just don’t throw this back on me and make me feel like shit.”
“You mademefeel like shit, Nina,” he shouted back. “One minute you’re all over me, and the next you’re with this other guy. So go ahead and run back to Charlie. I guess you tend to run when things get tough, huh? Like with the show.”
Her eyes narrowed at him. “When things get ‘tough’? You have no idea what being hated by millions of people is like. The role I was forced to play wasn’t just ‘tough,’ Leo. It was unfair and doing damage to my mental health. I had to take care of myself, because no one else would. If anyone should be able to understand that, it’s you. Except I guess you wouldn’t understand. You’re so in denial that you put yourself in the damn hospital.”
“I opened up to you!” His throat burned. He swallowed a big knot of tension. “Do you know how hard that is for me to do?”
“Opened up to me? Is this your version of opening up? Getting caught in a lie about how bad your anxiety is?” She threw up her hands, then placed them on the railing of his hospital bed. “And what do you think—that I just go around telling people about my mom? Or how hurt I am by the online comments I get? I opened up to you, too, Leo. I haven’t been with anyone since Charlie. He seriously fucked me up. I didn’t want to be with him today, but I needed him out of my life for good. And you know what? You’re just like him—blaming me for everything. Trying to bring me down. I can’t believe I thought you were...”
She trailed off and shook her head. Her fingers rubbed at her temples as she eyed the floor.
He was reeling from her words. Was she actually comparing him to Charlie? But he had to know. “You thought I was what?”
She looked up at him then, her expression as disappointed as he’d ever seen. “I thought that you were different from the rest of them.”
“You think I’m as bad as Charlie?” he asked. Was she serious?
Nina looked away and shrugged.
Well, that confirmed that. His thoughts stopped spinning as he realized that at least part of what she said was right. Here he was, projecting his hurt onto her. Blaming her for a situation he’d had more than a part in creating. Maybe he wasn’t all that different from the other men who’d tried to put their needs before hers. He’d brought up Charlie to wound her when he knew damn well the guy had never deserved to know her name. He’d mentioned her nickname on-air because he was trying to one-up her. How was he any better than all the awful, egotistical bros she’d had to work with? Or date, in Charlie’s case.
