Page 86 of Do You Take This Man

And in that moment, with everything Lear and I had just said to each other, the possibility of something romantic to believe in had never felt like a bigger illusion.

Chapter 44

Lear

MY PHONE BUZZEDon the nightstand like an incessant fly in my ear. I finally rolled over to silence it. My mouth tasted like I’d slept with an old gym sock in it, and my head rejected the movement. The bottle of Jack I’d finished the night before clattered to the floor, and I groped for my phone without moving my head from under the shade of the blanket. I had a brief recollection of stumbling to the bathroom, which was probably the only reason my bladder wasn’t joining the party of body parts cursing me.I’m drinking too much.I knew it was true, and I made a promise to myself to get my head back in order.

Caitlin:If you don’t pick up your phone so I know you’re alive, I’m asking Gretchen to check on you.

Lear:I’m alive. Go away.

Caitlin:PICK UP YOUR DAMN PHONE.

It buzzed again in my hand, this time with a phone call, and I considered ignoring it and going back to sleep. Shutting my eyesdidn’t help, and my head still swam in an attempt to quell the churning in my stomach. I tapped the green icon. “I’m too hungover for this.”

“Then you should have answered a single message from me in the last week.” Her voice was louder than normal, and I winced. “I was worried about you, jackass.”

“I’m a grown man.” I rolled to my side, where a cool spot on the pillow was a welcome sensation against my skin.

“Debatable.”

I had a high tolerance for my sister, even in the worst of times, but it was in short supply right now. It had been two weeks since I’d turned RJ down, and a week since she’d told me to forget I knew her and stormed out. I’d watched her go in shock, but also with righteous indignation firmly in place. Standing in the alcove, I’d reminded myself that she wasn’t that different from Sarah, and that I didn’t need the hassle. I’d tried to hang on to that feeling, but even after a bottle of Jack, the sinking sense that I missed her was still there. “What do you want, Cait? I’m alive. I’m fine.”

“You’re hungover on a Monday morning.”

“I work weekends and today is my day off. Don’t make it sound like I skipped work.”

“Why are you hungover on a Monday? Penny said you haven’t been around all week.”

Penny and Kelly, along with baby Connor, were finally home and settling into their new life. Coming back to work didn’t mean catching up on anything, since she’d been all over me about every event she’d missed.

“Penny has a big mouth,” I grumbled.

Caitlin’s voice softened. “I knew I should have come out there on his birthday. You’re not okay.”

I sat up, legs hanging off the side of the bed, and regretted it asmy head spun, countering the relief of being upright. “I’m fine. It’s just been a long week. It’s not that.”

“Well, what is it?”

RJ. It’s RJ.“Nothing.”

“I swear to God, Lear.” She used the same tone our mom had growing up. It was uncanny, and I would have teased her about it normally. “I’m not letting this go. You’re the only brother I have, and you had a hard year, but you’re drinking a lot, and you need to let me in because you won’t let anyone else in.”

“I did, okay?” I fell back against the pillows.

“You did what?” Her voice returned to normal. “You let someone in? Who?”

I let my eyelids fall closed again and saw RJ’s smile in the murky darkness: the smile she flashed me over waffles; the shy smile when she handed me that envelope, the one I hadn’t opened yet; the smile she gave me after she came down from a powerful orgasm. I saw all her smiles. “It doesn’t matter. It was something and now it’s nothing.”

“A woman?”

I rested my hand over my heart. “Yeah.”

Caitlin was quiet for a few moments. “She broke up with you?”

“Do we need to talk about this?”

“No, we don’t have to.” In a very Caitlin way, she let her statement hang in the air until I spoke.

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