Page 46 of Begin Again

“Was your ex fussy?” he asked.

Liz took a deep breath. She didn’t want to talk about this but had been putting it off. In her mind she knew if she gave just enough it might stop further questions.

That was how she played it with her father and it seemed to be working.

“Yes,” she said. “There were times I couldn’t do much right.”

He nodded his head. “Tate said that to me the other night about his ex. I guess I think of it more from his point of view than a woman’s.”

“What did he tell you?” she asked. She was glad that Christian went to dinner with his friend. She was starting to feel bad that he didn’t do anything unless she was around and she wasn’t around much.

But Christian’s mother had told her that her son couldn’t sit still. This was the longest he’d gone without having at least another flip lined up.

When she heard that, she wondered if they were hinting that he was doing these things in her house for that reason.

Then she started to think they were judging her and that she was taking advantage of his free time.

She tried to assure Judy Butler that wasn’t the case. That Christian didn’t want to take no for an answer.

There was some laughter to that and Judy had said her son never changed and he wouldn’t. For her to get used to it.

But she wasn’t used to it and when Christian had told her that Tate had a house he wanted the two of them to do together, she encouraged it. Just like she was glad he was going to a game with Tate in July because she’d already volunteered to work so she wasn’t forced onto other shifts with mandatory overtime.

“That his ex was never happy. He’d done everything she asked and it was never enough. He said no one is happy in the end. He wasn’t happy because he couldn’t do anything right and she wasn’t because it never ended. She found someone else to give it to her.”

“Sounds like she didn’t know what she wanted other than she didn’t want him,” she said.

“I think he figured that out after his ex left.”

“It’s hard to learn that way,” she said. She turned to wash her hands, then grabbed a paper towel to dry them and get a pan. “You want to know more about my marriage, don’t you?”

“You don’t want to tell me and I shouldn’t ask,” he said.

“There are things no one knows. It’s like that with any relationship,” she said. “It was a lot like what Tate went through...but worse.”

“Did he make you feel bad about yourself?” he asked, frowning.

“Doesn’t every relationship that fails result in people feeling bad about themselves?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve been in relationships that haven’t worked, but I never felt like shit afterward and I hope the woman didn’t either. Things work or they don’t.”

“It’s not that simple,” she said. “Let’s just say he wanted me to be something I wasn’t. Something I couldn’t be.”

“You’re not going to say much more?” he asked. “I just want to understand.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Because I don’t ever want you to feel that way with me. But I won’t know if you don’t tell me if I’m doing something wrong.”

“There is the difference, Christian. You want to know to prevent it, but this isn’t something to prevent. It’s either in you to be this way or not.”

“I don’t like where this is going,” he said.

She knew she had to dial it back. “Fine. He liked thin women,” she said.

“Okay,” he said. “You’re far from fat.”

“To him, right now, he’d be appalled.”

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