Page 74 of Faking It With the Small-Town Bad Boy

want to hear, Leah.”

“The truth would be a great start.”

Throwing up his hands in defeat, he retorts, “I gave her everything,

and all she gave me was a few bruises, a tainted image of her

cheating on me, and the ability to finally stop drowning in whiskey.”

Although all claims are interesting, I can’t help but lean into the last

one. “What do you mean you could finally stop drinking because of

her? That would mean—”

“I drank in the first place because of her,” he bites, his tone a little

harsher than before. “Let’s be real here, Leah, since you want to

know what my relationship with Farrah looked like. It looked like

war. Every day and every night it was a fucking war. It wasn’t her

insecurity, it was her accusations against me. If it wasn’t that I had

ruined her day by making some menial little comment towards her, it

was that I was too standoffish with her. I could never win.”

I nod with his complicated outpouring of pain. The things I want to

comment on, I can’t, simply because I don’t have the right to dissect

him any more than I already have. Granted, this setting has seemed

to be a better alternative than cornering him in my kitchen and

asking what the hell went wrong in his relationship, but I know when

people have hit their limits.

Everyone else’s limits except for my own.

“I’m an ugly crier,” I say, bringing the focus back to me.

It’s easier to pick on myself than it is to pick on him.

“I don’t think so,” he replies smoothly. “You looked rather pretty

before when you were upset. Back in the garage.”

“You weren’t even supposed to see that.”

“But I did, and I liked it. You looked real, Leah. There’s nothing

wrong with looking real.”

I wave him off, finding the glints of stars through the light brush of

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