Tallulah Ryker was frowning as he walked into the waiting room. His gaze scanned the crowd until it landed on me. The frown grew de eper as he made his way toward where Mom and I were standing. I’d chosen a spot near the window. Away from everyone else. I needed air. They were all packed together, going over what they had heard or seen. I didn’t want to re cap it. My stomach stayed in knots, and that made it worse. “Hey,” Ryker said, and shifted feet. He seemed uncomfortable. “Is he okay?” I asked, worried something had changed. Wishing I could see him just to reassure myself he was alive. “Yeah, uh, he’s upset. He saw Haegan, after he was gone. He saw it all. It’s haunting him, messing with his head.” I’d never seen someone die before. I imagined it was the worst experience one could go through. “Can I see him?” I asked. Ryker sighed, then shook his head. “No. He... he... doesn’t want to see you. He is angry with you. I don’t know what went down with y’all before all this happened, but he’s adamant that you leave.” I stood there confused and in shock. We’d argued a little about my helping Mr. Dace. It hadn’t been a real fight. I hadn’t left angry with him. Not that kind of angry. I was disappointed. But it hadn’t made me not want to see him
again. “I don’t understand,” I whispered. Ryker shrugged. “Like I said. Not sure what happened, but he needs space and time. Can’t force him to see you if he doesn’t want to.” That was it? I was just supposed to leave. Go away and give him time. He didn’t want to see me. That knowledge made my already fragile heart crumble. Today had been one I would never forget and would have nightmares about for years to come. Mr. Dace, then the car accident, then this. “Let’s go, honey.” Mom’s hand was on my arm. I realized her small touch was much-needed support. I wanted to ball up on the floor and cry. About so many things. But I couldn’t. Not here. I nodded my head and let her begin to lead me away. But I stopped and turned to look back at Ryker. “I loved him, you know.” I started to say more and stopped. That was something I hadn’t truly admitted to myself. I had claimed I’d been in love with him most of my life, but until I got to know him, I hadn’t understood what really loving a guy meant. I did now. And even though his rejection was ripping me apart, I would forgive him. That’s what love did. Ryker’s expression was pained. He didn’t say more. I left then. Walked away not looking back. Not searching for signs of Nash in the hallway. Mom led me outside, where the sun still shined. The warmth of the afternoon was still heavy in the air. My mom’s car was there, parked where we left it. Everything was the same, but it was also very different.
When we were both inside, she reached over and squeezed my hand. “He will regret this. But he is in pain right now. Ryker’s right. He needs space, and if he doesn’t see how you could help him heal, then that is his loss.” No. His loss was his friend. I was just a girl he was spending time with. Where I had fallen in love so easily, he hadn’t. He had been my first kiss. I had been one of his many. I understood it, yet it didn’t make it hurt less. This was a growing pain. Nash had taught me a lot. More than I realized I needed to know. Being invisible and alone with my books had been easier. I had hurt when I was made fun of or left out, which was daily. But I’d never felt this sharp pain in my chest. It made it hard to breathe. The saying “It is better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all” didn’t seem true to me. I disagreed. I thought it would be easier to not know how it felt for your heart to break. There was no going back. I knew now. “He was the first boy I loved. I feel as if I will always love him, but this... this pain I will never forget. I understand now why you never married. When I was a little girl, I daydreamed about you meeting a man and how beautiful you would be as a bride. I’d get a daddy, and we’d have a family photo on the wall with a dog. A large yellow lab.” I hadn’t thought of that dream in a long time. I’d outgrown it years ago. “But I am glad you didn’t. I am glad it was just us. That your heart was never broken. That you were happy the way we were.” My mother sighed. I didn’t look her way. I k ept staring out the window as we drove back to Lawton. I knew when I said it she wouldn’t like it. But it was true.
She’d been smart to hide from love, to not try to find it. “Tallulah,” she said, her voice heavy with what sounded like regret. “That’s not how I want you to feel. I never married again because no man was the right one. I wasn’t looking for just me but you, too. If I were to fall in love with a man, he’d have to love you as his own. That would be the final piece to winning my heart. No man I dated was ever good enough to be your father. I had expectations, and not one man I dated met those. That’s why I never married.” She had hardly dated. I could remember only two men in the past she’d brought home to meet me. “You didn’t look very hard, then. Because you’ve only dated twice in my life.” Mom laughed softly. I turned this time to look at her. I didn’t know why that was funny. I used to feel sad for her. Worry that she was lonely without a husband. She didn’t take her eyes off the road. “Oh, sweetheart. Only two men made the cut to get to meet you. Out of the many, many men I dated, the two you met I went out with several times and trusted that they just might possibly be good enough for you. They were good men, or I’d never have brought them to meet you. But in the end I realized I wasn’t one hundred percent sure that they were what you needed. What we needed.” My mom had dated many, many men? What? “You dated how many men exactly?” I asked, still shocked by this news. She shrugged. “Gosh, I don’t know. Friends would fix me up on blind dates. Those never went well. I met other men at work. I had many dates that never made it past the first one. Dating for me was like an interview. I think it’s that way with all single moms. I wasn’t out there to fill some romantic need. I was looking for a companion. Someone that I’d fall in love with.
Everyone needs love, Tallulah.” I never knew. I always wondered how my beautiful, fun mother had remained single. I couldn’t understand where all the men were. Why they weren’t sending her flowers and asking her out. All along she’d been dating. “So the man who gave the sperm that created me didn’t break you and destroy your belief in love after all?” Because that was what I had always thought. My mom smiled softly. It was almost wistful. “No. He didn’t. He taught me that life was hard. Not to trust easily and to be on guard. I was so young and naïve when I met him. Those were lessons I needed, and they were hard ones to learn. But I will always forever be thankful that with those lessons he left me with the most precious gift of my life. You.” She had told me many times in my life that my biological father gave her me so she could never hate him. But I hated him enough for both of us. Not because he didn’t want me. But because I didn’t understand how any man could not want her.