Wasted Time (The Steel City #1)

5. Penny

CHAPTER FIVE

penny

I’m curled up in my bed at my parents’ house the next morning, the hangover making it feel like my head is being run over by a horse. I probably should have stopped after the first Long Island. Maybe even the second. Better yet, I should have refrained from downing shot after shot at the pregame.

Ugh. Even the word ‘vodka’ makes me want to puke right now.

A gentle knock sounds on my door.

I already know who it is. I heard her buttering up my mom downstairs.

Avery had called within ten minutes of me leaving The Swan Dive last night. I ignored her calls but texted her to tell her that I was heading home, I was safe, and that I’d text her when I was out of the car to ensure my rideshare driver didn’t skin me alive.

I knew she wouldn’t make it very long before showing up, but she typically doesn’t get out of bed before eleven. It’s earlier than eleven. It’s barely nine. That means she senses this is an emergency .

I grumble out something that sounds like words, and she slowly opens the door, poking her head into my room.

She winces at the sight of me, but I glare at the sight of her. Of course, she looks pretty and remarkably well-rested after last night. Brown bob, perfectly shiny. Eyes clear and doe-like.

She’s a bitch.

My eyes dart to her hands, and I immediately retract all negative thoughts. Every single one of them. There’s a coffee in her hand with a familiar logo and a small bag hanging between her fingers.

With one sniff, I know she is that pretty because she is the greatest human ever born.

I lift my head. “Is that a cinnamon roll?”

She slides into the room and softly closes the door with her foot. She shakes it in her hand like I’m a dog, and she’s brought me a treat.

“Homemade by Seth and fresh out of the oven ten minutes ago.”

I scramble into a sitting position so fast that the room starts spinning. I don’t care. It doesn’t matter that I might fall out of this bed and onto the floor. All I can think of is the pastry in her hands and how great it’s going to taste on my tongue. I hold my hands out like a child and clap excitedly.

Everyone must know what happened if Seth spent his morning baking me cinnamon rolls before work.

She rolls her eyes, but hands over the goods. Both the bag and the coffee.

I pull the cinnamon bun out of the bag and let out a low groan. It smells like heaven. Like heaven, and puppies, hazelnut lattes, and being kissed for the first time. There’s also extra icing.

Scratch that. I take it back. This cinnamon bun is better than heaven .

Avery falls onto the foot of my bed, lying on her back. She stares at the ceiling.

“I threw a drink on Declan last night.”

I’m mid-bite into heaven when my head snaps up to look at her, eyes wide. I frantically try to chew and swallow so I can ask the ten questions that just popped into my head.

Avery rolls her head to look at me. “I came back to the table, and he was sitting there looking like a guilty little kid. He couldn’t even look me in the eye.”

I finally manage to swallow. “Did he tell you what he said to me?”

“Yeah,” Avery says with a sigh. “At least, his side of it, but he didn’t make himself seem like an angel, so I assume he was honest.”

He usually is.

“He wasn’t very nice,” I grumble, taking another bite.

That gross feeling comes back to my stomach. He read me like an open book, and I hated the way that felt. I ran, like a coward, because I couldn’t handle being honest. Not to him, and not about that. I shouldn’t have had to be, anyway. Not in that setting. He shouldn’t have made me.

It was too raw. Too real.

I couldn’t admit that I saw some of the same things he did. It’s like he had somehow gotten into my head and learned all of my dirty, private secrets without ever speaking to me about it.

Do you know how invasive that feels?

I know that my relationship is suffering. I feel it every day, in every step and in my every breath. It scares me to think that other people might be seeing through the cracks that I'm desperately trying to cover. I’ll keep covering them until I figure out if this is saveable or not. Everything in me wants to protect what I’ve built. Protect Gavin.

“I know. That was none of his business, either,” Avery says, rolling her head to stare at the ceiling again. “I obviously got a bit snappy with him, and when he said that I should be a better best friend, I lost my cool.”

“He said what?” I spit, my mouth still full of pastry.

She nods, not meeting my eyes. “He said that I should have been the one telling you all those things. He told me you deserved better.”

“Than you? ” I seethe, incredulously.

Avery is the most solid thing in my life. She’s the best thing in my life. She supports me through everything and anything, and would never expect anything in return. I return it tenfold, obviously, with the same energy and enthusiasm—but she wouldn’t care if I didn’t. We’re made for each other, her and I. Souls destined to go through life together.

The only reason she wouldn’t be my first call if I was ever arrested is because she’d be sitting in the cell right next to me.

Declan is out of line to suggest otherwise. But then again, when is he ever in line?

Contrary to what everyone thinks of me and Avery’s friendship, she is honest with me when she needs to be.

Declan doesn’t know the inner workings of our friendship; he doesn’t understand that she does tell me certain things in private. Unlike him, she doesn’t need to make a spectacle. He just assumes that everything at surface level is the truth and wouldn’t understand the depth of a female friendship if it hit him in the mouth.

I am going to stomp on his shooting wrist the next time I see him.

“ From me, from Gavin, from your friends.”

“He’s an idiot,” I say with a tone of finality.

At least, he’s behaving like one.

“I shouldn’t have thrown that drink. You should have. But since you didn’t, I’m kind of glad that I got to.”

I huff a laugh, taking a sip of my latte. I hope it ruined the expensive fabric of his ridiculously overpriced shirt. There is no reason a black, long sleeve should cost over one hundred dollars, and I’d be willing to bet his cost over three.

“Has he texted you?” Avery asks.

“No, but I told him I’m cutting him out. I don’t really expect to hear from him.”

She lifts her head. “You don’t mean that.”

I shrug. The sad part is, I think I do.

Declan and I have had the strangest of friendships over the years. We are thick as thieves when things are good, but we butt heads more than we should, and it usually ends up in me losing my cool and him taunting me from across the room. Neither of us ever truly apologizes, we just move on.

I’m tired of that. I don’t want to have to worry about when he’s choosing to be nice or when he decides he has some twisted score to settle. When it happens, it usually comes out of nowhere.

Can you grasp how exhausting that might be?

I’d like some space. That’s all. A bit sad, isn’t it? We only see each other a couple of times a year as it is, and I want space.

Maybe not permanently, but I need him to know that I mean the words that I say. Unlike Declan, when I make a promise, I stick to it. He doesn’t get to cross my boundaries with no repercussions anymore. I’ve let that slide too many times with him. Maybe space will be the lesson that finally changes things.

I was very clear about what would happen the next time that he did this. He just doesn’t seem to care that losing me is an option.

“What about Gavin?”

Yeah, then there is the Gavin of it all.

He didn’t need to ruin my night last night, but he chose to anyway. It’s one of those things that I try not to let bother me, but it does. It upset me enough to dismantle the great night that I was having with my friends. I don’t think he even realizes that he does it. That doesn’t make it any better, I know that. It’s just yet another habit that I’m trying to fix in order to save us.

“We talked last night. Just checked in quickly. I can tell he was still a bit pissed off, but honestly, he has no right to be. It’s… whatever at this point. It’s like arguing with the wall.”

And he never apologized for it. I’d wager he doesn’t think he’s wrong, but I don’t think I am, either. I’m allowed to go out with my friends. I’m allowed to come home and spend time with them. I’m allowed to go to the pub and drink myself silly if I want to.

It’s not whatever. It’s annoying and manipulative. I unloaded a lot of my anger on Declan last night that was meant for Gavin. Although Declan was out of line, everything he said made it ridiculously clear that I need to have another conversation with Gavin about our relationship. About how we’re sinking again, and we have to either grab a life raft or let ourselves drown.

If my cracks are starting to show to other people, I need to really focus on making repairs.

“Damn straight,” Avery grumbles.

I am actively choosing not to stress over Declan’s words. Normally, they’d keep me angry and in my head for the next couple of days. The sad truth is, he is right. His delivery was horrible, as it typically is, but his concerns were valid.

Gavin sucks a lot of joy out of my life. The things I love, the people I love, my happy place—they are always clouded in his shadow. While I’m here, it seems to bother him, even though he doesn’t want to be here with me. While I’m here, I wonder what he’s doing, who he’s with, or if he even misses me at all.

I fear he’s taking the happiness out of my home in hopes that I’ll leave it behind in the same way he did.

I’ve told nobody that. Not even Ave.

Declan wasn’t entirely wrong, but I promise, there are good parts of my relationship. He just doesn’t see them because he doesn’t see us anymore. He sees me. Alone. He conjures up the idea of everything else based on that.

The good parts still exist. They still happen, and they still matter. Just because there are rough parts, hard parts…it doesn’t mean the good isn’t there.

“Dec slept on my couch.”

“Oh, yeah?” I ask, sipping my latte. I pop the last bit of cinnamon bun in my mouth.

“I think he thought you were staying over. He went right up to the spare bedroom the second we walked in the front door and was confused when he found the bed empty.”

I roll my eyes. “Was he expecting round two?”

“I actually think he was coming to apologize,” she says, her eyes flickering to mine.

I snort. Tough chance. There is no way in hell that he wasn’t planning to barge into that room and spit out the many things that popped into his head after I stormed out of the bar. The things I didn’t let him finish saying.

“No, honestly. He tried to convince Seth to bring him here, but I told him to get fucked and sleep it off. That’s why I’m surprised he hasn’t texted you.”

“I am not holding my breath.” I turn my body so that my back is against the pillows and my legs are outstretched toward her. I wiggle my toes against her arm, earning a slap to my shin .

“Hey!” she cries, clamping her hands down on my ankle and forcing me to stop.

I laugh against the rim of my coffee cup, and a stark realization hits me. I don’t really laugh at home anymore. I just kind of exist. I don’t know if I remember how to have fun or how to genuinely enjoy myself. There is living and there is surviving. Here, I feel like I’m living.

Why is that easier when I’m away from him?

We used to laugh, didn’t we?

God, maybe Dec was more right than I realized.

My smile slowly dwindles as I consider how sad that is. I would have never thought I’d wind up here, uncertain if I’m with the person I’m supposed to be with after nearly ten damn years, realizing that he never makes me laugh .

“What just happened?” Avery asks, leaning up on her forearms. “Where did you just go?”

I swallow, looking over at her.

She’s the only soulmate I’ve ever really been certain of. Maybe I was only supposed to be given her, my platonic other half. It would be greedy to want more than someone as amazing as she is, to want two people whose souls are so closely intertwined with mine.

Maybe she’s it for me.

I have to give her the truth before it suffocates me.

“I think he was right about a lot of it,” I say quietly, lowering my cup to my lap.

Avery’s brow furrows. “Declan?”

I nod, that gross feeling taking root in my gut again.

She reaches over, places her hand on my foot, and squeezes it gently—one, two, three times. I meet her dark eyes, trying hard to force that burning feeling from behind my own.

Avery smiles tightly. She takes in the gravity of what I just admitted.

It’s heavy.

“If he is, that’s okay, too. But it really doesn’t matter what Declan says or does, Pen. It’s your relationship and it’s your decision. You’re in the driver’s seat. Not Declan. I’m in the passenger’s seat though, along for the ride, whichever direction you choose to go. And I’ll always have snacks.”

“I do love him,” I admit quietly.

She smiles that same, sad smile. She taps my foot again—once, twice, and a third time.

“I know you do. He’s lucky. It’s a wonderful thing to be loved by you.”

Gavin

What’s on the agenda for tonight?

Me

Going for a swan dive, I think!

Gavin

Lol, of course.

Me

Need my Swan Long Island. You know the drill.

Gavin

Classic.

Me

That sounded sarcastic.

Gavin

It’s fine. Just don’t know why you have to drink 24/7 when you go home but do what you want.

Me

Come on. I’m on vacation.

Gavin

You’re visiting your family.

Me

Don’t do this.

Gavin

Those people just pull you down when you’re with them. Eventually, you’ll see that. You’re better than that.

Me

Gavin please, you’re ruining my night.

Gavin

I’m not, you’re just being sensitive about it because you know I’m right. I’ll let you have fun with ‘the crew’. Talk tomorrow.