Chapter 24 Holly

Chapter 24

Holly

T his was happening. Tara wanted to be with her, and she was going to tell off her mother. Carrigan's really was magic at Christmas.

Tara fished her phone out of the basket on the kitchen island—where they'd all left their devices so they could focus on the wedding—and frowned.

"Hol, why do I have an email from the Innocence Project?"

Oh shit.

"Why are they offering me a job?"

Holly swallowed, hard. "So, funny story. I drafted an email to them about you, but I didn't realize I'd sent it."

She'd drafted it in a moment of panic, trying to figure out anything that would make Tara happier and allow them to be together. But she'd known even in the moment that she should never send it. "I'm so, so sorry."

Tara stared at her, frozen. "You did what?"

"I had this whole brainstorm, that it would be so great if you worked for them, because you would still be doing activism work, but you wouldn't be beholden to keeping ties with your family if you didn't want to, and you might even be able to have a broader reach, but I would never have sent it intentionally. I should have had a conversation with you about it. It was a huge overreach, even to draft something," Holly babbled, her heart in her throat as Tara's face only became icier.

"What I don't understand," Tara said slowly, her accent as thick as molasses in January, "is why you would have been brainstorming ways for me to leave the career I've painstakingly grown, that I excel at and care deeply about."

Holly blinked at her. She'd expected Tara to be angry that she'd stepped in without Tara's consent, but she wasn't sure how to process the idea that Tara didn't understand why anyone would think she should maybe leave her job.

"Well, I'm not saying leave your career," she said, equally slowly, "just your job. And perhaps because I see you constantly arranging your life to meet your parents' approval, which they use to hold you hostage."

Tara shook her head, her bob swinging from side to side like a pendulum. "That's a choice I've made. I decided a long time ago that I was willing to accept the whole package when I decided on this path."

"You made the choice, Tara, but you don't have to keep making the choice." Holly was exasperated.

"I don't deserve another choice."

Wow. She wanted to say, "You don't have to earn the right to a less desolate life," but realized it would be wasted breath.

Nothing Holly said would ever fix what was broken in Tara, her bone-deep belief in her inherent worthlessness. She needed to walk away now and cut any connection between them, so she did what she was good at—she brought out her knives and threw them.

"You're the exact same selfish, self-destructive kid you were at seventeen, Tara, and you're still throwing yourself on a pyre. I hope it brings you some peace eventually. I hope it's worth it, 'cause it's devastating everyone who tries to love you."

"That's a fucked-up, hurtful thing to say," Tara whispered. She rubbed both hands over her heart and took several short, shallow breaths. "Why did we ever think we could make this work in the real world? You're going to leave Charleston, go on waitressing and refusing to take a chance on baking, and I'll be a funny story from your past. That time you pretended to date a bitchy ice queen because she was too pathetic to go to a wedding on her own."

Holly wanted to scream. "Oh, fuck you for thinking that of me. And for throwing baking in my face. You know how much I want to see us together. You want that, too! You just told me you did! But your mom threatened to blacklist me not two hours ago, and I've never seen you happier than you are a thousand miles away from them, so forgive me if I think maybe a break from your job and family would be good for both of us!"

Tara nodded, her face stony. "So you emailed an institution I respect to tell them about me, without asking me first, and making me look like I can't get my own job?"

"It was a mistake !" Holly cried. "I didn't mean to!"

"Was it a mistake that had you talking to my friends all week about how I should totally live here? It's interesting that you want me to take you as you are, but you don't want to do the same for me."

That was rich. "Oh, so it's okay for you to try to Pygmalion me, talk about how great it would be if I got a job that was less embarrassing for you than being a waitress, convince everyone to offer me charity, but I can't say, ‘Hey, I care about you and I see you're unhappy'?"

"I never convinced anyone to give you a job out of charity!" Tara argued. "Any offers you got were sincere. And you told me yourself you don't want to be a waitress forever, that you want to bake! What's wrong with me trying to encourage you to do that?"

Holly cocked her head disbelievingly. "What's wrong is, it's patronizing and hypocritical. You can keep a job you hate for complicated reasons, but I can't choose my job for equally complicated ones? Maybe you should fix your own life before you decide to rehab your lovers!"

"Right back at you," Tara drawled, drawing up to her full height. "You want me to leave my entire life so we can be together, but you knew I never would. You were looking for a reason to run. You can tell yourself you wanted to try with me, but you didn't. Because that might ask something of you, for you to compromise or change or grow. Which you won't because you had one failed marriage and made it your whole personality."

Holly took a page from Tara's book and wrapped herself in ice so she didn't cry.

"Thank you for showing me that when I eventually fall for someone, it needs to be someone who actually likes me for me, instead of trying to make me into a project." Holly rubbed her hands on her pants. "I think I'm going to go."

Tara was right about one thing.

Running seemed like a hell of an idea right now, so that's what Holly did.