6. Clara

CHAPTER 6

CLARA

Momma will be out of town for the weekend. Thank god for bake-offs and her mean-ass competitive streak. Feel like making out in a lavender field? - HB

The. Audacity.

He had made me feel stuff—mushy stuff, nostalgic stuff.I was having feelings for him when the only thing I should be feeling for Nicholas Andrew Easton right now was rage. Frickin’ Nick.

He hurt me.

He broke my damn heart.

So what if it was a long time ago? A woman doesn’t forget her first real heartbreak that easily. Even after a decade and a half, damn it.

I wish I had kept that damn note so I could find it and read it again. Apparently, I needed a reminder of how he had broken my heart.

We’d planned out an entire future together, and he’d thrown it away like it was nothing.

And like a fool, I had almost allowed him to do it again. We’d almost kissed on my balcony, for eff’s sake.

Damn him.

Maybe I should talk to him.

We could have lunch together. I could let him attempt to explain what the hell he had been thinking back then, and then I could yell at him and throw a drink in his face or smack him around a little bit.

He deserved to be given a piece of my mind. He deserved to be as broken up about seeing me as I was by seeing him . . .

with his cute kids . . .

in his beautiful house . . .

all happy and content and living his life like⁠—

UGH!

Friends, he had said.

He wanted to be my friend?

After all we had been through together?

After all we had meant to each other?

No frickin’ way.

He was living over there with a family and all I had was a freaking bug to keep me company.

After spending the better part of my morning simmering and sulking and showering, I threw on my best leggings and sports bra combo. I fluffed up my boobs, then added a silky robe over the ensemble and pulled my hair up in a bun. If I was going to be miserable, I was going to look hot doing it. I grabbed a deep berry lipstick and slicked it on.

Frickin’ Nick.

Freaking stupid dumb feelings.

I was in a spiral. I hadn’t been this pissed off since my old boss grabbed my ass and I broke his fucking nose.

Nick had better watch out. He was lucky I liked his kids. He seemed like a good dad, too. And there was the whole bug rescue thing, damn it.

No breaking Nick’s nose.

After heading down to my kitchen, I switched on my coffee maker to make a fresh pot and paced around the kitchen island, muttering to myself as it brewed.

I fixed my mug and stalked to my front door and threw it open dramatically, because that’s the kind of mood I was in.

“Damnnnn, Clara. Look at that face. What’s wrong?” My lifelong best friend Molly stood there with her hand formed into a fist ready to knock on the door. Leo—my other bestie, ever since grade school—was with her. They were not just my friends; they were also my high school companions in delinquency. They used to be as messed up as I was, but now I was the only one left rotting in misery now that they were both loved up and each part of a healthy marriage, the jerks.

We’d spent our days cutting school, usually drunk, as we commiserated over our problems.

When Molly’s dad had passed from cancer, her mother had mentally checked out, and shortly after, remarried and left the family. Her oldest brother—who was now Leo’s husband—had taken his siblings under his wing and was now essentially a father figure to Molly and her other two brothers.

Leo’s parents had kicked him out when he told them he was gay, and he’d moved in with his grandparents.

Sadie had joined us on occasion, whether it be under the bleachers at the football field, or behind the library, but she’d usually been too wrapped up in her stupid boyfriend to hang with us.

“Who put this tragic look on your face? Tell us who to maim.” Leo placed the cooler bag he was carrying on the porch, shoved his way around Molly, and tugged me into his arms. “We got you, sweetie.”

“Yeah, give us a name,” Molly insisted. “Say the word, and we’re off. Is it your ex-boss? Is something finally happening with that situation?”

My voice was muffled against Leo’s chest when I said, “No, I’ve given up on that, it’s going nowhere.”

Molly balked. “The hell you’re giving up! His ass needs to be nailed to the wall. Sue him or file a complaint outside of the HR department. Report him to the bar or whatever. Do all that stuff you were talking about after you quit that place and were freshly pissed off. Don’t let him get away with it.”

I stepped out of Leo’s embrace and shook my head. “No, I just want it to be over. I’m letting it go.” The thought of having my own past dredged up was inconceivable. Why would I put myself through that? No, thank you.

She nodded and backed off. “Okay, I understand. It will dredge it all up again and that would suck. If you change your mind, we’re here to support you. Did you hear from Chris again? Is that it?”

“No, and I’m over him.”

“Then what’s with the rage fest?”

“Let’s settle in,” Leo tutted. “I brought you a summer squash and prosciutto quiche, with all the extra Gruyère your heart could ever desire.” Gently he pushed at my shoulders until the back of my knees hit the swing and I sat. “Let us take care of you. You need a good breakfast. You need emergency cheese, and old friends. When your mood is this bleak, it’s essential to keep yourself fed, so it doesn’t devolve into anything worse, trust me. The last thing you need is a prison sentence for killing”—he waved a hand around— “whoever.”

Molly’s family owned the Smoky Mountain Inn. It was uber fancy. Like, if you had a special event to plan, you’d have it there—weddings, birthday parties, baby showers, girls’ trips, you name it. Leo was their chef, which meant this quiche was going to taste like heaven in a pie plate. I was almost distracted enough to forget about Nick for a minute and simply stuff my face.

“Why can’t I be like you, Leo? All grown up and settled, cooking for yourself and other people, just like a real adult.” I sighed, the quiche no longer enough to make me forget about my troubles. “I tried so hard to make it work with Chris. I tried hard to make it work with all my relationships, but no. I failed every single time. I’ve spent all these years adding to my red flag collection and look at you two,” I said, gesturing towards them. “You have Landon, and Molly has Garrett. Even my sisters are happy—Sadie has Barrett and Willa has Everett.” I wrinkled my nose. “What the hell is up with those names?”

Molly shrugged. “Mrs. Becky Lee Monroe is a bit compulsive. Two t’s for all of them. But back to you and names. Chrises are cursed, but I won’t say I told you so, even though I did, like, so many times. I could write an entire book about it, for eff’s sake.” Molly had four exes named Chris, so she should know.

Leo rolled his eyes. “Molly, now is not the time—” Molly was fond of a good rant and once you got her going it was hard for her to stop. But she was great at making me laugh and gave the best soft squishy hugs, so I scooted next to her on the swing and put my head on her shoulder.

“Gah! Leo is right.” She pulled me into her side and kissed the top of my head. “I’m sorry. You deserved so much better than him. You deserve the world, Clara. We’re here to take care of you.” She pulled a small, credit card–sized envelope out of her bra and tossed it on my little wicker end table. “For the new spa. It’s a gift card for an entire day of pampering—mani, pedi, massage, facial, the works.” The inn’s spa was new, and I couldn’t wait to try it. My eyes lit up in spite of my bad mood.

“Y’all! This is too much. I can’t⁠—”

“Shh. Nope.” She pointed to the cooler bag next to Leo, who was nestled in my little pink Adirondack chair in the corner. “There’s no such thing as too much when it comes to friends. Leo brought you food for the week and there’s more where that came from. We will not allow you to subsist on coffee and angst. No way.”

I couldn’t help the laugh that burst out. “Coffee and angst, huh? Everett has a big mouth, y’all. I can’t accept all this.”

“Shut up. You can, and you will. We love you. You are always, always there for us and you have been since we were kids. It’s our turn to be here for you.”

“Don’t act like you weren’t there for me too back then. We helped each other. I don’t know what I would have done without y’all⁠—”

“Back then we were three disasters figuring out how to cope with our problems, darling,” Leo said. “Now we’re two happily-ever-afters and a friend in need.”

“I’m so stupid, Leo. Why did I waste so much time on a dumbass like Chris?” But more importantly, why, after all these years, am I still hung up on Nick?

He held up a hand to shush me. “No. First of all, you are not stupid. Wanting to find love, trusting people, and giving second chances are all beautiful things. But my second point is that unfortunately, people who grew up like we did tend to waste a lot of our time trying to make people who don’t deserve our efforts treat us better, instead of just walking away from them and moving on. Forgive yourself for that, Clara.”

“I’ll try. I promise I will.” I contemplated telling them about Nick. I needed to get it out of me. “I want to tell you something. I feel like I have to get this off my chest. But you have to keep it to yourselves, okay?” I pulled out of Molly’s arms and sat straight, scooting to the edge of the swing so I could watch their faces.

They exchanged a glance. “All right . . . ,” Leo drawled as his eyebrows shot up.

“Of course. These lips will remain sealed, just like always.” Molly mimed turning a lock with a key and I grinned at her. “Spill it.”

“Remember Nick Easton? From back in high school?”

Molly’s eyes got big. “You mean hot quarterback Nick who now comes to the inn to play touch football with Garrett and Wyatt and all the rest of their superhot friends who me and Leo totally do not spy on from the kitchen window? The football coach at the high school? That Nick Easton?”

I grimaced. “Yep, that’s the one. So, uh, anyway, we were a thing back in high school, starting the end of junior year and through the entire time we were seniors. We were in love. We were going to run off to Knoxville together after graduation.” Their eyes were wide; their mouths too. “Leo, remember when you dropped me off at the bus station?”

He nodded and was able to pull himself together enough to answer. “Yes, of course I remember that. You didn’t want me to wait with you. I’d always thought it was weird.”

I shrugged. “I was supposed to meet Nick there. He had a football scholarship to UT. We’d been saving up our money. We were going to buy tickets out of town, find a place to rent together, get jobs, and I was going to go to junior college. But he never showed up, so instead of going to Knoxville, I went to Nashville. I left alone.”

Leo’s face fell. “Oh sugar, you should have called me. I would have come back and sat with you or drove you home. I would have been there for you⁠—”

“I’m sorry. I know you would have. I just couldn’t face it. I had to get far away, and Nashville was as far as I could afford to go and still make it back home if I couldn’t hack it there⁠—”

He took my hand and squeezed. “No apologies. You buried everything, didn’t you?”

I nodded.

“I get it. You buried it deep and moved on, as we three were wont to do at that age. And as you still are.” He was sympathetic even though he was calling me out.

“But I can’t seem to do that now for some reason.” My voice was small, I hated how weak I sounded. I let out a huge sigh and reached for the cooler bag full of food. I unearthed the quiche and dug straight into it with the fork Leo had so thoughtfully included. “Probably because he moved in right next door.”

Leo’s eyes bulged. “Oh shit.”

“I know.” I practically wailed, hand over my mouth, through a huge bite of quiche.

“What the heck, Clara?” Molly stared at me stunned, her mouth hanging wide open and her head shaking side to side. “You’re telling me you hid an entire relationship. With Nick Easton? Hot quarterback Nick? With the great hair and the big shoulders and that spectacular football player ass?!”

“Not the point, Molls,” Leo playfully scolded her.

“Right. So, you hid it? For all these years? Damn, girl. He’s a nice guy. I like him. He always buys a crap load of Leo’s brownies for his kids before he leaves. You and Nick Easton. Damn, girl.”

I chewed and swallowed before answering. “Yeah, that frickin’ Nick.”

“I’m so sorry. I wish you had told me so I could have been there for you.” Her head tilted toward Nick’s place. “And now he lives right there?”

I nodded.

“And we’re the only ones who know?” she continued.

“Yeah, and Sadie. She’s always known.”

They nodded in unison. “Obviously.”

I flopped back against the swing. “It’s like, I want to punch him in his stupid face, but I also want to find out what happened to make him not want me anymore. I kind of want to kiss him, too. I almost did this morning when he saved me from a huge-ass demon bug on my bed. It’s stressful. I’m confused and mad and sad and there’s more.”

“Oh crap, what is it?” She reached in the bag and pulled out a muffin to take a huge bite.

“I’m about to become a substitute down at the high school. Once my background check goes through, it will be official.”

“What?” Leo’s head drew back on his neck. “Why would you do that? That seems a bit out of left field. You were an attorney.”

“Uhhh . . .” I couldn’t tell them about Gracie; that was not my secret to spill. “I guess I need a change. I can’t spend the rest of my life out on this porch Rear Window-ing my neighbors and puttering around in my yard.”

“But-but—substitute teaching? Kids? Like, actual children?” Molly sputtered. “The only thing you’ve ever taught is a pole class down at Suzie Samuels’s studio.”

“That’s hardly what I’d call teaching experience, sugar.” Leo turned his attention from Molly to me. “What’s really going on?”

“Hey! It counts, okay? Plus, there’s a nationwide teacher shortage, you know. I’m doing my part to help out the youth of America. I’m college educated and I’m fully qualified.”

Molly huffed a laugh. “Okay, sure. We can wait. You’ll tell us the real reason sooner or later. We all know that. Even if it takes fifteen years,” she added with an eye roll.

“I’m sorry, I should have told you about Nick ages ago.”

“No, it’s okay.” Her face softened. “You don’t have to apologize to us. None of us were in our right minds back in high school. Didn’t his dad die? And his mom got married right away to her boss, right? Damn, that must have been hard for him.”

“Yeah, it was. Plus, he thought she’d be pissed about him dating me. She was pushing him hard to go to college, constantly nagging him about his grades and extracurricular activities, his SATs and GPA or whatever, and, as you know, I was not exactly a good influence back then.”

“Oh, hell no,” Leo snapped. “You’re torturing yourself over someone who wouldn’t even stick up for you?”

I lifted one shoulder in a resigned half shrug. “He had problems too. His family was a mess after his dad died, and he didn’t want to drag me into it. He didn’t want me getting hurt by her.”

“Hmph,” Leo scoffed. “I don’t know about all that. Sounds pretty weak to me.”

“It wasn’t like that. Or at least it hadn’t felt that way, not until the end. When we were together it was—” My eyes filled with tears. I brushed them away with a mini wail of frustration, but to my chagrin, they kept right on coming. “He loved me, he really did. Remember his family used to live in the trailer park down the hill from me?”

Molly pulled me close again and dried my cheeks with a soft napkin from the bag. “Yeah, I remember that. Then after his dad died, they moved into that big-ass house up at Bandit Lake.” Bandit Lake was exclusive. Only the richest of the rich lived up there. I would have bought a house there when I moved back to town, but they could only be passed down through inheritance, or shared within families.

“He used to let me climb through his window whenever Momma was being extra mean. Sometimes Sadie and Willa would come too. We’d make sure Gracie was asleep, then sneak out of the house and camp out on his bedroom floor. Willa had no clue, but Sadie knew about us. She was the only one.”

“Oh, Clara. I’m so sorry. I wish I had known too.”

“I know. I should have⁠—”

“No, no,” she soothed. “No apologies. We all did the best we could back then. None of us were capable of making wise decisions when we were going through so much. Kids do the best they can, right Leo?” she hinted not-so-subtly.

He shrugged his shoulders and his eyes lit with sympathy as he thought it over. “The main thing is we’re here for you today. What’s happening with him now?” he asked. “Why are you so upset? Besides the memories, of course.”

“I’m about to start subbing at Green Valley High—his school. Aaaand, he’s one of Gracie’s teachers.”

“Clara!” Molly was aghast. She pulled away and lifted my chin to study my face. Suspicion was etched all over her expression as her eyes narrowed on mine. “I defended your teenage choices, but this is crazy. Unless you want to end up banging him somewhere in that school, of course. Is that your end goal? Because if it is, I’ll help you get him back. I love a good second chance love story. I’m here for you no matter what.”

“I’m not going to bang him anywhere.” I backed out of her grasp with a defensive laugh. “He hurt me, and I hate him.” Even I couldn’t sell that lie. My feelings were written all over my face. The last thing I felt for Nicholas Andrew Easton was hate.

“Sure you do. You hate him so bad.” Molly’s head tipped to the side as she watched me. “This is why you’re so upset. You still care about him. The opposite of love isn’t hate. It’s indifference. And you are an obsessy Nickoholic right now. Do not even try to deny it to us.”

“I am not obsessed with him. I’m mad at him. I’m upset.”

“Well, duh. But he’s going to come up with some totally understandable explanation for what happened at the bus station, and then y’all are going to forgive each other. You obviously still have a lot of feelings for him. It’s written clear as day on your face, and I don’t blame you. First love can last forever if it’s real and the timing is right.”

“Yup. She’s right and you know it.” Leo nodded his agreement.

“I do not know that. I know no such thing.” I was a total liar. What Nick and I had was real and I did know it. That’s why seeing him had hurt so much. But I wasn’t ready for them to know it too.

Molly held up a hand. “Let’s talk about something else, something fun, to cheer you up. Your bridal shower will be a hot-for-teacher theme and I’m calling it right now. It’s mine to plan, not one of your sisters’. I declare dibs on the shower and we’ll have it at the inn. The rest of them can battle it out for maid of honor duty.”

“You have lost your damn mind.” I was indignant. “I’m telling you about my rage, about my abandonment issues and my tragic first love, and you’re talking about bridal showers.”

“I’ll make the cake!” Leo burst out. “The topper can be a little chalkboard with two hot nerds kissing in front of it. Or two houses side by side.”

“Oh my god, that’s perfect.” They high-fived in front of my face.

What the . . . ?“Y’all! Quit it!”

“Nick is a nice guy,” Molly stated matter-of-factly. “He has great kids. Garrett wouldn’t be friends with him if he was an asshole. Something happened back then—a misunderstanding, a youthful error of judgement, maybe cold feet or his mother got to him somehow. Bet on it. Y’all were kids. Kids are dumb.”

The thought struck me that maybe this is why none of my relationships had ever worked out. I’d always gone for men who were the opposite of Nick. Nick was careful, caring, even downright methodical when faced with making a decision. He had also been so sweet and romantic, thoughtful and loving.

Maybe he hadn’t been faking that shocked, hurt look on his face when he saw me in the parking lot with Gracie. Maybe something really had happened to make him think I didn’t want him, and that’s what caused everything to fall apart.

Maybe we could have another chance.

What the hell, Clara?

No.

Molly and her wild theories were getting into my head. I had to be smart about this. I couldn’t let him hurt me again, I’d never recover.

“Oh, lookie there.” Molly clapped her hands together. “Here he comes now. How fortuitous.”

Our eyes followed the path of his truck as it drove up the street and pulled into his driveway.

She stood, waving wildly over the porch railing as he drove up his driveway into his garage.

“Stop it,” I hissed. “He’ll see you.”

“That’s the point. The only way to feel better is to talk this out with him. Otherwise, you’re going to be a seething mess of anger and stress every time you see him, and that’s not healthy.” She took a big breath, and I knew she was getting ready to serve me up a dose of reality slash tough love. “Look, I was mostly teasing about all the bridal shower stuff. But I’m not joking about this. Make peace with him. It’s the only way to be okay with having him live next door.”

“Quit being smart,” I shot back. “I still want to be mad and irrational.”

“It’s weird when the shoe is on the other foot, isn’t it?” she mused. “I remember you giving me all kinds of smart advice when it came to me and Garrett. And look at me now.” She threw her hands out at her sides and smirked at me.

“Fine,” I grumbled.

“Let’s go, Molls,” Leo took her hand and pulled her up off the swing.

Panicked, I hopped up and attempted to block their escape. “Wait! I need buffers. Y’all can’t leave now.”

“You don’t need us,” Leo insisted. “You got this. But definitely call us after and tell us all about it. Better yet, come to the inn and we’ll have a BFF night. I’ll bake your favorite chocolate chip blondies.”

I smiled through my annoyance. “I love your chocolate chip blondies.”

They were right. Being an adult and facing my issues head-on was the best thing to do, I’d had enough therapy to know that. Plus, it’s the advice I would have given them if they needed it, damn it. Advice was more fun when you were the one giving it. Receiving it was bullshit.

Nick stepped out of his open garage with a hesitant smile on his face.

“Hey, Nick,” Molly waved him over. “You’re off early today.”

“It’s an early release day for the high school.”

“We’re about to go back to work. It was good seeing you.” They headed to Leo’s car and took off.

“We have to talk,” he informed me without preamble. “Can I come over?”