If You Need Me (The Toronto Terror Series)

I can’t deal with being in my penthouse. Everything reminds me of Wilhelmina, so I go home for the weekend. But before I do, I schedule my cleaner to come while I’m gone so when I return, I’m not slapped in the face by my failure.

Like an idiot, I leave on Friday afternoon, and the two-point-fiveish-hour drive takes four. My regrets are excessive by the time I arrive. Because now I have to explain why I’m here, looking wrecked.

“Where’s Wilhelmina? When you said you were coming to visit, I thought you would bring her along.” Mom frowns.

“We broke up.” Saying it aloud feels like I’m being stabbed in the chest.

“What? Why? What happened?”

“I messed up,” I admit. My eyes are hot, and my chest aches in a way I’ve never experienced before.

“Well, you can fix it, can’t you?”

I shake my head. “I don’t think so.”

“Come on, sweetheart.” She takes me by the elbow and leads me inside.

My younger sister, Paris, is already in the kitchen, helping Mom with dinner. Her brow furrows when she sees me. “What happened?”

“Dallas and Wilhelmina broke up.”

She drops the potato into the pot on the stove. “What did you do, Dallas?”

I flop into the chair and accept a glass of fresh-squeezed lemonade. I’d love a shot of vodka or seven to go with it, but I should probably be sober for this.

“Why do you assume it was me?”

“Well, was it?”

I word-vomit the whole horrible story, starting with all the things that happened when we were kids, down to every shitty little thing my friends did in high school, and all the ways I tried to make it better—like going to the custodial staff and secretly painting her locker when it was defaced after everyone else had gone home, or stopping one of the guys on the hockey team from ruining her student council president’s speech, and ending with the breakup in my car and the shitty office gossip. Marrying someone who doesn’t want to marry me was a future I didn’t want.

Mom plants her hands on her hips. “Dallas Mattias Bright, what were you thinking?”

“About which part?”

“Any of it! All of it! That poor girl.” She tosses her dish rag on the counter. “And to think, we just ambushed her! All of us showing up out of the blue, and she had to entertain us and pretend the engagement was real.” She shakes her head. “I don’t understand where your head was with any of this.”

“In his ass,” Paris mutters.

I glare. “You’re not helping.”

She gives me a look. “Well, you’re sitting here, looking the part of the sad sack, so you’re not doing much to help your case either.”

I drop my head into my hands. “I’m such a screw-up.”

Mom sighs. “You screwed up, but you’re not a screw-up, Dallas. Far from it. But the way you went about this whole thing didn’t leave much room for it to go right. Why not be honest with her from the start? You could have taken her to prom and fixed it all years ago. Why wait all these years to tell her the truth? Why set it all up as not real when you want the opposite?”

“It just…spun out of control on me.” I run my finger along the rim of the glass. “I thought I was protecting her after she protected me.”

My mom and sister are more than happy to recount the horrible story to my dad and brothers when we all sit down to family dinner.

“It’s pretty on brand for you,” Manning says.

Ferris agrees. “I mean, you ratted out your friends and spent your own money on new student council posters but let her believe you were one of the ones who’d defaced them.”

“I still don’t get that,” Manning muses.

“What right did I have to tell her? Because I let it happen in the first place. My friends were being dicks. She didn’t deserve it. Like hey, listen I fixed this for you and stuff but also stole your bike once? She never owed me that opportunity. Just like she doesn’t deserve the shit I’ve put her through these past months.” That’s ultimately why I ended things. She deserved better. That and being in love with someone who doesn’t love me back hurts too fucking much.

“I think you need to give the seventeen-year-old version of you a break,” Dad muses.

“The seventeen-year-old version of me knew better, though,” I retort.

“Sure, but are you seventeen anymore? Have you allowed anyone to be mistreated since then?”

“No. Of course not.”

“What if you tried to forgive yourself instead of beating yourself up about it? You’ve grown into a person to be proud of over the last ten years, son.” Dad looks at me as though stating that should erase my shame. He taps the arm of his chair. “Did she want out of the relationship?”

“I want to be married to her,” I tell them. “I wanted that ring on her finger. I want to spend the rest of my life loving her, but knowing she doesn’t want the same…that’s torture.”

“Is that what she told you?” Dad presses. “That she’s never interested in a life with you?”

“She’s not in love with me.” I push my chair away from the table. “I’m going down to the dock. I need a breather.” I grab a bottle of scotch, a plastic glass, and the crochet bag from the living room and leave my family sitting at the dining room table. I need time to wallow.

Unrequited love is some shit. Why doesn’t my family understand how hard it is to know my feelings aren’t matched? I know I’m not entitled to her love. I’m not entitled to any part of her.

I’m good and drunk by the time my sister drops into the chair beside mine.

“What is that supposed to be?”

“A peach.” It looks like a blob.

She picks up the bottle and gives it a shake. “Dude, you’re a mess.”

“I know.” I just want to be sad and hate my life in peace.

“Was any of it real at all? Or were you so in love with the idea of having her that you forgot to consider the ramifications of what would happen when you made her yours?”

I blow out a breath. It’s annoying that my sister can so succinctly lay it out for me in a few sentences.

“I’m not in love with the idea of her. I love her. Everything about her. She’s everything. She goes after everything she wants and doesn’t stop until it’s hers. I don’t care that she might not be for everyone. She’s it for me.” I take a deep breath. “Why am I such an idiot?”

“You’re not an idiot. You’re impulsive. You always have been. It works well on the ice, but it doesn’t always translate in real-life situations. Like this one.” She gives me an empathetic smile. “Impulsivity aside, you’re a great guy. You’re genuine and you do things not because it will look good, but because you actually care. Hemi obviously saw that, or she wouldn’t have gone along with any of this nonsense.”

“She didn’t have much of a choice.”

“Yes, she did. And she made it. She chose you, Dallas.”

“She didn’t want to ruin my career. She never wanted me.”

“Did those words come out of her mouth?”

“No. But she doesn’t date players. She dates smart, educated guys who don’t do stupid shit, like propose in front of an entire arena.”

“Your excuses are bullshit, big brother. The proposal could have backfired spectacularly.”

“It did backfire!”

“So you say. But I’m pretty sure the reason she hasn’t dated a hockey player before is because of the bureaucratic headaches and office politics. And smart isn’t limited to people with PhDs, Dallas. She would not have agreed to be with you if she didn’t find this package attractive on more than just a physical level.” She motions to me. “She doesn’t strike me as the shallow type.”

“She’s not.”

“So let me ask you again, why are you sitting here, regretting your choices, when you should be figuring out a way to fix this?”

“What if there’s nothing to fix? All she said when I broke it off was okay.”

“Fucking hell, Dallas.” She sighs and shakes her head. “Think about it from her perspective. For nearly a decade, she believed you sabotaged her life because you flexed your popularity. And when she joined the team you signed up for every promo known to man to spend time with her. But you never told her the truth. Instead, you pushed every last button she had, like you were back in high school all over again. Man. Child. Finally, you tell her you love her, and then you break up with her before she even has a chance to catch up, like it was all just another game to you.”

“Fuck. It’s not a game.”

“You wanted her attention. And then when it got real, and hard, instead of saying, ‘Hey, I messed this up. I want to be engaged to you, but now that we’re in a real relationship, I realize maybe you would prefer that I propose when you’re actually ready, whenever that is. So how do you want to move forward?’, you just gave up on the love of your life. Like a saggy scrotum. You made the decision without consulting her, a-fucking-gain.”

“Why are you being so mean?”

“I’m not being mean; I’m being real. Don’t be a baby. Hemi would have this exact conversation with you if she were in my position and not on the receiving end of this breakup. Your biggest flaw is that you don’t think you’re good enough, which is mind-blowing, considering how you don’t have to be anyone other than yourself for people to want to be in your orbit. What if you are exactly the right person for Hemi? What if you’re everything she actually she needed?”

“This pain is astounding.”

“Welcome to falling in love and then fucking it up. It hurts. Love is the most powerful emotion. It makes us incredibly vulnerable, but when it works, when it’s right and real, it’s the most beautiful, wonderful thing.” She sighs, and her expression turns sad. She’s only twenty-three, and it makes me wonder what’s happened to her heart while I’ve been off living my life. “You have the potential to be the best boyfriend, husband, dad, and friend Hemi could ever hope to have. But you didn’t give her a chance. So this is where you are.” She motions to the setting sun. “Now you have to decide if it’s where you’re going to stay.”

I drive home the next morning after breakfast with the family. My place smells like lemon and cleaning supplies when I arrive, which is to be expected. I drop my bag in the laundry room and stop in my bedroom, frowning at the lack of nightshirt on Wills’s side of the bed. I folded it and left it there out of habit.

My heart aches when I open the top drawer of my dresser, where Wills leaves her sleepwear, and find it empty. I move to the closet, already knowing what waits for me. But I’m unable to believe it unless I see it with my own eyes. Empty hangers greet me on the right side, where Wills’s clothes used to be. The outfits I bought for her are all still there, though. Did she think I’d want her to give them back?

My bedroom is too depressing, so I move to the living room. The blanket she brought over for cuddle-on-the-couch nights is gone. She took everything that was hers.

The awful ache in my chest expands when I reach the kitchen. On the counter is an envelope, my apartment key, and her engagement ring. I pick it up by the band and curl my fist around it, the diamonds biting into my palm. I slide it onto my pinkie and pick up the envelope. My hands are unsteady as I break the seal. I don’t know what I expect to find. A scathing letter? An admission that I was right all along, she would never love me the way I loved—love—her?

Instead, I find two tickets to a special event featuring my favorite comic book artist. They’re VIP meet-and-greet tickets that sold out months ago. Wills went out of her way to get these for me, and still gave them to me, even though I broke up with her. She’s such a rare, special person, and I don’t know if she sees that the way the rest of us do. She always puts others ahead of herself. She did it with every single promo op she had to help me through, and again when I proposed, and even now, maybe without even realizing it. It’s who she is at her core. She’s the most loyal person I know. The glue. My heart and soul.

I didn’t think it was possible to regret my choices more, but here I am.