Page 27 of Searching for Beautiful
I open my mouth, wanting to ask him if he’s okay, but he closes the door before I get a chance. When the woman slips in the door behind him, I turn, ready to get the heck out of here, but run straight into Emery.
“Jeez. What’d I ever do to you?”
“Oh my God. I’m sorry. Are you okay?”
She wrinkles her forehead. “Yes. I’m pregnant, not made of glass. ”
Oh. Duh. But my mind is still with Christian, so my eyes dart to the door, wondering if he’s doing a better job at talking than I did and wondering if it helps.
“What’s wrong?” Emery asks.
“Nothing. ” I shake my head but then stop, wanting to say something but not sure exactly what.
“Come on. Let’s go. I can tell I’m needed. ” Emery shocks me by grabbing my arm and practically pulling me through the center. She stops, peeking in different rooms—the game room, art room—until finally pulling me into the movie room.
When I step inside, I realize it’s empty. “Emery, really, I’m fine. ”
“So? That doesn’t mean you don’t have something on your mind. ”
And she’s right. The big surprise is I want to share it with her. I need to talk to someone, and Emery makes me feel way more comfortable than Valerie does.
“It’s not really that big a deal. ” And in reality it isn’t. Not when you compare it to other things people deal with.
“Again, so? Can you imagine how boring life would be if the only things people talked about were really big deals? Or maybe not boring but depressing, at least. ”
She’s right. I walk through the room and plop down in one of the chairs, Emery right behind me. My stomach is a little uneasy. It’s crazy how quickly someone can get used to not really opening up to people.
“Moving your mouth helps. ”
Author: Nyrae Dawn
I don’t expect the chuckle that jumps out. Then I continue to keep opening my mouth and speaking so she can’t tease me anymore. “There’s just this guy. ”
“Sigh…isn’t there always a guy?” Emery asks.
I roll my eyes. “Not that kind of guy. ” Though he used to be. Or I wanted him to be. “But he’s nice to me when most people aren’t anymore. Or I guess they don’t take the time to pay attention is a better way to word it. Anyway, he does. Did. And I was a bitch to him on more than one occasion. Today was worse than the others and when I saw him later, he was really upset. He kind of lost it and he’s usually so level. ”
I don’t know when Emery came into the room earlier, but I still don’t tell her who I’m talking about. Still, she probably knows. It sort of feels like giving away something that’s his. Or at least his business to tell. He told me earlier that he doesn’t listen to gossip. Who knows if it’s true, but I figure if it is, I at least owe him this.
Emery puts a hand on her stomach and my eyes are briefly drawn there. “So he likes you or what? And you hurt him and he’s upset, so now you feel guilty?”
“No…he doesn’t like me. And I don’t think I hurt him, I was just a bitch to him. I don’t know if that’s why he had a bad day but—”
“Brynn,” she interrupts me. “I mean this in the best possible way, but not everything is about you. You might not be the reason he lost it, as you say. ”
My cheeks heat when I realize she’s right. Christian sort of said the same thing to me earlier—that I make everything about me. “When you put it like that…”
“I’m not saying it is or isn’t the reason, but don’t beat yourself up too much unless you know it is, ya know? I’m pretty sure you’re a lot like me. And we have enough to worry about that we don’t need to create new reasons if we don’t have to. ”
Again, she’s right. It makes so much sense when she says it that I wonder why I didn’t think of it on my own. “Still. ” I look away from her. “That doesn’t mean it was right to treat him like crap. ”
“True. I hear apologies go a long way. ” She raises a brow.
“You’re being sarcastic,” I tell her.
“No, I’m being funny. ”
So many more admissions beg to come out, but they’re locked in a lot tighter than this one was. Talking to Emery was a step, though.
