Secrets, Lies, and Summer Skies

Chapter Three

I waited until morning to email Dad.

I didn't know what time it was in England, but it was probably the middle of the night for him. If he was busy with guest lectures, he wouldn't appreciate his sleep being interrupted. Of course, there was another reason to not call him, and it had nothing to do with the astronomical cost of international dialing. Dad was forever putting others before himself. If it hadn't been for Grayson letting himself into the house all the time to hang out, Dad wouldn't leave his office for days on end. If I broke down on a call with him, he'd cancel all his plans and be back on the next flight.

As much as I wanted a hug from my dad, I couldn't do that to him.

He deserved this opportunity, and I was sure that my heartbreak would still be around for him to soothe by the time he returned.

Grayson had also reached out. The continued presence of his friend apparently reassured Dad because, according to Grayson, he planned to continue his full residence in England unless there was a sudden emergency. I couldn't imagine he'd have been so cool with it if he knew that I'd spent my first night back dreaming about being pressed against Grayson's chest.

Stupid sexy businessman.

I kept to my room the first day to unpack and only emerged when Grayson knocked and told me to eat. Choking down food was the worst even if I knew it was the right thing to do. I hadn't realized just how much I'd craved a decent meal until he'd demanded I finish at least one slice of pizza. I was too stubborn to tell him, but I was grateful that he hadn't let me go to bed hungry.

I was also relieved that he'd largely left me alone.

I needed time to process the change in my circumstances and, honestly, it would've been infinitely harder to deal with my crying intervals if Grayson was there to watch. I could slap sense into myself far more quickly if I was alone. I also didn't need to be conscious of how ugly I was when I cried which probably wasn't at all attractive to him. Not that I cared if I was attractive to him. Just, you know, it made me self-conscious when my eyes and nose were streaming all at once in front of a hot guy.

Three days after I'd arrived home, my room finally looked the way I remembered. One box sat squat and ignored in the bottom of my walk-in closet. It was stuffed with memories of Trey and Anna. I didn't know what I wanted to do with them. Sure, I'd thought about burning it all, maybe with flaming arrows like I was conducting a Viking funeral, but I didn't think Dad would want me to do something like that in the pool. I hoped that I'd have the emotional strength to deal with it before the end of summer, otherwise it might just sit in the closet forever.

Desperate for a return to something like normality, I called Jenny. Her gap year had turned into two years. I'd envied her from afar when following her adventures on social media. By the time she'd returned home, she'd probably had a boyfriend in every country across the world. I was keen to catch up with her and didn't hesitate to agree when she suggested we go shopping.

Grayson had told me to behave like I did when Dad was home. Usually, I'd ask his permission to go somewhere, but Grayson was my roommate and not my father. Besides, he'd left for work early and I wasn't going to call him to check if he was okay with it. I was an adult and could do what I wanted. Still, I left a note on the kitchen counter in case he came home and wondered where I was. He had my cell number, anyway.

It'd been a hot minute since I'd spent a day at the mall. I'd been too busy in college to waste days trawling around stores and sitting in food courts. When I arrived, I felt like I'd been thrust back into my high school days. Almost every weekend we'd tried on clothes we had no intention of buying, shared meals between us, and watched back-to-back movies at the theatre. I quickly spotted groups of kids doing just that, all of them giggling between themselves, their excitable shrieks reverberating from the tile floors and crisp white walls.