“I’m sorry, Harp. It’s all just a lot right now. Todd. The baby. The wedding. Todd’s parents. Max.”
“Don’t apologize.” Setting her smoker down, she pulled me in for an awkward bee-suited hug, the attempt alone drawing a watery laugh from my chest.
“I know he’s my brother, so you don’t have to share?—”
“He told me he’s always had feelings for me,” I blurted out. “Before he knew I was with Todd. While he knew I was with Todd. Now.”
Meanwhile, I was so afraid to admit I’d made the wrong choice, that I’d ignored the right man standing in front of me all these years.
“For the record, I told him many times he was an idiot for not saying something,” she muttered, annoyed.
“He was trying to be respectful of Todd. Of me,” I found myself defending him because, in spite of my anger earlier, he was defensible.
What kind of person would he have been to drive that wedge between Todd and me?Not the man I knew him to be, that was for sure.
“Max is too respectful. I get not wanting to ruin a friendship or a friend’s relationship, but everything he did to help Todd keep you? And on top of that, planned your wedding? Talk about beating a dead horse.” She slid the top off the next hive. “You have every right to be angry at him for not saying anything. Infact, I really think you should take the opportunity to torture him with it.”
“Torture?” Remnants of a laugh splintered free as I shook my head. “I can’t torture him. Not after everything…”
Not after four years of torturing himself to try to make me happy.
“Well, it’s still my vote. And Nox’s.” She pulled out the honeycomb crawling with bees. “Plus, it’ll be good to get out some of the anger.”
“I’m not angry with him,” I admitted, catching Harper’s gaze through the screens in our hoods. “I’m angry with myself.”
“What?” She shoved the honeycomb back inside and closed up the hive. “What are you talking about? You didn’t do anything?—”
“That’s it. That’s why I’m upset.” I gulped, guilt clawing at my throat. “I didn’t do anything. I didn’t do anything when things with Todd weren’t right. When I saw all the signs that I should’ve left him.”When I couldn’t stop fantasizing about his best friend.
This was what had broken my heart into a hundred pieces earlier. Not Max. Not his holding back how he felt. Me.
Me, afraid to accept how I felt. Me, holding back that I wanted him the same.
“He was right. I went to him, to Max, when I was upset with Todd. I wasn’t looking for someone to tell me to leave. I was looking for someone to give me reasons to stay, someone to give me reasons why I’d made the right choice and hadn’t fallen for disappointment like all the men my mom dated.”
And Max had taken my lead.Like he always did.
He’d given me what I’d told him I wanted: reasons to stay with Todd. He’d tried to make Todd into the man I wanted…the man Max was.
“You can’t beat yourself up for that, Daisy. I’m not sure there’s a single person who isn’t guilty of trying to hangonto a relationship that wasn’t right for them,” she counseled, sounding far too wise for someone so young as we walked back through the thicket to her tool shed. “We’re all afraid to put ourselves out there.”
“It’s not just that,” I confessed quietly, my gaze dropping to the ground, sprigs of wildflowers shooting up between my feet.
“Then what is it?”
I met her stare. “I’m angry with myself because, deep down, I’ve wanted him this whole time too.”
I wasn’t angry at Max for keeping how he felt about me a secret. I was angry at myself for doing the same. For four years, I’d fantasized about him. Savored the time we spent together. Ached for more. But did nothing because Todd was safe. Todd was who I’d picked.Todd was never a real threat to my heart.
Max wasn’t a coward for not speaking up. I was. I was the one who was too afraid to be wrong, even when it kept me from being with the person who felt right.
“I don’t know what to do.”
“What do you want to do?”
What did I want?
I wanted for this time with Max to never end. I wanted for every moment to be like those in the bathroom last night, where there was no invisible barrier between us.
