Reese gave her another appraising stare. “Any reason why I’m just hearing about this now? It seems like the situation has been developing for a while.”
“It only escalated recently,” was how Brynn decided to phrase things. “But you’re right. In retrospect, it’s been building for longer.” It was a certainty that Brynn had only just recently accepted, once she’d realized that her feelings were way beyond friendly.
“The last time we talked, you were planning to casually date and sow your wild oats,” Reese stated. It was a fair point. They hadn’t checked in nearly as much as Brynn had expected when she’d come to Stoneport, but that was on her.
Still, she shrugged off the idea for some reason. Probably because it seemed so ridiculous that she would have ever gone on dates with other people, considering Hallie was right there, waiting for her. God, Brynn had been so laughably oblivious toher own feelings. “I don’t think anyone would define anything about me as wild.”
Reese looked at the hickey again. “I beg to differ.” Brynn laughed but then quieted when Reese added, “I just wanted to make sure that not telling me didn’t have anything to do with me being Grant’s sister. The last thing I would want is for you to think that you couldn’t talk to me. Especially because you are, by orders of magnitude, the person that I picked to stick with post-breakup.”
And as Brynn accepted Reese’s words, she felt the truth in them. Reese had always been honest with her, even when it had caused significant drama in the Devereux family. Brynn didn’t take that lightly, and it made her feel like she owed Reese an explanation. Not because it would make Reese happy, but because it felt important to Brynn herself. “I didn’t mention it because I wasn’t sure exactly what was going on. With myself. With Hallie. Honestly, I didn’t even know that I was into women until recently.”
Truly, there had been so much newness in Brynn’s life over the last two months—since coming to Stoneport—that it felt like she’d boarded a rocket ship into the future. She was here now, and everything, including her, was so very different.
“I really do value your friendship so much,” she said. “And I think there was a part of me that worried about the complexity of everything. Hallie and I are both of your maids of honor. We both work for you. And Hallie and Sydney are best friends. It’scomplicated.”
Reese laughed lightly. “Don’t worry. I know all about complicated. Earlier this summer, I felt like I was living in a soap opera.”
But, if they were putting it all on the table— “I really like her, Reese. Like, a lot.”
“I’m sensing some hesitation, though,” Reese observed astutely. “Is it about Grant?”
Brynn let out a harsh laugh. “God, no. I don’t think about him except when I wonder how I ever almost married him.”
“What was that about, anyway?” Reese shifted in her chair. “If you don’t mind me asking. I’ve always really liked you, and I’ve never really liked Grant. The two of you just seemed like such a strange couple. No offense.”
She’d been getting that a lot. “The thing with Grant was…” Then, she realized that Reese would probably understand better than a lot of people. “You’ve met my parents.”
“I have. Lovely people who want the world for their only child.”
Starting to talk about Bridget more with Hallie was making it easier to push through the opening that Reese had unknowingly given her. “Actually, I had an older sister. She passed away when I was six.”
Reese held her hand up to her chest, clearly upset by this information. “I’m so sorry, Brynn. I didn’t know.”
“My parents don’t talk about her. She died, and it was like the idea of dealing with that grief was too painful for them. So…” Brynn had been thinking about this a lot lately. Why she couldn’t stand the idea of disappointing her parents, even though she knew they would always support her no matter what.
Reese waited patiently, giving Brynn the much-needed time and space to collect her thoughts. All the pieces were scattered across her brain like a scavenger hunt, but she’d never really wanted to connect them. That would mean that she actually needed to do something with that information. And she didn’t relish the conversation she would need to have to make that happen.
But starting with Reese was a good place to practice. “I love my parents.”
Reese nodded. “I know you do, Brynn. It’s clear to everyone how much you all love one another.”
She rolled her lips inward, chewing on them. Finally, she exhaled. She could do this. Talk about the hard stuff. “I was only six. And once Bridget died, it was like the light had gone out of my parents’ eyes. I can remember that much. Everything took on this muted, sad quality that sort of felt like I was looking at life underwater. And when she was gone, it was like all the energy they’d been putting into her treatments and care had nowhere to go. I don’t really think they could deal with that. But they’re great people, and they were very aware that they still had a daughter left.”
She got an affirming, encouraging nod from Reese to continue.
“What they really want, more than anything in this world, is for me to behappy. Maybe so happy, even, that it could somehow balance out the scales of losing a daughter who would never get that chance. To grow up and fall in love and live her own life.” Brynn felt tears prickle behind her eyes, realizing everything Bridget had never gotten the chance to experience. “And for a long time, I looked at being happy as never being sad. Or never struggling. Or never making mistakes and then charting a new path as a result. It’s sort of defined my entire existence, if I’m being honest. These last handful of months have been the first time that I’ve let myself be confused or wayward or searching.”
The sympathetic smile on Reese’s face cut straight into Brynn’s chest. She knew that Reese understood a whole hell of a lot about wanting to please her parents. Even if it was for different reasons.
But Brynn wanted to get this out. She wanted to give it a voice for the first time in her life. Otherwise, she was likely to fall backinto old, destructive patterns, and with a relationship with Hallie on the line, she needed to make sure that didn’t happen.
“And it’s so crazy because I know my parents didn’t even like Grant. But by the time he asked me to marry him, I was graduating from my PhD program and staring down the barrel of what came next. And the idea that my parents would be worried about me and how I was living my life created this… opening for me to think that settling down and getting married was the most practical decision. Even if it was with a complete bonehead.”
Reese laughed wryly. “Understatement of the year where Grant is concerned.”
Brynn ran her hands along her lukewarm coffee cup, frowning. “I’m worried that Hallie doesn’t think that this version of myself is the real me, but I feel more like myself than I ever have before.”
Reese held Brynn’s stare for a beat, Brynn’s words hanging in the air between them. “I can see how someone like Hallie, who thrives on consistency, would think that. Have you two talked about it?”
