At her expression, Tom released her hand and pulled his arm back to his side of the table, leaving her wrist feeling tingly and exposed.
“Um,” Tom said, tone now vaguely embarrassed. “We should probably do that, right? Talk?”
Rose sighed to anchor herself. “Right.” She pulled out her day planner. “I’m sorry, but I need to send some out-of-office emails and instructions to the foundation’s property managers right now. It’ll probably take me like an hour. But then we can talk. I think the best place to start is the claims estimate, right? Have you had a chance to read that yet?” She opened her purse and found the binder that had the insurance paperwork in it.
“Oh,” Tom said. His face was a muddle.
“What?” she asked. “It’s okay if you didn’t get to it yet. It’s a long boat ride. I’ll walk you through it.”
“No, I read everything you sent. I just meant—yeah. Of course we’ll talk about the inn stuff. But. Everything else too, right?”
“What else?”
“We never really did, you know,” Tom said, when of course Rose knew that. “What happened, why, how you felt—”
“But why? You think we need to—for closure?” It was the only thing she could think of, and she supposed she might owe him that for his troubles here, but if she had to think back to how she’d felt as a scared and lonely twenty-two-year-old, she needed a fifth of whiskey and her therapist on standby.
“No, basically the opposite of closure,” he said, deep brown eyes wide and concerned. “We’re going to talk, and then we’re going to work things out the way we should have ten years ago.” Tom paused. “Isn’t that why I’m here? We’re going to work things out?”
No, she’d thought he was going to help her hang drywall in a suitably apologetic way, and then maybe once a year or so they’d exchange gentle yet emotionally fraught nods from across crowded rooms.
Remember when we thought we’d die holding hands in the same nursing home?
Ah, yes, we were young once, weren’t we?
“You didn’t seriously think we’d just pick up where we left off?” Rose demanded, even though it sounded beyond ludicrous to articulate. She’d thought there was zero chance Adrian or Sloane could be right about why Tom was here.
Tom laughed, the sound bright and startled.
“Um, no,” Tom said. “Where we left off was you tossing myclothes in the hall.” He mimicked her voice. “I hate you, you bastard, you ruined my life?” His chin tilted as though he was waiting for her to acknowledge the accuracy of this recitation. She stiffened instead, unable to defend herself but unwilling to say he hadn’t had it coming. “That wasnota good place. So, no, not where we left off. Forward? Backward. Not sure which way. But someplace else.”
Rose blinked at him, her cheeks turning to flame. “You mean you think we could be friends now?” she tried to clarify.
It sounded unlikely. What did he think they could manage? Drinks at their college reunions? Jointly plan Adrian’s eventual bachelor party?
“Friends? I don’t know. We were never really friends, were we?” he said cautiously.
Rose looked down at her lap, clenching her hands where they’d twisted together. “I used you think you were mybestfriend.” That had been the worst part. There was only so much one kind of love could do to substitute for another, and loving her remaining family and friends even harder hadn’t felt like it could ever fill the giant Tom-sized hole in her life after he left.
She swallowed, thinking about ice cream and cold beer and pickles out of the refrigerator, which was a trick to clear her throat when it felt too tight.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” Tom said after a moment, tone abashed. “Of course we were friends. And if I hadn’t been such a dick, I would have tried to at least keep that, if nothing else. If that’s all you want from me, I’ll—I’ll try. But can’t you try too?”
“I don’t know,” Rose hedged. “What about you and Boyd?”
Tom made a face. “Is Boyd really a problem? What you’ve heard probably isn’t even true, and uh…we were divorced.”
Rose had not at all intended to suggest that she judged him for dating Boyd, but rather that Boyd might have some objection to Tom’s ex-wife playing a recurring role in his life.
“Of course I don’t have a problem with you and Boyd,” she hurried to say. “Who would say no to Boyd Kellagher, even if they were still married?”
She was joking, but Tom looked even more uncomfortable.
“He’s notthatgreat,” Tom muttered. “Not everyone likes him.”
Rose snorted. “Come on. Everyonedoes. I will never have a relationship that is closed to someone like Boyd Kellagher, and I wouldn’t expect you to either.”
Tom now looked like he was about to cringe off the entire boat. “Seriously? That’s how you’d want it?”
