I hated Brandon, and I hated how her parents kept me away from her.
But they all were right about one thing. I had to grow up and fix this. She deserved better.
If the media wanted to twist my life in ways that would hurt people around me, I couldn’t stop them. But I could fight fire with fire, and that was exactly what I intended to do.
Friday night at that fundraiser, I would show this whole world just how much she meant to me, and I'd use the press's own reach against them.
28
LAINEY
I heard footsteps on the stairs and assumed it was my mother coming to check on me. But when the door opened, Brandon stood there with his hands in his pockets. I was laying on Wren's bed probably looking like a total wreck, but he had a smile on his face that almost made me cry again.
"Hey," he said quietly.
I sat up and wiped my face even though I knew I looked like a disaster. "What are you doing here?"
"Your dad called me this morning." He moved into the room but didn't sit down. He stood there looking uncomfortable, holding a teddy bear and a chocolate bar. "He said you were having a rough day and you could use a friend."
"That's an understatement." I had to remind my father at some point that Brandon could not be my go-to comfort anymore. It was sweet of him to do this, but I knew there was an undercurrent there I had to discourage. I had no intention of going back to Brandon after everything that had happened.
He gestured to the chair by my desk. "Can I sit?"
I nodded, and he pulled the chair over to the bed and sat down. We looked at each other for a moment and I saw the boy I'd fallen for when I was fifteen. The one who'd taken me to prom and held my hand through my grandmother's funeral and talked about our future like it was a sure thing.
Before everything went wrong, we really were pretty happy together.
"I'm sorry," I said. "About everything… about how things ended."
"Don't apologize." He leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and set the bear and candy on the comforter next to me. "I'm the one who screwed everything up." He sounded genuinely sorry. "I knew it the instant you didn't show up at the altar, and I felt like I broke everything."
"You did break something."
"I know." He rubbed his face. "And I've been trying to figure out how to fix it, but I don't think I can."
"No." I pulled the blanket tighter around myself. "You can't."
I picked up the teddy bear and hugged it. I thought about all the years we'd spent together. Movie nights where we'd argue over what to watch and end up falling asleep on his couch. Road trips where he'd let me pick all the music and never complained even when I played the same song five times in a row. We had so many good memories together, and now it was over.
That's what I'd lost when he cheated. Not just the relationship but the friendship underneath it. The person who knew me better than almost anyone.
"I told him off," Brandon grumbled and rubbed his face with both hands. Then he looked up at me with an apologetic expression.
I looked up. "What?"
"Kade—he was standing outside when I drove up... I told him he was a piece of shit for treating you like this and that he needed to leave you alone."
My stomach dropped. "Brandon?—"
"I know you probably didn't want me to do that." He held up his hand. "But I couldn't help it. Lainey, I may have messed things up with you, and that's on me. But you're literally perfect. You're a treasure, and he's treating you like trash. He needed to be told how bad he's messing up."
"You didn't have to do that." I felt heat creeping up my neck. I was embarrassed enough as it was. I covered my face and groaned, and Brandon pulled my hands down.
"Don't be embarrassed." He leaned back in the chair. "He's the one who should be embarrassed. Calling you names and denying you exist and then showing up here like he has any right to see you."
"He's not that bad, Bran." Why was I defending Kade when Brandon was probably right?
"He's a total douche," Brandon said with conviction. "And he doesn't deserve you. You're smart and talented and way too good for some rich playboy who can't make up his mind about what he wants."
