“Is she happy?” I ask, nodding toward Mrs. Delgado.
“She’s terrified. But the good kind. The kind where you’re afraid you might actually get what you’ve been praying for. She’s already picking out curtains in her head.”
“Good, though she might not want ones in the kitchen. It’s got a good view of the park. I made sure of that.”
I take another bite of the sandwich, looking out over the site. A worker yells something in Spanish, followed by a burst of laughter.
Once the noodles are gone, leaving nothing but that salty, yellow residue in the bottom of the cup, I set it on the gravel between my boots.
“I was a coward, Harley. And I don’t just mean at the wedding,” I continue, my voice steady, though my heart is trying to kick its way out of my ribs. “The wedding was just the collapse. I used you. For three years, I used you like a piece of structural support I didn’t want to pay for.”
I feel her shift beside me, the navy fabric of her blazer rustling.
“I did it with Amanda, too,” I say. “I found women who had what I lacked—integrity, a spine, a sense of self that wasn’t dictated by a board of directors. Too weak to find my own, I wrapped myself in your strength. I used you as a shield against Robert and Elaine. I figured if I was with someone like you, then maybe some of it would rub off on me by osmosis. I could pretend I was standing up to them just by being next to you. Or on my worst days, I’d sacrifice you in order to keep them away from me.”
I finally turn to her. She isn’t looking at the site anymore. She’s looking at me, her expression unreadable, her hands still tight on her briefcase.
“Every time they insulted you, every time my mother made a ‘suggestion’ about your clothes or your career, and I stayed silent, I wasn’t just failing you as a partner, I was failing myselfas a human being. I was prioritizing a version of me that lived in their heads over the woman who actually loved me. I wanted their approval more than I wanted your dignity. And that’s never going to be okay. I just wish I’d been strong enough to deserve you then. But I’m trying to be strong enough to deserve my own respect now.”
“Thank you for saying that, Skyler.”
Her voice is soft, the professional edge finally blunted.
“I needed to hear it,” she continues. “For a long time, I wondered if I was the one who was crazy. If I was being too sensitive, too ‘difficult.’ You have a way of making people feel like their boundaries are just inconveniences for your parents. Hearing you admit that it was a pattern helps.”
She stands up, smoothing the wrinkles in her slacks. She looks back at me, and for the first time, I see the girl I fell in love with—the one who works in a cramped office and believes in justice even when it’s inconvenient.
“I think you needed to say it, too,” she adds. “Good luck with the house, Skyler. I think it’s going to be a good one.”
The lunch whistle blows.
“I’ll have those cabinet specs for you by tomorrow,” I say, pushing myself up from the sawhorse. My legs are stiff, my back is protesting, and I have a long afternoon of labor ahead of me.
“I’ll be here,” she says.
She turns and walks toward the front of the site, where Mrs. Delgado is waiting by the car. Harley doesn’t look back.
I watch her, but I don’t feel the desperate, clawing longing that used to keep me awake in the mansion. I don’t feel the urge to run after her and promise her a mansion or a diamond. But I do feel respect.
Chapter 29
Harley
Skyler Thompson used to be a masterpiece of avoidance.
He was a man built of velvet and silence, a human shrug living in his father’s shadow. In the Thompson mansion, Skyler was nothing more than a beautiful piece of furniture, carefully placed to complement the decor. He drifted through the mahogany hallways, never raising his voice and never standing his ground.
Now, I’m standing behind a stack of kiln-dried lumber at 4th and Maple, looking for the new version of that man.
I haven’t found him yet. Physically, that is.
Because I’m hidden. Strategically placed between the lumber and a portable generator, I’m an observer.
Skyler is thirty feet away, standing in the center of what will eventually be the Delgado living room. Wearing a T-shirt that’s seen better days, there’s a smudge of charcoal acrosshis forehead. It’s as if he drew up designs in ink and then immediately jumped into action.
I watch him as a crew member—a tall man with arms like knotted ropes—struggles to position a massive support beam. The beam is heavy, a dead weight of yellow pine that threatens to slip.
Old Skyler would have called a foreperson. Old Skyler would have checked his reflection in a window and waited for someone else to get their hands dirty while he negotiated the “aesthetic synergy” of the room.
