PROLOGUE
DECLAN
I ringthe bell and stand there with my hands shoved deep in the pockets of my jeans as I stare at the tips of my shoes. It still feels weird wearing running shoes for stuff other than running. And I wish I could run here. I feel like it would alleviate a lot of the tension that builds up when I drive here. But it’s been a particularly hot and humid start to summer so it’s not a good idea. I may not be uptight, label whore Declan anymore but I still think showing up here covered in sweat, and probably stinking like rancid lobster meat, wouldn’t be appropriate.
He opens the door with the same placid smile he always has. I want to ask if there’s a required class that teaches therapists to smile in a way that emotes tranquility and acceptance but I don’t. I can ask my sister Terra one day, since she also went to school to become a therapist. Instead, I just say, “Afternoon Mr….” I pause. He told me to call him by his first name. “Sean.”
“Hey Declan.” He holds the door open wider. “Come in.”
I step into the small waiting room. It’s more like a hallway. Long and narrow with a couple of wicker chairs against the wall and a door to a tiny bathroom at the end of the hall. The chairs look like outdoor furniture, like he hauled them in from his back patio or something. It’s possible because his office is in the converted garage of his home. I stand there and wait for him to close the main door and then open the one to his right, which leads into his office. He motions for me to enter and I do, walking right over to the sturdy wingback chair across from his broad oak desk. There’s a couch and two other chairs that look much more comfortable in the corner of the room under the three small, square windows, but I ignore them. I’m sure his other patients sit there, and I probably should, but he doesn’t tell me to, so whatever.
“Coffee? Tea? Water?” Sean offers, just like he did the only other time I’ve been here. And just like that time, I shake my head no.
“Okay then.” He sits down behind his desk and reaches for a notebook. It’s a simple brown leather bound one. “Where should we start?”
I shrug. “I have no idea.”
Sean smiles again. I don’t find it soothing. I actually find it placating and I hate being placated, but I try not to get my back up. “Why don’t we start with how your week went since our initial meeting?”
I shrug. “Fine.”
“Any confrontations?”
“With whom?”
“Anyone.”
“Just the usual,” I grunt out.
He lifts one of his sandy eyebrows. “I don’t know what that means. Can you be specific?”
“I told a guy to fuck off,” I elaborate. “I was on the dock, cleaning my dad’s fishing boat after we brought in the morning haul. He’s getting arthritis in his back so we try not to let him do as much manual labor anymore. Anyway, one of the local fisherman, Stan, he and his son were coming in on their boat. He has issues with my family. We both own restaurants and he used to date my mom or something when they were young. Anyway, as they’re walking up the dock Stan makes some comment about what a shock it is to see me on the boat.”
I pause and shift in the chair. I really don’t want to rehash this and it’s not like it’ll solve my problems to re-live it. Sean is waiting for me to continue and when I don’t, he prompts me. “And you told him to fuck off for that?”
“No, but it irked me. Got my back up, because he’s right. I usually try to avoid the boat work like it’s the fucking plague.” I pause. “Sorry for swearing.”
“Swear away,” Sean tells me, and his smile feels a little more authentic this time. “A good obscenity is required sometimes. Go on.”
I sigh and run a hand over my hair. It desperately needs a trim and annoys the hell out of me every waking hour of my day. I don’t know why I’m not cutting it. It drops back onto my forehead as I continue this shitty story. “Truth is, I’ve barely been on the boat since I graduated college so it makes sense Stan and Stan Junior made a remark. I definitely never do the dirty parts, like cleaning the thing.”
Sean nods and I shift again in my seat. “I decided to just kind of nod and ignore them. I mean, it’s not like we’re friends. They’re rivals, actually, and every year he tries to steal my mom’s chowder recipe. Anyway… I thought they’d just keep on walking down the dock but Junior turned to his dad and said ‘Well you would avoid the restaurant too if your ex-wife still worked there and was getting it on with your brother.’”
The only sign of his shock is a quick blink of his brown eyes. “Well, that’s a shitty thing to say. Is it true?”
“Yeah. I told you I was divorced, and had come out to my family, and I needed to work through some things,” I reply, trying not to sound terse. I tend to sound dismissive and bitchy a lot. I wish I didn’t. I take another deep breath and level out my tone. “Well, my ex is still working for the family business. And I’m happy about that. And she is dating one of my younger brothers, and it’s weird, but I’m not bothered by it. Not one bit. But I still told the Stans to fuck off.”
“I see.”
I lean forward and put my elbows on my knees. “Why did I do that? Why didn’t I just tell them the truth. I could have said ‘I’m happy for Nova and Finn.’ Because I am. Honestly.”
“Because you’re not in love with her anymore?”
“No. I’m not. I don’t think I ever fully was. Not in a romantic way,” I reply. “I mean, I don’t know. I just know I didn’t feel things as… intensely as I wanted to with Nova. And I know she feels things much more deeply for Finn, my brother, than she ever felt for me. So it’s a good thing. I want her to have those feelings. She’s a great person.”
“And your brother? You’re okay with the way he feels about your ex-wife?” He doesn’t look confused or shocked. He looks non-judgmentally interested.
“Yeah. Look, they should have been together from the get go, but like…” I flex my jaw, which I know he observes because I have a really angular face and it’s hard to miss my annoyed tick. “I don’t know if they would have been. I mean, not back then. And she needed someone back then and I needed someone, and I don’t regret my marriage. And I don’t regret my divorce. I do regret how I’ve handled a lot of things in between. Like, just about everything. I’m here to work on that, so I can stop telling random idiots to fuck off.”
