Ainsley grew up here, sure, but she kept to herself in high school and then left immediately. She’s as much of an outsider as you get in Bluebell Falls and might have a perspective I’ve been too blinded by anger to see.
I contemplate my options as I change into my standard uniform of black leggings and a razorback tank top, this one forest green. I decide that if I really want to move on, I need to talk things out. I’m not so sure I’ve ever had a clear head when thinking about anything involving Arlo.
Opening my door, I plaster a smile on my face.
“Oh, stop. Don’t fake smile around me. It’s just insulting.” She shakes her head with a smirk.
I sigh as I collapse onto the couch next to her and pick up the coffee she made me. The fortifying sip gives me the boost I need to open up.
“You’re right, sorry.”
“What’s going on? You’re usually the one pounding on my door for our morning girl time,” she says with nothing but concern.
“You have to promise that none of this leaves this room. Ledger can’t know; Bluebell Falls can’t find out, okay?” I know Ainsley, and she would never gossip or tell my business to anyone, but this is huge and would be a shockwave throughout our small town.
“Oh shit, this is serious.” She puts her mug down and shifts her left leg under her right as she turns to me. “It doesn’t leave this room, I promise.”
“God, I don’t even know where to start.” Understatement of the century. Between our past and our recent hook-ups, there is no easy place to start explaining things. “Arlo and I … have a complicated history.”
“I fucking knew it!” Ainsley yells with a fist pump. “Sorry, sorry. That was rude. Carry on.”
I snort at her reaction. “What gave it away?”
“You hate him just a little too hard for there not to be something going on there, sorry.” She cringes, but I love her honesty. It’s exactly why talking this out with her might help my very scrambled brain.
“No need to apologize. This is a long-ass story, so bear with me.” She nods, and I proceed to tell her about our whirlwind romance when we were barely out of high school. How we had this grand plan for our life together, and then I drop the biggest bombshell of it all. “And then we got married.”
She stares at me blankly as the confession finally sinks in. “What the fuck? You married Arlo? How did I not know this?”
“No one knows. We kept the whole thing a secret. Back then, he and Ledger were best friends, and Arlo was scared of his reaction. Arlo was going to basic, and our plan was to figure out the military life thing before telling our families.”
“Holy shit,” she whispers.
My phone pings, but I ignore it.
I chuckle. “Oh, it gets worse.” I tell her how he had to almost immediately leave for a deployment or a mission and how it changed things for him. “I didn’t know any of this until last night. He blindsided me with divorce papers, and I never knew why.” I explain his reasoning ,and although saying it out loud makes my heart hurt for him all over again, my anger is simmering just below the surface still.
“That’s so tough. Not going to lie, I completely understand the animosity toward him now. Did hearing his explanation help at all?” she very astutely asks.
“Yes. No.” I sigh. “I’m not sure, honestly. I feel for him and everything he went through, but I still don’t really understand why I wasn’t enough, you know? Why couldn’t he just talk to me about his concerns and fears,and let us work through things together?” It’s the biggest question I still have. I would have run through fire to help him, to be there for him, and I just can’t comprehend how his head went to divorce so easily.
“I’m going to look at this objectively. You were both extremely young, right? Both had huge changes happening. Maybe he thought it was his only option. No one would claim that twenty-year-olds make great decisions. That’s not excusing his behavior, but I think it explains more about why he made such a shit choice.”
I choke out a laugh because she has a valid point. “I think the reason I couldn’t—and still can’t—fully forgive him is because he did it two weeks after my parents died. I needed him more than ever, and instead, he just threw everything we had away.”
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Absolutely,” I say.
“Do you want to forgive him? Is that something you are even interested in?”
I try to find the answer, but I’m no closer than I was when I knocked on Arlo’s door last night.
“I’m not entirely sure. I want to move past the anger, move past hating him, but I don’t know that it includes forgiveness.”
“I can understand that. What happened recently that allowed you both to talk about things and get to this point?”
My fucking phone pings again, and I turn the ringer off without even looking at it.
