Page 2 of Hard to Love

Fury and confusion laced with hurt own me as I shove against his chest. He stumbles backward from the force. Other students come out of the gym, the lure of a fight irresistible to them.

But I refuse to be their amusement. Refuse to let my embarrassment be the talk of the school.

My hands are fisted and I curse the tears that burn in my eyes. I blink them away and take a few steps back, unsure what to do, uncertain how this happened.

“I don’t understand,” I whisper as the crowd grows and tears fill Molly’s eyes. She shakes her head.

I want to believe the regret I see on her face is genuine, but this is the same girl who told me she loved me last month. The same girl I loved.

And I believed that to be true so why should I trust myself?

I need to get out of here. I need to breathe. I need to—

Without a word, I turn and jog back to the car where my dad is still sitting behind the wheel.

“Finn,” he says way too calmly as I slam the door.

“Drive. Get me out of here,” I say, my voice hoarse, those tears back in my eyes.

But he doesn’t start the car. Instead, he sits with his hands on the wheel staring at Molly who’s now looking our way.

“Now you understand what I’ve been telling you all these years. Women are nothing but traitors. They use you, then spit you out. You need to learn to use them and spit them out before they dig their hooks in. Once that happens, you’ll feel like you do right now. Hurt. Raw. Angry. Just like your mom made me feel. And you, Finn. Because of what she did to us.”

“Not now, Dad.” But his words hit my ears differently this time. They start to hold some truth. They start to feel valid.

“Women always leave. Remember that.”

He finally turns the key in the ignition and slowly pulls out of the spot and away from my bullseye view of Molly and Eddie. Thank God. I hate them. I hate them both. But how did my dad know to bring me here?

How did he know they’d be standing right there and what we’d find?

And why did he laugh as my heart was ripped from my chest and stomped on?

FINN

I HOP ON ONE FOOT in the dark as I try to put my shoe on without tripping over the piles of shit on the floor throughout the room.

Too late.

I lose my balance and smack my thigh against the corner of her dresser.

Motherfucker. I grab my leg, my shoe still half on, and grit my teeth in response to the pain as I stare through the darkness toward the bed.

“Finn?” Roxy’s sleep-drugged voice calls.

I freeze with my hand on the zipper of my slacks. Shit. So much for making a clean getaway.

“Where are you going?” she asks as she shifts in bed so that she’s sitting there, a shadow against the night.

I hesitate for the briefest of seconds, thoughts of her warm body and her more than wild ways filling my head. But right after those thoughts are her words from earlier tonight.

“We’re good together, you and me. Maybe I shouldn’t renew my lease and we could . . . you know, move in together.” And if that wasn’t enough to make my dick wither and fall off, there was the soft sigh of “I love you, Finn,” that she whispered when she thought I had fallen asleep. The four words nearly stopped my heart.

Jesus. It took everything I had to not leave right then and there.

Live together? Surrounded by all this clutter? By not having the freedom to come and go as I please?

Love? Let’s face it. She doesn’t know the first thing about love and neither do I. No, it’s time to stop while I’m ahead.