Page 19 of Something Old

He sighed. “I guess the answer has two parts. One, it’s kind of a strange carryover from my childhood. I always feel self-conscious, like ashamed almost about where I live, how I live . . . I’m dealing with it, but it’s tough.”

Madeline nodded.

“Two . . . I used to have a really nice home, a big one that I also built myself. It was similar to this one in style and aesthetics but on a much grander scale—and I had a small acreage with a big shop that I ran my now-defunct business from.”

“What happened to it?” Madeline asked but thought she knew.

“Because I made it myself—and used a lot of reclaimed materials, etc., plus my own labor was free, of course—and some years had passed, I’d spent way less on the place than it was worth on paper. And I had a couple lean years profit-wise because Greenridge was in an economic downturn. We’re on the upswing again, but the region’s always boom or bust.”

“Like a lot of industry-based small towns.”

He nodded. “Yeah. Anyway, when Holly and I split, I couldn’t afford to buy her out, not even close. We were forced to sell so she could get her half.”

“And you couldn’t . . . salvage the business part of things at least, start over somewhere else?”

“No. I didn’t want to, actually. I thought we’d been working toward something together, you know? A home, a successful business, a tight-knit family of two, with love and friends, a good life . . . but it was all, every bit of it . . . a lie. I always wanted kids, but she said she couldn’t have them, and that was that. I loved her and thought she was my family; she was enough. More than enough.”

He looked down at his hands. He had picked up his wineglass and was gripping it too hard. He set it down again. “When I found out she was pregnant and that not only was the baby not mine, she had always been able to conceive, just hadn’t wanted to—and didn’t disclose that to me—something inside me broke, I think. And I haven’t been able to fix it.” Bitterness and pain roughened his voice to a scraping whisper, and the kinship Madeline felt with him at that moment made her shiver.

“And it wasn’t just losing her that was hard . . . it was realizing I’d never had her love the way she had mine—and being forced to let go of every dream I’d had for the future for us, ones I hadn’t even known I had until they came crashing down around me in one horrible evening.”

Madeline discreetly nudged the outer corner of her right eye, willing away the creep of saline.

Grant noticed, however, and dismay, bordering on alarm, creased his face. “Sorry, that’s too doom-and-gloom for a celebration night. Instead of throwing shade on the house or food, I should’ve warned you about an even bigger flaw: I’m a terrible host.”

“Not at all. It’s been lovely in every way—but I should probably call a cab, get going.”

“I’m sorry I can’t offer you a ride home, but I have a strict no drinking and driving policy. I don’t drive even when I’ve only had a couple—and as you know, we’ve each had more than that.”

Madeline laughed. “I’ll say.” Then she grew serious. “I appreciate that policy. Thank you.”

Instead of picking up her phone, however, she plucked her wineglass from the table again, took another long, appreciative sip, and elaborated. “I enjoyed the meatier bits of our conversation. I don’t actually talk to a lot of people these days, except for light chit-chat.”

Grant nodded and studied her intently, as if wondering about something but unsure how to put it into words.

Madeline raised her eyebrows in silent encouragement for him to speak.

“You really just woke up one day, packed everything you owned, and moved to a new town where you knew no-one—a place you’d never even visited before?”

Well, she hadn’t really woken up, per se, since her insomnia had been a ravaging beast at that point. Still, his general summary of the events she’d shared in scant detail earlier was on point. She nodded.

“How could you do that? I mean . . . why?”

Such simple questions. No simple answers. And it was . . . getting late. She shrugged and gave a wry grin. “Well, you know how it is. It was either Greenridge or jump off a bridge.”

Grant didn’t laugh. He made a finger gun and pretended to shoot her. “I can do it too, you know—play shrink.”

“Oh, how’s that?”

“How I use anger, you use humor. To deflect, I mean.”

Even though he was as drunk as she was, he wasn’t wrong. “Well, there is that, I guess, but don’t let it muddy the more important and much bigger truth.”

“Which is?”

“That I’m freaking hilarious, of course.”

Grant’s eyes crinkled in a way she liked and looked forward to seeing more of. “Oh, yes, undeniably.”