Page 24 of Some Sort of Happy (Happy Crazy Love 1)
“God, Sebastian, I had no idea. That must be so hard to live with.”
“It is.” It felt surprisingly easy to open up to her. The only other person I’d talked to like this in the last few years were therapists. I sure as hell hadn’t ever talked to a woman on a date this way. But it felt good. “You know that voice in your head that knows all your deepest fears and apprehensions, the one that knows exactly how to make you doubt yourself, the one that refuses to leave you alone until you feel so on edge that you can’t even function?”
“Yeah,” she said quietly. “I hate that voice.”
I regarded her a moment. “What does yours say?”
She sighed. “That I’m stupid. That I’m a failure. That I’m never going to be as successful as my sisters and I should just stop trying.”
Her candor surprised me, as did her doubts about herself. On the outside, Skylar Nixon appeared to have everything going for her. But I knew better than anyone that you can never tell what demons someone is fighting. “And you know that’s not true. But it’s hard to ignore, isn’t it? For me, it’s impossible. I have to learn to accept it as part of me without being its victim, without sacrificing my entire life to it.” Or worse, someone else’s, I thought, hearing the sound of Diana’s anguished sobs behind a locked bedroom door.
She tilted her head, her expression curious. “How do you do it? Medication?”
I refocused on the woman in front of me. “That’s part of it, but the meds don’t cure it. I think the bigger help, for me anyway, is the therapy.” I took a deep breath and exhaled. “I have good days and bad. Today is good.”
She smiled. “I think so too.”
• • •
It might have been a good day, but walking into a restaurant with Skylar still made me edgy. We were seated at a four-top table, and she sat adjacent to me, which put her closer than if she’d sat in the chair across from mine. People were staring at us, and they were probably wondering what a girl like her was doing with an eccentric like me. I wasn’t stupid—I knew rumors had gone around after I’d returned from New York, especially since one of my sisters-in-law has a big mouth, but I was used to not caring what people thought. Skylar, though, kept her head down, her hair hanging in her face. Was she ashamed to be seen with me? If so, then why had she suggested a drink? This was a mistake.
“Are you OK?” she asked, her eyes concerned. “I’m sorry people are staring at us,” she said. “It’s my fault, and it’s probably making you feel weird.”
“Your fault? I think it’s my fault.”
Her eyes went wide. “Your fault? Why would it be your fault? I’m the one who made an ass of myself on national TV. My God, I drunk-rode a mechanical bull for seven seconds.”
“Fuck,” I said with a straight face. “That’s a horrible number.”
She looked confused, and then it registered. “Oh, ha ha ha.” She slapped my arm. “I’m glad my humiliation is so amusing.”
Laughing a little at her red face, I assured her I had never heard of the show and couldn’t care less about it, nor did I care what other people in here might be whispering about her.
“Thank you. I wish more people cared less. I keep getting the evil eye from all corners of the room.” We sat back as our server set two plates in front of us and warned us they were hot.
“You know who you are,” I said once we were alone again. “Fuck them.”
She smiled ruefully. “I wish I could have that attitude. I know I shouldn’t care about what people think, but easier said than done.”
“Yeah. I know that feeling.”
She gave me a sympathetic half-smile and picked up her cheeseburger. “So you had a good day today. Tell me about it.”
While we ate, I told her about how I’d hung a hammock between two birches that morning and took a nap in it this afternoon.
“I love naps,” she enthused, munching a french fry. “Any day with a nap in it is automatically better.”
“Agreed.” For a moment, I indulged in a fantasy of the two of us in my hammock, Skylar lying on top of me, head on my chest, her bare feet tangled with mine, the leaves shading us from the afternoon sun. I’d play with her hair and she’d sigh softly, and I’d feel her body melt into mine. We could fall asleep to the sounds of the birds and and the wind, and the water, and—
Fuck. I wish things were different.
I picked up my beer and took a long pull. No sense in thinking like that. I was who I was. “So did you have a good day?”
“I guess so. I worked this morning, and then I went shopping for something to wear to the reunion.”
“What reunion?”
“Ours. Our ten-year high school. It’s this Saturday. I was going to ask you if you were going.” She picked up her wine glass.
