Page 43 of A Matter of Time
Maybe that night would be the night we could finally let it go.
The smile on my face made Tyler laugh. “I take it that something good happened during your extended absence?”
“None of your business,” I told him, giving him a nudge as I tried not to look too pleased. Though I couldn’t say for sure if Tyler’s attentions played a role in what just happened, they didn’t seem to have hurt. “Thank you for coming tonight, though. I owe you one.”
“How about you let that woman at the end of the table know that you and I aren’t really together, and we’ll call it even?”
As I looked over to see who he meant, the woman quickly looked away, making it obvious she’d been watching us. Since it seemed pretty clear she was interested in Tyler, and apparently, he was interested too, that should be easy enough to deal with.
Giving Tyler a wink, I made my way over to chat with her, letting it drop casually that Tyler was just a friend, and then I went to sit with Marianne, giving the woman a chance to take my seat next to Tyler, which she quickly did.
It felt like high school all over again, and that impression didn’t change once Marianne and I had a chance to catch up.
“Jason hasn’t come over here at all yet,” she told me unhappily. “He’s just sitting over there with the other managers. Maybe I read too much into things.”
I didn’t think she had, and I also had a pretty good idea how we could find out for sure. “Come with me.”
I pulled her to her feet and we both headed over to the bar to order some more drinks. As I expected, as soon as Marianne was separated from the rest of the women, Jason made his way over to us, coming up next to her at the bar before we’d even had a chance to put our order in.
“Are you ladies having a good time?” Though he smiled at me, he clearly meant the question for Marianne.
“It’s been great,” I told him, though I had no intention of sharing exactly why I had enjoyed myself so much. “Oh, shoot, I think I left my phone at the table. I’ll be back in a minute. Go ahead and order without me.”
Leaving them alone, I headed back to the table and took Marianne’s old seat next to the other women while Jason and Marianne continued to chat by the bar and Tyler and the other woman were deep in conversation at the other end of the table.
That had to be some kind of matchmaking record. I was on fire that night. If only my own relationship was half as simple to sort out.
While I chatted with the other women from the office, half an hour passed since Cam left, and then another half hour. Marianne and Jason made their excuses and left, separately, but only a few minutes after each other, giving me a strong feeling that their evening wasn’t over just yet.After another twenty minutes, Tyler asked if I minded if he left too. I told him to go ahead and thanked him again for coming in the first place. With a frown, I double-checked my phone just to be sure I hadn’t missed any messages, but an empty screen stared back at me.
I couldn’t imagine what would be keeping Cam so long. His apartment wasn’t that far away; I knew that now that I knew exactly where he lived.
The crowd dwindled even further, and finally I had to face facts: Cam wasn’t coming back and he hadn’t even bothered to let me know. By the time I stood up to leave, my earlier satisfaction had completely dissipated.
Why did it feel like we were always on different wavelengths? When I needed some space, he took it personally, but when I wanted to get closer, he pulled away. I had tried to take Shawna’s advice and not leave things unsaid, but how was I supposed to say them when he wouldn’t listen?
Yes, he could make me come like a steam train rolling down a mountain, but what good was that if we still couldn’t trust or open up to each other?
At some point, I really had to cut my losses and move on. I thought Ihaddone that already before these last two weeks had ripped all the wounds open again, pressing on bruises that were still there, just beneath the surface, and as I walked out of the bar in frustration, I just wanted the numbness back that I had before. Where Cam had gone, who he’d gone with and what he might be doing there really didn’t matter. What mattered was that he said he would come back and he didn’t. Once more, he let me down.
At some point, it had to end, and I decided that evening would be it. I drew my line in the sand, and if he didn’t like it, that was too fucking bad. Usually, I didn’t give anyone a second chance, let alone a third one, and that evening showed exactly why. People didn’t change, and to expect them to was a sign of madness.
When I got home, I turned my phone completely off and left it on the counter so I wouldn’t be tempted to check later, and then I went to bed, alone, doing my best to put Cameron Bailey out of my head once and for all.
~Cam~
Mrs Callahan gave me a warm hug as soon as I arrived at the hospital room where Tonia’s dad was recovering. He gave me a shaky smile from his bed, which seemed to me to be a good sign.
“How’re you doing?” I asked him once Mrs Callahan let me go.
“I’ve been better,” he said bluntly, his spirit obviously still intact even if his voice sounded far weaker than usual. “Thanks for coming, though I told her not to call you.”
“He doesn’t mind,” Mrs Callahan replied on my behalf. “And you’re going to need to start accepting some help now if you don’t want this to happen again, or worse!”
Clearly, I’d walked into an ongoing argument, so I did my best to stay out of it while trying to figure out exactly why they’d asked me there in the first place.
“I understand why you didn’t call Dex,” I said, though I thought he’d probably still want to know, tough or not. “But what about Tonia or Laura? They’d both be here in a heartbeat.”
Billie was still in college and didn’t have a car, so it would be trickier for her, but the older two Callahan girls would drop everything for their daddy, I knew that for certain.
