Well, everything, apparently.
“Kinsey McKenna! Willy’lookat this here, Collin! Kinsey is back from school!”
Patrick’s dad waved at me from the couch,tipping his head. “Nice to seeya, Kinsey. You’vebeen sorely missed around here. Right, boys?”
The seventeen-year-old twins, Ryan and Sean,flanked their father, shooting me half-hearted waves in the dismissive teenageway I remembered all too well.
Then, Mrs. Kinney threw her arms around me,pulling me into a hug that pushed tears from my eyes. She heard my snifflesagainst her ear, and she stepped back, holding my shoulders.
“Oh,m’dear, ‘tisbeen a tough time, hasn’t it? Buty’know, I believethe Lord has a plan, and—”
“Mam.” Patrick appeared behind his mother,staring at her through warning eyes. My heart jumped at the sight of him; notwith love, but with surprise—hedidlook different. Sixmonths had made him older, and tired. Something had changed. Something hadshifted in his universe, and it had pulled him away.
“Oh, Paddy, I was just aboutt’getya.”
“Cany’leaveusalone, Mam?”
I clenched my sweater in my fists, my mindcatapulting every gut wrenching possibility at my heart.
“Oh, right, of course.”
Mrs. Kinney looked to me with sad eyes, longingeyes, and then, turned away, nodding her head as she walked toward the back ofthe house. Patrick motioned with a jerk of his chin for me to step back outside,and with hesitation, I complied.
Closing the door, he gestured toward a bench onthe porch. “Sit down.”
He was so commanding, a harsh bite to hisvoice, and I did as I was told. Patrick sat beside me, and didn’t touch me,didn’t even look at me. All I wanted was for him to read my thoughts. To knowthat I wanted him to hold me, to kiss me, to lie and tell me everything was allright. But instead, he leaned forward, planting his elbows against his knees,and his hands rounded to the back of his head. Pulling, grasping at his hair.The silence was thick and deadly, choking me with every passing second, and Itook it upon myself to make the first move, just to remind myself that Ipossessed the ability to breathe.
“Patrick, I—”
“I slept with Christine.”
My back straightened at the sound of her name.My mouth went dry, my tongue stuck to my palate, the way it does when gorgingon peanut butter. My stomach flipped, and I was afraid I would heave,potentially losing the Easter breakfast I had eaten only hours before. Iremembered the ham my mom was cooking—how could I eat anything knowing myboyfriend had his dick inside that long-forgotten bitch?
And then, with a brutal twist of my heart, Iremembered he wasn’t my boyfriend. We had broken up, and he had done nothingwrong, except move on from me when I hadn’t even begun to stop crying myself tosleep.
“I, um …” I swallowed at the threats from myscrambled eggs, my jaw slack. “It’s o-okay. We can, um, work—”
“She’s pregnant.”
As though I hadn’t heard him correctly, orperhaps he hadn’t intended to say that word and it was just a slip of theol’ Irish tongue, I asked him to repeat himself.
“Oh, Jesus,y’heardme, Kinsey. She’spregnant.”
My response was to clap a hand over my mouth;to prevent a scream or the uprising of vomit, I don’t know which. But, eitherway, my efforts were proven futile when I involuntarily thrust myself forwardand threw up on my shoes.
One of Patrick’s hands had come to lay againstmy back, rubbing gently as I heaved, while the other held his forehead. He kepthis eyes pinched shut, and I was at least grateful for that when I sat up towipe my sleeve over my mouth. I couldn’t look in those eyes after what he hadjust told me, after what he had done.
I shrugged his hand off my back, the hand thathad touched her. I wanted to run away from him, but my feet were frozen to thespot as my brain struggled, sputtering along, trying to process it all.
“I came here to tell you I had chosen you,” Isaid, finding my voice and my tears. “Iwa-wanted tofix things.”
“Jesus, Kinsey, I can’t do this right now,” hesaid, shielding his face with his hands.
“I tried to date a couple guys at school, and Icouldn’t do it. I couldn’t get through a single date without thinking aboutyou.” A bubble of heartbreak emerged from my gut, and I sobbed in a blubberymess. “I fucked up when I broke up with you, I-I know that, but you had alreadychosen me when you fucked her. How could you do that? I could barely looksomeone else in the eye, and you fucked her. How could you do that when you’resupposed to love me?”
Patrick sat there, motionless. The only soundhe made was the muffled sniffling from behind his hands. He couldn’t let me seehim cry. He was too cool, too tough for that.
Stubborn Irish bastard.
