Authors: Delia Delaney
He raised
his
eyebrow
s
at me.
“You’re an idiot for being friends with me,” I added. “I’m sorry you couldn’t trust me enough to be completely honest with me. I guess I wasn’t that good of a friend if you felt—”
“Now
you’re
being an idiot,” he told me. “This has nothing to do with you, Ellie. It has to do with rebuilding my life again, and…and…”
“And what?”
“Nothing, I just…” He sighed. “My future
with you
. I just need to know where we stand, Ellie.”
I couldn’t help it when I swallowed. Did he
mean
…? Was he saying what I thought he was saying? His future?
With me?
The way he was looking at me made my pulse race, and I was thinking about doing something really impulsive—
“Because my friendship with you is important,” he continued. “If you don’t want to be friends anymore because you can’t trust me, or because you’re disappointed
in
me, then I understand. But I want you to know how sorry I am for keeping things from you. I wish I didn’t have such a mixed past,
but
I just wanted to blend in.”
I guess I could feel my heart drop a little. Friendship and friends… Those words were starting to annoy me. I knew that I used those words too, but who used them more often? And then I wondered if we were just mutually using them to cover up what was really going on…
He sighed again and took a few steps away from me. “You’re right,” he ended up saying. “Our worlds are pretty different, I guess. I understand.”
“You understand what?” I finally said. “I didn’t even say anything.”
He looked at me again and shrugged. “I guess you didn’t have to. You’re standing there, absolutely stunned
, and can’t even answer a simple question.”
“What was the question?”
“I just wanted to know if we could still be friends, Ellie.”
“How is that a simple question?”
“Uh, because you either say yes,” he said, nodding his head, “or you say no,” he finished, shaking it side to side. “Yes,” he nodded, “or no,” he shook his head. “Yes—”
“Stop it!” I
smiled
. “Okay, I get it.”
He smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
“Yes, we’re friends, Tyse. We always will be.”
“Always?”
“Yes. Do you have a problem with that?”
“No, not when it’s what I want.”
I slightly nodded my head, feeling the air deflate right out of me. I
dropped down
on
to
the couch and glanced at my watch. I had about an hour before I needed to leave, so even though I was still trying to process everything that had happened over the weekend, I decided I could at least try for more answers.
“So while we’re kind of having a heart to heart,” I began, patting the spot next to me.
He tilted his head back and groaned, reluctant to oblige because he knew what was coming next. But he did sit down and turned to face me.
“My brother
shot
himself
, if that’s what you wanted to know,” he said right away. “My father pushed him and pushed him as far as he could, forced him to go to Pepperdine and forced him to work in his company. Shane hated it—couldn’t handle the pressure and couldn’t find a way out of it—so he finally killed himself.
Shot
himself right there in my dad’s office. Now if that wasn’t bad enough, my parents decided to play it off like someone murdered him. Created all this confusion and bullshit to confuse the public so it didn’t look like they had a son that committed suicide.”
I stared at him in disbelief.
“Yeah, it’s amazing what money can do for you. So when my dad started in on me to take my brother’s place—like it was a big,
frickin
’
pleasure
of mine, like I was doing it in Shane’s honor or something—I pretty much told him to shove it. I was eighteen at the time, and I had no interest in my dad’s company. My dad basically told me I was
gonna
do it or else, so I guess I chose the ‘or else’ option. My parents decided to offer the public a reward for any information that solved my brother’s
‘
murder,
’
and that just really did it for me. My father’s busines
s soared through the roof because of the publicity, and I couldn’t stand seeing him making money off of Shane’s suicide. It was because of my dad that he killed himself, and I just couldn’t live with what my parents were doing.
“So,” he sighed. “While I still had the cars and the other possessions gifted to me by my wonderful parents, one by one I sold them all—everything I could—and I donated the money to various charities.” He kind of chuckled. “It was pretty liberating, really. But of course my parents were livid, and when rumors began circulating, I was asked a lot of questions. One day, after I’d left home and moved in with Nate, a reporter found me and flat out asked, ‘Did your brother really commit suicide?’ and I said, ‘Yes, he did.’ And then he asked, ‘So are you saying that your parents have been lying to the public?’ and I said, ‘Yes, they have.’ ”
He shrugged, and I just sat there in astonishment.
“So…” he continued. “After my dad used a pile of money to dig himself out of that one, you can see why they refused to help me out
when I got arrested
. And, I didn’t say this before because I didn’t want to get into it,
but
it’s because of them that I actually got convicted.”
“
What
? You mean to tell me that you were railroaded by your own parents
?!
”
He slowly
nodded and lowered his voice. “They p
aid Nate’s sister to lie in court that she and I were together, and that I went there looking for vengeance.”
I hung my mouth open in shock.
“Of course there was no proof, and the history with my parents was kept out of it, including the stuff about my brother because it involved another case. There was a lot that the media didn’t know, including who my parents were. It was just… It was unbelievable.”
I couldn’t even believe it myself. It made my parents’ wariness of Tyse hurt me even more because of how truly innocent he was of it all.
“So what does your dad do? What’s his company?”
“He’s an investment banker. Runs the
second
largest investment company on the west coast right now.”
“And investment banking wasn’t what you were interested in?”
“I honestly could not picture myself in a suit and tie every day, talking business with people I didn’t want to talk business with. It just wasn’t me. And seeing what my brother went through was about all I could take. He didn’t want to be a part of it either, but my dad just wouldn’t let up on him. I didn’t want to be unhappy like that; I didn’t want to live my life doing something I didn’t enjoy. I especially didn’t want to work for my dad, and that was probably the biggest motivator to cut myself loose. Surviving on my own wasn’t easy, but being away from my parents was a dream come true.”
“What about your sister? Elise? Is she close to your parents?”
“Yeah, she’s just a miniature version of my mom.”
I blew out a breath of air. “Yikes. I’m sure she’d hate me, too.”
He laughed. “Yeah, probably.”
“So where is she these days?”
“Harvard.”
I raised my eyebrows, but I guess I wasn’t surprised.
“
Dad’s
alma mater,” he added. “He’s proud as a peacock.”
I took a deep breath and prepared myself for the question I dreaded asking. “So… What did going to your parents’ house do? I mean what damage did
I
cause by doing that?”
He shrugged. “Probably nothing.”
“Don’t lie to me, Tyse.”
“I’m not. So they think I have a crazy friend that comes looking for me? What are they gonna do about it?”
“I don’t know,” I smiled uneasily. “
But what if I’ve caused them to, like, I don’t know…feel like they want to ruin your life even more or something. I don’t know,” I shrugged.
“What can they do to me? I’m sure all you did was remind them that they still even
had
a son.”
He smiled about it, but man that
was
sure hard to hear. I had been upset with my parents for even
calling
me over the weekend, wondering where I was. They’d found out that I didn’t go with the Newman’s to the mountain, and I was sure that freaked my mom out. I only listened to their voicemails because I didn’t want to talk to them, but now I felt bad about it. I
had left
them a message
on Saturday
, k
nowing they were both at work
, and I just told them I was out of town but that I was fine. I was sure they knew where I was though, and I was also sure I was going to have to face them about it sooner or later.
I had a very hard time getting on the plane that night. Tyse even wondered why the
heck
I was crying, and I had to stick with saying, “Because I’m going to miss you,” instead of what I really wanted to say.
I was even grumpy on the plane, sticking with my music so I didn’t have to talk to anyone. I was confused, to say the least, and even though my visit to California was pretty productive, I also felt like it complicated my life even more.
I still talked to Tyse every couple of days—more than we had before—and it was kind of nice to know so much about him. On the other hand it was annoying, because now I knew him even better, and I had a hard time dealing with that. I almost felt like my heart broke every time he said the f-word.
Friends
.
Ugh, I was beginning to hate that word.
My family had kind of become a little distant to me. My sister was living with me again, and after a huge apology (with pregnancy tears) we made up.
However,
I still
didn’t want to talk about Tyse
because of how I felt about him, so I kept that topic locked away. My parents tried to bring him up a couple of times, but I quickly shut them down. I just wasn’t ready to
discuss it
again. Especially because I knew it would
crush
me if they still chose not to accept him.
I pushed along with work, and by the time December arrived, I was pretty busy with a huge on-air Christmas party we were planning to do on the 15
th
. We had twenty guests coming in
to the
studio to win prizes
, choose songs to play, and be surprised with a few guest musicians.
It was going to be pretty fun, and I practically dedicated my life to doing the best job I could.
I tried to go snowboarding at least one day every weekend. It was my only release, and it was silly, but I treasured that time on the mountain. Half of the time I went by myself, and half of the time I went with Asher, but either way I found myself lost in my own confused little world.
Dawn and Wyatt ended up working things out, and my sister even moved back in with him. I didn’t really understand it, but I told myself I was never going to judge another person’s relationship again. I didn’t want mine to be criticized, so I certainly wasn’t going to criticize others. Dawn actually seemed to mellow out a little bit, and I wasn’t sure if it was because she was in her second trimester or because she was happier
being back with Wyatt, but
I was grateful. The rest of us didn’t feel like we were going to have our heads bitten off for no apparent reason, and now we could actually find ice cream in the freezers.
When I told that to
Tyse
he
thought that was pretty funny.
Tyse…
He was going to be coming on the 24
th
and I was ecstatic
. At the same time I was scared, and I didn’t know what to do about my feelings for him.
I wondered why my thoughts about him were beginning to change, and I realized it was probably because I wasn’t with Gage anymore. When I had a boyfriend, Tyse was just a friend to me. I
thought he was a beautiful guy
inside and out, but
when
Gage was my man I didn’t let anything get in the way of that. Now that I was single again, I began looking at Tyse a different way. I realized that I wanted more from him, but I wasn’t sure if he was willing to give it. We made such great friends, but what if that’s all he was comfortable with?
What if I completely ruined that with one stupid
mistake…
Chapter Twenty-Seven