Only Through Love: A Cane River Romance Novella (10 page)

            “Tell
me,” she said.

            “What?”

            “Tell
me your secret. If you can’t tell them, you can tell me. Maybe I can help.
Maybe I can do what you do, and show you the way to shuck off that old guilt.”

            He
looked into her eyes, and she remembered the first time they’d met, and how
she’d thought he was a handsome Southern guy from a good family who led an
uncomplicated, privileged life. There was a shadow in his eyes she hadn’t seen,
or bothered to see. He was just a person, with burdens and anxieties and
secrets. Just like her.

“Love can change a person the way a
parent can change a baby― awkwardly, and often with a great deal of
mess.”

― Lemony Snicket

            “It’s
not something little. I didn’t put salt in someone’s coffee, or hack their
facebook account and change their profile to a chicken.” He was trying to be
funny but sadness tinted the words.

            “Well,
that’s my cue to model-walk away, then.” She echoed his light tone.

             “You
know, when I was about fifteen, I had this friend, a girl named Heather. She
was the ultimate geek but hotter than the bottom of an old-school laptop. She cosplayed
Sailor Moon at all the ComiCons. Every guy wanted to date her, every girl
wanted her as a friend. I felt privileged just to be allowed in her presence
even though she was always pitching a fit about something.” His lips were
tuning up. “I used to get Green Lantern and Green Arrow mixed up and it made
her crazy. She finally dumped me over it. She told me I was the lamest noob she’d
ever encountered and always would be.”

            “That’s
a very specific sort of shade she was throwing.” Charlie was afraid to ask if
this girl was still part of the local gamer culture.

            “She
moved. No idea where she is,” he said, as if he knew what she was asking. “My
parents must have been praying double time because I escaped that relationship
with just a bruised ego and a residual aversion for Green Lantern.”

            “That
can’t be your secret.”

            He
sighed. “No, it’s not. It’s related, though. I spent a year of my life trying
to impress this girl and she despised me. Openly, vocally, completely despised
me. You’d think that would have taught me something.”

            “No?”

            “No.
I met Megan my senior year in college and she was Heather 2.0. I would have
thought they were clones except that Megan couldn’t pull off that Sailor Moon
cosplay. The selfishness, the complete self-absorption was the same, the way
she turned her attention to you when she needed something, but otherwise you
were invisible. She wouldn’t even let me tell people we were dating. Most of
the time, I was trying so hard to carry the conversation and she was offering
so little, I might as well have been talking to her cat. She was up all night
and even though I’m a morning person she would call at two in the morning to
ask me to go get her some Twix or at five to get her some doughnuts, or
whatever. I never met any of her friends. She knew all of mine. Once, I asked
her about her family and she went on for hours about her older, more beautiful
sister who had landed some sort of TV show when they were little. She was still
extorting money and gifts from her parents to make up for the fact she hadn’t
gotten to be on television, too. Anything her sister accomplished, she had to
beg, borrow, or steal something even better.”

            “Oh,
no. Never give power to the bitter, thwarted sibling. Remember Loki? That never
turns out well.”

            He
grinned. “Now I’ll never think of Megan the same. She’s Loki now, out for power
while wreaking as much mayhem as possible.”

            “Glad
I could help,” she said, smiling up at him. His big secret was coming and she
knew it wasn’t anything shocking. It couldn’t be.

             “I
loved her. Honestly, I did.”

            “There’s
no shame in that.”

             “I
know love is a good thing. Jesus said that if we have the faith to move
mountains, but don’t have love, we’re nothing.” He focused somewhere down the
riverwalk, thinking. “But love isn’t a get-out-of-jail-free card. I did things
for Megan that I shouldn’t have done for anyone.”

            Charlie
nodded. Lots of people made bad choices out of love and regretted them,
especially when they were far from home and family. “This sounds like first
love in a nutshell for a lot of people.”

            He
met her eyes, visibly steeling himself for her response. “I cheated for her.”

            “You
mean―”

            “I
wrote papers for her, did her homework. I even helped her cheat on exams.”

            “Oh.”
Charlie thought of how hard she’d worked in college, making sure everything was
her own work and never borrowing inspiration from friends or teammates. She
never used a source she couldn’t credit. She never even browsed a web page on
source code if it looked like it was taken without permission.  It was hard to
reconcile what Austin had said to the man who stood in front of her. “Okay,
that’s pretty serious. But some say it’s not cheating if you’re alive in the
end. You survived Megan and you didn’t get expelled.”

            “But
my pants
are
on fire every time someone mentions my degree. In fact,
every time I go to work and sit behind that desk, I feel like a fraud.”

            “Did
you cheat on your tests, or hers? I’m confused.”

            “You
cheat, you get expelled. It doesn’t matter who it was for or which class. Therefore,
my diploma should be nullified. I wouldn’t be employed if I weren’t such a
liar. I shouldn’t be there.”

            She
shook her head. “I knew a liar once. We can call him Mr. Shifty Eyes.
Everything that came out of his mouth wasn’t simply a lie, it was a whole
universe of distorted truth. When Shifty Eyes told you it was sunny, you better
get an umbrella. He’s stiffed every landlord who let him move in. He burned
every employer who took a chance on him, leaving the place in chaos. You’re
telling me that when you go to work, you’re just faking all that counseling you
do?”

            “Maybe,”
he said, frustration coloring his words. “I want to help but I’m simply
repeating everything I’ve read. I don’t really know what I’m doing.”

            She
started to laugh. His expression was part shock and part irritation. “Austin,
that’s what people do. They learn things in books. They repeat what they’ve
learned to other people who didn’t read those books. Those people find it very
useful.”

            “But
I’m supposed to be talking to kids about how not to break the rules, how to
keep their noses clean.” He raked a hand through his hair. “It would be like
Tom preaching not to steal while skimming off the top of the collection
basket.”

            “So,
what are you going to do?”

            “Do?”

            She
took his hand. “Just like you asked me. What are you going to do?”

            Austin
looked down at her, hope and fear warring in his expression. “I― I want
to go talk to the dean at University of Louisiana.”

            Charlie
felt her eyes widen. “To tell them what you’ve done?”

            “Right.
I won’t mention Megan’s name unless I have to, but I want to come clean. I
don’t want to carry this anymore.”

            “You’re
very brave.” She wanted to be brave, but she’d spent too long pretending she
had nothing to hide.

            “Like
you,” he said.

            “I’m
not.”

            He
stepped forward and she realized how long they’d been standing outside the
bookstore, and how much they’d talked today. He reached up and cupped her
cheek. “You’re a survivor. What happened to you would break most people. They
would be filled with hate and bitterness.”

            “Oh,
I’m plenty bitter,” she said, smiling against his hand. She was making a joke,
but her heart was thudding in her ears.

            “They
tried to make you give up, but you’re still here and you’re still you.”

            She
thought of the sketch sitting on the desk. She’d given up her main project and
shelved that character, refusing to illustrate or code anything at all. “I did
give up. For a long time.”

            He
cupped her face with both hands now. He was close enough she could smell his
aftershave and something that made her think of summer mornings. “You’re still
you, and you’re still here,” he repeated.

            It
was true. She’d wanted to die, wanted to take the easy way out. In the
beginning when she was still online, her accounts were inundated with messages.
Just kill yourself, cheater. Your life is over. You don’t deserve to
breathe.
Kill yourself and make the world a happier place.

            “I’m
glad I made it through. Otherwise I wouldn’t have met you.” Part of her was
screaming that she was making another bad decision based on feelings and not
facts. The other part was already leaning forward, yearning to feel Austin’s lips
on hers.

            He
shifted, and she closed her eyes just before he kissed her softly. For a moment
she thought how the kiss was completely unexpected, and at the same time, she’d
been waiting all week for it. Then she stopped thinking and kissed him back.

            A
laugh filtered through the happy fog in her brain and she reluctantly pulled
back. “I think― I’m guessing we shouldn’t be kissing right here in front
of everybody.”

            “Who’s
everybody?” he murmured and didn’t even bother to turn around.

            She
couldn’t resist one more kiss and then with a sigh, said, “You know, the entire
town of Natchitoches.”

            “Tourists,”
he said, but dropped his hands, giving her mouth one last glance.

            “And
Father Tom,” she said.

            He
whirled around. His brother was standing on the sidewalk a few feet away and
looked as if he’d paused mid-step. An older couple grumbled as they detoured
around him.

            “Well,
this is interesting,” Father Tom said as he walked over. He looked like the cat
who’d eaten the canary. “Should I pretend I didn’t see you? Or do you want to
pretend that didn’t happen in front of me as I was innocently minding my own
business?”

            Charlie’s
face had gone hot. Nothing like getting caught kissing by the parish priest,
and the guy you’re kissing is his little brother. If there was accepted
etiquette for that situation, she didn’t know what it was. “Um, we can―
you should―”

            “He’s
kidding,” Austin said. He shot Tom a look that might have contained a threat
but she wasn’t sure. “Nobody’s pretending anything.”

            “Great.
I’m headed into By the Book. We can announce your new dating status to our
friends and then there won’t be any hard feelings.”

            “Hard
feelings?”

            “You
know, for the people who are out of the loop and find out these important
things last. On the sidewalk.” Father Tom gave Austin his most innocent look.

            “Funny.
And if I’d known you were so interested in my love life, I’d have kept you more
up to date.”

            “Love,
is it?” He beamed at Charlie. “Well, congratulations and welcome to the
family.”

            Austin
rolled his eyes skyward. “I’m going to tell mom.”

            “Yes,
please do. She’ll want to know why you haven’t offered to bring Charlie home
for dinner yet.” Father Tom seemed to be enjoying himself a little too much.
“It was bad enough when Gideon got engaged and she’d clapped eyes on Henry only
a few weeks before.”

            Charlie
caught sight of Austin’s face and started to laugh. “Oh, don’t worry. I know
he’s kidding.” She looped her arm through his. “Let’s go inside. No announcing,
no more teasing.”

            He
let himself be pulled along, but not without shooting Father Tom another
narrow-eyed look. “Good idea.”

            Austin
opened the glass front door and waved her inside. Charlie was tempted to look
back and see if the brothers exchanged any other nonverbal communication.
Several customers stood at the main counter, where Alice was ringing up their
purchases. Bix had tissue at the ready to wrap and secure their vintage books,
then put them in long-handled paper bags.

            Charlie
looked around for Aurora and just as she decided the little girl was finally
taking a long nap in the play pen, Paul walked out of the back room. The baby
was in his arms, facing forward, watching the store with large dark eyes.
Charlie smiled as she read the white print on her tiny blue T-shirt.
I party
with Jay Gatsby
.

            “Isn’t
that a little suggestive for a four mouth old? Gatsby wasn’t exactly the kind
of guy you’d want your daughter to date.”

            “I
agree. But I thought it fit her mood this week.” Paul smiled but he looked
weary. “No wonder Alice is tired. I’ve only been walking her for an hour and my
arms are aching.”

            “You
need one of those baby wraps. Or a snuggly. You strap them in and then you can
use your hands.” Charlie made a mental note to look up the reviews on line as
soon as she got a chance.

            “Good
idea. Make sure it’s in a manly color. I don’t want to be wearing a pink
flowered sheet tied around my torso. Even if it does hold Miss Invictus.”