He Priced Me At A Penny So I Married Another Chapter 20
The whole building came out to watch.
Carol stopped there when she told me. She said just listening to them argue was exhausting.
Now Derek stood in front of me, lowering his gaze as he touched the newly embroidered cloth.
“Tori’s gone. Those friends don’t contact me anymore, either. Every night I come home to a dark house. I always feel like you’re still there, waiting for me.”
His voice broke off abruptly.
“I used to think you asked too many questions. Now I just want to hear you say one thing. I scroll all the way back through our conversations, and all that’s left are messages from months ago.”
I draped the scarf over my arm and glanced toward the door of the activity room.
They had already started cleaning up inside. Carol would be out soon.
Derek stepped closer, his voice shaking.
“Lydia, I know I was wrong. Everything you wanted before, I’m willing to do now. When we get married, where we live—you can decide all of it.”
I took out my phone and texted Everett that Carol was almost done and that we were still on for the evening.
Derek looked at the screen, and the cotton cloth in his hand slowly sagged.
“You really don’t want to come back at all?”
His voice was so quiet it was almost drowned out by the music.
I remembered the moments when I couldn’t bear to leave. At my mother’s memorial service, he had stood between me and the harsh light. When the power went out in my old apartment, he held up a flashlight while I found the breaker box in the basement.
Back then, I leaned on him and thought I had finally found someone I could rely on.
It was also because I couldn’t bear to leave that I kept swallowing the hurts that came after.
I slipped my phone back into my bag and looked at him.
“Derek, I’m never going back to that life with you.”
Carol came out of the activity room. I went over and draped the scarf across her shoulders.
After we’d gone a fair distance, she glanced back once and tightened her arm around mine.
“What should we eat tonight? Didn’t Everett say he found fresh fava beans?”
I took the cloth bag from her hand.
“Let’s go see. Last time he stir-fried them too long. And today he still won’t let me lift the lid early.”