Your Fault

Chapter 25 Noah

Maddie would be there soon, and we needed to finish her room. I had told my mother I’d be staying there during some of the days she was with Nick, and since I didn’t want things to go even further south between us, I went home like a good girl once I’d made sure all the junk had been cleared out of Madison’s room and there was space for the furniture to be brought in and assembled. Nicholas would be supervising everything, and he wouldn’t see me until after I’d spoken with Anabel Grason.
Time passed quickly afterward. I had hoped to be able to better prepare myself, but before I knew it, the morning of Anabel and Maddie’s arrival was there. I was nervous; I knew Nicholas was, too. He had sent me a bunch of photos asking me if I liked the room, if his sister would like it, if we should change the furnishings, if it might be better to put the bed under the window instead of in the corner, if the dresser was big enough, if she’d like the remote-control train as much as he did.
I laughed on the other end of the line. “Nick, she’s going to love it.
Anyway, your sister’s coming to see you, not her new room.”
He paused. “I’m nervous, Freckles. I’ve never spent more than a day with her. What if she starts to cry all of a sudden because she misses home?
She’s a little kid, and I’m a grown man. Sometimes I don’t know how to deal with that stuff.”
I smiled in the mirror in front of me. I loved when he worried like that:
Nick, who was always so self-assured, so commanding, so bossy. When he let down his guard and showed me how tender his heart was, all I wanted was to hug him.
“I’ll try to be over there most of the time,” I said, sitting on my bed and looking up at the beams in the ceiling.
“What? You’re going to be here the whole weekend, no?” he replied, changing to a more serious tone.
I bit my tongue. Just then, someone knocked at my door.
“Can we talk for a moment?” my mother asked, coming in and observing me. I nodded, happy for the first time in my life to have my mother interrupt a conversation with Nick.
“My mom wants to talk. I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”
I hung up before I regretted it, setting my phone down on the mattress next to me and watching my mother pace back and forth. She looked distracted and a little upset. We hadn’t had the best time lately, either of us.
It had been weeks since we’d really talked, and things would certainly get worse when I told her about my plans.
“Are your suitcases almost packed?”
I knew she was feeling me out. I never packed my bags until the day before. I’d inherited the habit from her. We didn’t understand why people needed weeks to pick out their clothes, shove them in a suitcase, and zip it, but still, I shook my head, thinking I’d take advantage of this attempted reconciliation to tell her I would be living with Nick.
“Almost. Listen, Mom…” I started to say, but she interrupted me.
“I know you’re champing at the bit to get out of here, Noah,” she said, grabbing a shirt and folding it, distracted.
I took a deep breath, watching her eyes glaze over. “Mom, I don’t…” “No, Noah, let me tell you something: I know the past few days have been difficult, that we haven’t gotten along well since we returned from Europe, and believe me, I get it: you’re in love, and you want to spend all your time with Nicholas… I just would have liked for this…”—she pointed at the two of us—“to stay intact. You and I have always gotten along well.
Even when you were going out with Dan”—I frowned hearing my ex-boyfriend’s name, but I let her go on—“you used to come running to my room to tell me how the night had gone and all the romantic stuff he’d said to you, remember?”
I nodded, grinning. I could see where she was going.
“Now that we’re getting close to the time you’ll leave, I just wanted to tell you I’ve tried to give you the best things I could. I really wanted you to consider this place your home. I wanted you to live here, surrounded by all these opportunities. Even when you were little, I dreamed of seeing you in a room like this, with more toys and books than I could have ever hoped to give you on my own…” “Mom, I know I was unbearable when you told me we were coming here, but I understand now why you did it, and you don’t need to explain anything, okay? You gave me everything you could, and I know it’s hard for you to see me with Nicholas, but I love him.”
She closed her eyes when she heard this and forced a smile. “I hope you grow up to be a wonderful writer someday, Noah. I know you will, and that’s why I want you to take advantage of every opportunity life gives you.
Study, learn, and enjoy college. These are going to be the best years of your life.”
“I will,” I whispered, and though I smiled, I felt a little guilty that I couldn’t bring myself to be sincere with her and tell her about Nick.