What's a Girl to Do? (Season 6)

Chapter Eleven: Are You In Or Out?

Things had died down by the beginning of April, and I was beginning to forget that I'd broken my sobriety, although there was the constant reminder of AA meetings with Lip, and the chips that I'd continually hide from Nicholas, so as to keep up the secret. Nicholas seemed to have his own problems to attend to, however, and would continually stay up later and later in our study attending to them. I knew it was unhealthy, the state of our marriage, given that we both had massive secrets we were keeping from one another, and yet, neither of us could seem to stop our pattern of behavior, and yet I found I was self-aware enough to know that the breaking point had to be just around the corner.

"You were holding back tonight."

I shrugged at my older brother, methodically taking the cigarette from between his fingers and taking a sharp inhale upon it myself. "Yeah, well, I didn't have a lot to say. The diner really does stress me out, you know that, and so me talking about work isn't necessarily a bad thing." I looked over at him and smirked. "Besides, I've always been the standoffish type. I think you're well-aware of this."

"Standoffish also denotes unfriendly," Lip replied quickly, reaching out and snagging the cigarette back before I could take a second puff. "You're not unfriendly, necessarily. On a good day, you can be polite."

"I can attempt to be polite," I replied, growing impatient with Lip hogging the cigarette, so I got one out of my pocket and lit it up myself. "Guess it really depends on what's going on personally and professionally with me...and who the person I'm communicating with is..."

"You talked professional tonight," my brother said, thinking that over. "How about personal? Is there something you want to share?"

I shook my head. "Not willingly, no."

"How about unwillingly?" he asked. "I'm your brother—your older brother. If something's fucking with you, I want to know."

"More of a someone than a something, if you want to be that black and white about the whole thing," I replied, shrugging again as I stuck the cigarette between my teeth, and stuffed my hands into my pockets to ward off the chill to the early spring air. "Not much to talk about other than the old news."

"That Nicholas is keeping secrets?"

I scoffed. "Yep," I replied. "So, what else is new, really?"

"Are you any closer to figuring it out?"

I shook my head at him. "Nope, and I'd be a hypocrite for trying, Lip. There's me and all my problems and secrets and lies to account for as well. There are two of us in this marriage, and we neither of us are doing a very good job of taking care of it properly."

"What do you think he's keeping from you?"

I sighed. "I want to think that he's cheating on me, because that's the worst thing I can think of right now," I replied, feeling like a total bitch for even considering it. "I mean, personally, I think it would justify some of my bad behavior. And besides, it would paint Nicholas as the ultimate hypocrite between the two of us, and then I could throw back into his face about how much he was convinced that I was cheating on him..."

"He ever ask you about it?"

"No, not so much anymore," I reply. "We barely discuss anything, other than the kids. He barely spoke to me after the procedure to give me another kidney, and then there was the lame excuse I gave for the night I got alcohol poisoning, by saying I fell asleep at work..."

"You think he believed you?"

I sighed, rolling my shoulders. "I think the problem with all this is that Nicholas just doesn't care anymore, not like he used to. When he stood to lose me—all those times we broke up before we got married—he seemed to care. And, in the weeks after I got out of jail, he was hammering the point home about how much he wanted another baby, but..."