Saudade | ✓

epilogue

            
THE RESOUNDING SLAP rang in the room. Bridget flinched, placing her hand on her reddened cheek. She took a deep breath. "I suppose deserved that."

"You suppose? You damn well did," I said calmly, though my hand stung with it. "Your selfishness ruined everything. And to think, I was nice enough to break up with him so you two could settle things. Instead, you abused that goodwill and used it to your advantage, you two-faced cow."

She flinched. "I did.. I know. I am truly sorry, Annie. I couldn't apologize enough."

I rolled my eyes heavenward. "Are you, really? You're not sorry. You're just here to rid your conscience of guilt."

"That's not fair.." she murmured, clenching her manicured hands on her skirt.

"Oh please, Bridget. Had Dean not confronted you, would you have told me?"

The look on her face nearly made me laugh. She truly thought I was stupid. I suppose she never thought of me as anything other than the ghetto girl compared to her British sophistication.

I leaned in on my elbows, giving her a withering look. "And what makes you think I believe you anyway?"

"Y-you slapped me," she sputtered. "And you don't believe me?"

I shrugged. "I've wanted to do that for so long. Even if I didn't believe you, you still deserve that slap."

Guilt churns in her eyes, and I want to slap her again. She's quite good at the innocent façade. She really had us all fooled - especially me. No more of that now though. Not once has she looked ticked off throughout our whole conversation. Her perfectly coiffed hair not even disheveled. If one would put her beside Dean, she would look like the perfect Southern wife.

I would never have fitted the stereotype. I snorted at the irony.

Both of them had dragged me into the mess that is the two of them. They really should have ended up together.

"I did," she said, shaking her head sadly. "But Annie, you must believe me. I've loved Dean for so long, and I thought he loved me too, the way his parents loved each other..."

"And he did. He was a different man after you left."

She nodded. "And I felt horrible for that. What I did had deeply wounded him. But then you came.. and I.. I realized I was wrong."

I raised a brow. "Lay it on me."

Her big blue eyes turned misty. "I was wrong for thinking I was the love of his life, just as he had been mine. When I came back, he had already fallen for you. I would catch him looking at you when you weren't looking. Even when we were having group dinners, his eyes would solely be on you."

"And I had been with him for years, even grew up with him. But he had never looked at me that way."

"And yet he still slept with you when you came back," I bit.

She took a deep breath. "I told you, he did not."

"He admitted to it."

Frustration etched her face for the first time, and when she spoke, her voice was raised. "Because he accepted the lies I fed him! Because I.. I.. took advantage of whatever faith and trust he had on me. You should know he could never have truly hated me even when I left, Annie. I grew up with him."

"We were each other's firsts. I took advantage of the little boy inside him that fell for me as a child. He was still angry at me when I came back. He was never able to truly process those feelings when I left. You know Dean, he's light and easygoing but he'd never truly confess to the war inside of him."