I drove to the Riverside project. Finn's truck was gone, just as Ivy had said when I called.
"You look terrible," I said when I climbed into the trailer. The interior looked neat and tidy, a far cry from when I first saw it, but Ivy looked awful. Her belly was growing, but her eyes looked sunken and her hair looked like it hadn't been brushed in a month.
"Thanks," she said sullenly.
"How's the baby?"
"Fine."
She was going to freeze me out with terse words and a cold shoulder. So be it.
"I came to tell you that I regret the way we parted. I was hurting, and I wish I had handled it differently."
"Are you saying you want to move back?" she asked perking up slightly.
"No. I'm saying that I want to be a part of your life in a healthy way." I took a deep breath. "And that I want to be with Finn as well."
Her face screwed up as if she just tasted a lemon. "Why him?"
"I don't know. I've been in love with him since you first brought him home. When he walked through the front door, I swear angels sang. The night in March when I saw him alone in the café, I swear I didn't mean to do anything but comfort him, but when he turned to me," I paused, uncomfortable with my own incredibly selfish act. I'd acted pious, as if I was the only one who wasn't greedy, when I was the greediest of all of us. I pushed on, "I was the one who kissed him. I touched him, and I took advantage of his state. If I was truly the good sister, I would have walked away, but I didn't."
Ivy sat motionless. "You've always had a crush on him," she finally said.
I nodded. "I have. I wanted him even when you were dating him. When I saw my chance, I took it. I didn't think of you or what it might mean. Even when Finn and I started dating, I didn't think about you."
She pressed her lips tightly together, a red slash against the paleness of her face. I watched her cycle from disgust and hurt to calculation. I steeled myself for her words. "You're a real piece of work. Claiming I'm the one who hurt you when all I wanted was a little goddamned help. I saved you. You could have gone into the foster home, but I swore to the courts I'd be your guardian. I dropped out of school for you, and this is how you stab me in the back? You want my forgiveness? Then you drop him, come home, and help me birth this goddamned baby."
I took her words, not because I deserved them but because she was alone and hurting and because, more importantly, I wasn’t backing down.
Ivy hadn’t coped with the loss of our parents—or rather, she did but it was in the bottom of a bottle or in the bowl of a spoon. She had to come to the same realization that I did. That hurt from loss didn’t need to break us.
But I wasn’t the one who was going to be able to convince her of this, just like Finn couldn’t convince me. No, it was an understanding she would have to gain on her own.
"I love him, Ivy, and if he’ll forgive me and take me back, I am going to be with him. I still want to help you in whatever way that I can, but I'm going after him."
I made myself face her while I said these words because I knew she’d take them as an abandonment when it really meant I was just expanding our family. She’d have more than me to lean on. There’d be Finn too. Tears streamed down her face, and I felt wetness on mine.
I wasn't even sure what we were crying about, other than we were hurting each other so much right now. I could stop it, but if I did, that meant I'd lose Finn. I was making a choice, between Ivy and Finn, and she knew it.
The door slammed open, and both of us jumped. It was Finn. He glanced from one tear-stained face to another. "Should I come back?"
"I wish you'd never shown up in the first place," Ivy cried. She snatched up her purse and flew out, nearly knocking Finn over in the process.
"That went well." I gave Finn a weak smile. I hadn't seen him in forever, and I had to grip the side of the seat so I didn't launch myself at him. The tattoo that Tucker had just finished felt huge, and I was embarrassed and unready for this. I'd hoped to take one thing at a time.
"What are you doing here?" I asked. It sounded like an accusation. I tried again. "I mean, it's good to see you."
"It's good to see you too, Winter," he said.
It had only been a few weeks, but it seemed like a decade. I drank him in, and I could tell he did the same. He looked older, as if the past weeks or months of contact with the Donovan girls had aged him beyond his twenty-five years. We stared at each other because I didn't know what to say. I didn’t know what his excuse was. I opened and closed my mouth a couple of times trying to form my words.
I hadn't prepared my speech yet. The one I would deliver when I threw myself at his feet and begged for another chance. This was so close on the heels of my emotional talk with Ivy that I wanted to shrink into myself and disappear.
True to form, though, it was Finn who was the courageous one. He took a step forward. And then another. And then another, until he was so close I could feel the cotton of his T-shirt against my nose.
"You look beautiful," he said quietly.
I raised my hands and hesitantly placed them on his chest. He shuddered under my touch. "You too." His eyes closed as if he wanted to savor this.