“You see? What’s that supposed to mean? I mean, is he like that with everyone, or is there something about me that just brings out the worst in him?”
I really wished I hadn’t asked that. I looked away, hoping Derek didn’t notice the flush on my face.
“Well, you do seem to get to him a bit more than some other people, but I can understand why. You’re strong and defiant. You don’t take his shit, which he’s not used to in a work setting. He’s used to people just giving him his way and doing what he tells them to do. You don’t do that. He can’t exactly grapple with you,” Derek said.
I cringed a little but did my best to keep my expression neutral.
“Why do I feel like that came with a ‘but’ attached to the end of it?” I asked.
“Because it did,” Derek said. “You get under his skin, but no, he hasn’t always been this way. The last few years have been really hard on Noah, and he hasn’t really come out of it.”
“Because of your grandparents?”
“And his wife,” Derek said.
I felt my stomach somehow drop down through my feet and surge up into my throat at the same time.
“His wife? Noah’s married?”
“He was,” Derek said. “They were married for five years. Monica. She was really sweet.”
“Was?” I asked, my voice quiet.
What he was saying started to sink in. Noah wasn’t married. He didn’t get a divorce. His wife was dead.
Derek nodded. “It was completely unexpected. As far as Noah and everyone else, including Monica, knew, she was one of the healthiest people in existence. She was in incredible shape. She worked out all the time. She even ran marathons. I remember her trying to get Noah to run one with her. It was hilarious.”
“Noah’s in good shape too,” I said.
There my mouth was again, but this time I didn’t care as much.
“He is, but he’s not a runner.”
“How long was she sick?” I asked.
I didn’t know why I wanted to know or why the question made my throat ache.
“We don’t know,” Derek said. “She seemed fine. She complained of headaches for a few months, but she had migraines when she was young, so she thought they’d just come back. Then one morning he got out of the shower and went to wake her up like he always did, and she was gone. She’d died in her sleep from a brain aneurysm she didn’t know she had. It completely shattered him. He doesn’t want to get his heart broken again. Our grandparents died not long after. He hasn’t really recovered.”
My heart ached for Noah. I had no idea he had been through so much. Now I understood he had every reason to be sad. But that didn’t change the way he treated me. I still wasn’t sure why he took what he had gone through out on me. In between bouts of getting naked with me, of course.
Maybe I was right in the first place. I really did need to keep my distance from Noah. The sex was pent-up frustration and nothing more, just like Holly explained. Now that I had this new information, I was even more certain I needed to let it go and focus purely on my job.
19
Noah
By the time that Friday rolled around, it had been two weeks since I had made good on my promise to avoid Ally like the plague. Not one word, not one interaction with her since then, and things were starting to look up for me. My emotional situation was starting to get into check again, and with my work keeping me busy and Duncan keeping me company, the time had seemed to move much faster than it had been up to that point.
Two weeks. I had made it two weeks without addressing anything or speaking to her at all. In those two weeks, I thought about her, but mostly in the way that I thought about trying to avoid her if I had to go into rooms where she might be. I avoided going into the kitchen at all and instead went in and out through the front door of the restaurant. I avoided the main bathrooms in favor of the staff one. I avoided getting coffee from the kitchen by having Duncan bring in his boxed coffee thing from the convenience store directly into the tasting room.
It worked out pretty well.
So, on Friday, Duncan and I finished up the tasting room, and I was feeling rather good about myself. Duncan was in an even better mood and was whistling as he cleaned up. I still had to go see my brother Derek, so I was less celebratory, but his good mood was infectious.
“What do you say we go to the bar?” Duncan said. “We can clock out early for once and get a few drinks in before the young people come in.”