Tiffany followed my gaze. This wasn’t exactly how I wanted her to find out—I’d assumed Manning would be at my side when she showed up. Even my mother was taking an unusually long time in the pantry. Or maybe, to make things extra uncomfortable, time had slowed down only for Tiffany and me.
Her eyes darted from the window back to my face. “You’re here with him?” she asked.
It’d been years since I’d shown up at Manning’s home in Big Bear and stayed for good. Even longer since he and Tiffany had decided to end their marriage. But I supposed there was really no amount of time that would make this conversation any less awkward, so I took a steeling breath and raised my overfilled wineglass before I said, “Yes, I’m Manning’s, well, date—for lack of a better word.”
She gagged like a cat with a fur ball stuck in its throat. “Oh my God.”
“Yep.” I slurped Pinot off the top. “I didn’t know the best way to tell you, just that I wanted to do it in person.” After setting the glass down, I patted the corners of my mouth with the towel. “I know it’s shocking, but believe me, neither of us wants to hurt you.”
“You’re dating my ex-husband,” Tiffany pointed out, her voice pitching.
“You have every right to be angry and hurt,” I said, opening the cupboard under the sink to toss the paper towel in the trash, “but you have to admit that some part of you knew this could happen.”
“How long has this been going on?”
“A long time—but then, you knew that.”
I held my breath in anticipation of my sister’s wrath. So much time had passed, and so many confusing emotions and memories still tinged the air between us with tension. When Tiffany had asked Manning to the fair all those years ago, could she have ever imagined things would end up this way? Could I? And if so, would either of us have changed anything? Because I knew I was in the wrong, and that the insecurity that lived in my sister often caused her to lash out, I wanted to go to her. Hug her. Be her little sister again. Remind her that I loved her despite everything, even as I knowingly hurt her. But this moment wasn’t about me—it was about what she needed.
“Manning and I want to be a part of this family,” I continued when she didn’t respond. “We want to stay for dinner and hear about your life—and share ours as well.” Again, I looked out the window. After the struggle it’d taken to get me to the house, Manning wouldn’t want to leave, but in that moment, I wasn’t sure I had any right to force my presence on Tiffany.
Her face scrunched as if she’d bitten into a lemon. “It’s weird,” she said. “And kind of gross. I wouldn’t want somebody else’s sloppy seconds, especially my sister’s, but it’s your life.”
I blinked at her a few times, trying to process her words. Weird? Gross? Sloppy seconds? I had to stop myself from laughing. That response didn’t faze me at all. I’d never seen Manning as sloppy seconds, only as the man I loved. “You’re not angry?” I asked.
Tiffany set her pie down. I fought myself from checking if she’d also brought Manning’s favorite flavor. She twisted her lips as if considering whether she should be angry. It was unlike her to deny an opportunity to overreact, which made me wonder if she’d matured at some point over the past decade, or if I’d stumbled into some kind of alternate universe. The latter seemed more likely.
“I’m not angry,” she decided, lightly flipping some hair over her shoulder. “I mean, I’ve suspected this since the divorce. I know you told me at the viewing party you hadn’t seen him, but I wasn’t sure if I could believe you.”
“It was the truth,” I said. “Nothing happened until after.”
“Well, I didn’t know that, so all this time, I sort of assumed you might be together.” She rounded the island to pick up the wine bottle, checking to make sure I’d left some. “But even if I hadn’t had time to come to terms with it,” she said, pouring herself a glass, “I don’t think the two of you together ever surprised me. Not at camp, and not in New York.”
Her point wasn’t lost on me. Perhaps Manning and I hadn’t always been fair to Tiffany, but it would be impossible to explain or reason away a love like ours. So instead, I just laid out the truth. “If it helps, it was never about hurting you. But Manning and I . . . we are, and always have been, so in love.”
She set her drink on the island and squatted to a cabinet to remove a cake stand—the same one my mom and I had used over the years for dessert. It was bizarre to picture Tiffany baking, but apparently, it wasn’t her first time. “Oh, I totally understand.”