Chapter 97
Chapter 90: Forn About Nick
Sedona’s POV
I took a deep breath keeping quiet for a moment as I processed what Cameron had told me about Nick, Nick who was not to be blamed, Nck who had been manipulated by Sherry, Catherine and Logan and had doner shitty things to me that he regretted.
“Nick,” I said, and the name did the thing it always did, which was tighten something in my chest that hadn’t fully loosened since the day I’d walked out of Logan’s house. “If Logan wants to do
something useful, he should focus on Nick. He should be looking after his son, not chasing after
happy enough to ignore while she was right in front of him p>
“I’ll communicate that to him, that is a valid concern and you are right on that account.” He said
with a nod of his head.
“Nick is what matters.” I heard the conviction in my own voice, the clarity of it, and recognized it as
something that had solidified during the weeks of treatment-the stripping away of complications that kept making the problem bigger than what it actually was, the reduction to what was actually
true.
“Whatever happens with me, whatever the markers show, whatever Frank’s next report says-Nick is what matters. He needs stability as a child, he needs people that will stay for him. He needs a parent who is actually paying attention.” I paused. “When I’m out of here-when I’m better and out of this hospital-I’ll decide then whether to reach out to him. About Nick. Not about anything else p>
“Not about Logan p>
“My marriage is finished, Cameron. I knew that since the day I decided to divorce him, I was not waiting on a pleading to take him back, if that was the case, I would not have signed the divorce
papers, I would have left like that. Whatever he’s feeling now-guilt, loss, whatever version of
missing me he’s experiencing-it’s not love. It was never love. Not the kind that does anything
useful to me, nor does it does anything to change the past. It’s the love of someone, if I can even
call it love, who didn’t notice the thing they had until the thing was gone, and now they notice it because the absence is inconvenient for them and they want things to go back to normal p>
Cameron said nothing, which was its own form of response.
“He loved the system,” I said. “He loved what I did for his house, taking care of everything and his
son and his life. He loved the labels in the suits and the lavender cream and the fact that
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everything worked and he never had to think about why it worked. He loved the output of my
sufferings and hardwork that I had put in to make the marriage work. He didn’t love me.” I said it ithout bitterness, or tried to-said it as a thing I’d arrived at through looking at it clearly rather
than through the distortion of hurt. “And I can’t go back to someone who loves the output, I’m not
a system. I’m a person p>
“I know,” Cameron said quietly.
“So tell him whatever you need to tell him. Tell him I received the message. Tell him I appreciate that he found out the truth about the diagnosis and I appreciate that he’s sorry. Tell him Nick’s message means something to me, that when I’m ready I’ll think about whether there’s a way to let Nick know I’m all right.” I settled back against the pillows. “But tell him the marriage is finished. Tell him that part isn’t negotiable and it isn’t about punishment. It’s just the truth p>
Cameron was quiet for a moment. Then he exhaled-a long, slow exhale, the kind that contained something that had been held for a while. He ran a hand through his hair looking less tense and more relieved than he had been for the past few days, carrying this on his mind.
“Okay,” he said, nodding his head as he gave me a sort of approval nod that stated, you did it, I am
happy and glad.
“You sound relieved.” I pointed out, curiosity overriding everything else.
He looked at me with the particular expression of an older brother who had been trying to hide something from his younger sister and had just been caught as he smiled sheepishly. “I was worried,” he said finally. “That he’d call, and you’d hear it, and-” He stopped. “You have a habit of absorbing other people’s needs. Of making their problems your responsibility. I was worried that if he called, and he was sorry, and you were still in the middle of treatment and vulnerable and he made a compelling enough case p>
“That I’d go back,” I said, cutting through his explanation, coming to the realization that he was
obviously getting at on his own.
“That you’d consider it,” he said, more carefully, looking at me as he continued speaking. “Out of
guilt, or habit, or because that’s what you’ve always done with people who needed something from
you p>
I looked at him for a long moment. “You thought I’d go back to Logan p>
“I thought you might talk yourself into it. I thought you might find reasons. I thought-” He rubbed
the back of his neck. “I thought you might decide that his needing you was a good enough reason to go back, because needing you has always been sufficient reason before p>
It was accurate. I knew it was accurate. The version of me who’d stayed in Logan’s house for three
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years, who’d kept reducing and adapting and making herself convenient, had operated exactly on
that logic. Being needed had felt like belonging. It had taken a cancer diagnosis to clarify the
difference.
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