The Trouble With Before by Portia Moore Page B

casually, and my eyes widen in surprise.
    “You’re opening up a body shop?” I ask happily. Aidan has always loved working on cars, but whenever I mentioned the idea of his own shop, he balked at it, saying there wasn’t enough money where we lived to sustain it.
    “Yeah.” He gives me a half-smile, but I can tell by the way his eyes are lighting up that he’s really excited.
    “That’s amazing, Aidan. Congratulations!” I squeal, and he nods shyly. Aidan is only ever shy is when he’s embarrassed, and he’s only ever embarrassed if he thinks he doesn’t deserve something. “So what changed your mind?”
    He sort of shrugs, finishing the last of his fries. “There’s not much else for me. I’m done fighting. I wish I could be a rapper, but I kind of suck at that, so fixing cars just sort of made sense.” He says playfully.
    “But you always said there isn’t enough money for you to do it here.”
    “There isn’t.” He obviously can tell I’m confused. “I’m going to start it in Chicago.”
    Now, I’m really stunned.
    “Chris and Lauren are going in with me, and we already have some places scouted and . . .” He obviously notices my face dropped at the mention of them.
    I almost feel sick. “Wow, that’s great. That’s really, really great.”
    I hate that hearing the name of my former best friend makes me want to jump off a building to avoid being drowned with guilt, but even with those feelings, I want to ask Aidan everything about Chris—how’s he doing with his condition, about his impending twins, if he’s still teaching. I want to know my best friend is okay. More than okay, I hope he’s fantastic. But I know now isn’t the time to ask about him. Aidan’s just now warming up to me, and I think even the mention of Chris would make him pissed off at me. He probably doesn’t think that I should ask anything about Chris and his family since I so gloriously almost destroyed it.
    “Enough about me,” Aidan says, taking a seat beside me on the couch. His weight makes it sink. He looks at me dead in the eye. “So what’s the game plan?”
    I take a deep breath and lean back into the couch. Aidan has never been one to beat around the bush. It isn’t his style. I fold my hands across my stomach. “I don’t know.”
    “You don’t know?” he asks, his voice unwavering.
    I can tell he’s trying to hide either irritation or amusement from his voice. Since I’m looking straight ahead and avoiding his stare, I can’t say.
    “You came back here for a reason, I’m guessing.”
    “Other than it was supposed to be a place where I had free room and board?” I say dryly, and he lets out a sigh of frustration.
    “Come on, Leese, I know you’d live on the highway in a box before coming back and putting up with Evie,” he says adamantly.
    This time I glance at him out of the corner of my eye. He’s definitely in fix-things mode. Aidan the fixer. I really wish he could just be the eat-ice-cream-and-drink-wine Aidan. I’d love that right about now, as if Aidan would ever drink wine.
    I let out a deep breath. “I just . . . I figured if there was a place to start fixing things, the place where I broke it all makes the most sense.”
    He nods slowly. “Do you think you can get your old job back?”
    I think about how hard it would be to work at a bar in my state and not take one drink. “Yeah, but since I don’t know what I want to do yet and alcohol is too tempting to be around, that probably wouldn’t be a great idea.” I chuckle, and he looks at me disapprovingly.
    “I meant at the school.”
    “Oh.”
    I didn’t really think of that. I gave notice when I left, but God, the last thing I want is to be around kids. Not that teaching was terrible; I just felt like a hypocrite, teaching young minds when I had no clue what I was doing in my own life. Especially since the reason I became a teacher was just so screwed up in the first place. Choosing the job of the married man you