Everything Nice by Mari Carr Read Free Book Online Page A

with cancer, Ginny never blinked twice at the thought of giving up college and staying home to help take care of her.” Allie took a deep breath, her next words too painful to admit. “I didn’t. I wish I’d been able…”
    “You didn’t feel the same,” Charlie finished for her, walking to the table and reaching over to take her hand in his.
    “I’m a terrible daughter. A horrible person, I know that.” Allie swallowed hard against the lump in her throat and tried to blink away the tears filling her eyes.
    “No you’re not.”
    “Oh please, don’t bother saying any differently. My mother was dying of cancer and all I could think of was escaping, getting the hell away from here.”
    “So you’ll never be a nurse,” Charlie teased, and Allie smiled at his jest.
    “It was more than running from my mother’s disease. I had this fire inside me, this ache that wouldn’t go away. I was so afraid that I would never see more than the twenty square miles of this shithole town and that I’d die of old age in my parents’ house. Hell, I was terrified I’d die in my childhood bedroom surrounded by fucking posters of Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt.”
    “Don’t forget New Kids on the Block,” Charlie joked. “I seem to recall you had an abundance of those guys hanging on your walls.”
    Allie laughed. “Don’t remind me. Oh Charlie, there was just so much I wanted to see, to do…to experience.”
    “And you couldn’t do that if you were tied to home. But your mother—”
    “Recovered,” Allie finished. “Yes, she did. Her cancer went into remission and all was well with the world. Problem was, I’d graduated from high school, taken a shitty job as a waitress and I was still consumed by this damn impatience that told me there was more to life, more to see.”
    “So what happened?”
    “I was waiting tables at the diner. Jim had become a regular customer after his wife died and we spent a lot of time talking about our lives, our ambitions. It’s strange how much we had in common given the fact my life was really just starting while his seemed to be winding down. One night we started listing all the things we wanted to see, things we wanted to do before we died. We ended up talking until the diner closed. Turned out we shared the same sort of wanderlust. Next thing I know, Jim decided to make our dreams a reality. He offered me a job. I took it and, well…you know the rest.” She stumbled over her half-truth, fully aware of how much of the tale she’d omitted.
    “No, I don’t know,” Charlie said shortly. “According to Ginny, you were his personal assistant, but since he didn’t have a damn job, what exactly were you assisting him with?”
    Allie could tell from his tone what he was thinking—and she couldn’t refute his claims.
    “Do you want to know if I slept with Jim?” she asked hotly. “Yeah, Charlie, I did. So there. Are you happy? Did you get the nitty-gritty details you were looking for?”
    “Your father—” he started.
    “Would blow a gasket if he ever found out about the sex,” she interrupted. “And yeah, he wasn’t too thrilled with one of his friends dragging his youngest daughter through what he called ‘Jim’s midlife crisis’ at first either. But after a while he stopped worrying about it and just accepted it.”
    “Christ, Allie. He was too old for you.”
    “Who says? Why does age make a difference—or anything else, for that matter? It’s what’s on the inside that counts, the rest is just wrapping paper.”
    He shook his head, his look a perfect combination of frustration and anger. “Were you sleeping with him when you left?” he asked.
    “No, I wasn’t. Shit, Charlie, what’s with this third degree? You got the answer you were looking for. I fucked Jim Griffin—loads of times. So what? And you wanna know something else? I loved it. I loved him !”
    She sucked back a breath at the sobs threatening to consume her. She’d missed Jim terribly