The Rules of Regret

  THE RULES OF REGRET

  By Megan Squires

  The Rules of Regret

  Copyright © 2013 by Megan Squires

  First Kindle Edition: 2013

  All rights reserved.

  Cover art by Regina Wamba at Mae I Design and Photography

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  I keep thinking that the more I write, the more space and pages I’ll have for all of my Thank You’s.

  But that just simply isn’t the case. With every book, my list of supporters, friends,

  and readers grows, and I just can’t find enough room to adequately articulate how much you all mean to me.

  So to all that have been there with me on this journey,

  I thank you with all I have—a heart full of thanks.

  PROLOGUE

  “Ma’am, can you recall what she was wearing?”

  Mom’s thin hands trembled in her lap. The remains of a used up Kleenex shredded into snow-like flakes of tissue, fluttering to the hardwood ground near her feet. She lifted her head up and sniffed back a tear that almost choked her. “Wearing? Oh God. I don’t even remember.”

  “She had on my purple Adidas hoodie,” I spoke directly to the officer. He looked to be in his mid-forties with a short, trimmed mustache that ran the full length of his upper lip.

  “Do you have any recent photographs?”

  Dad pressed up from the couch with his hands on his knees. He was still wearing his suit from the day before, though the pleating was no longer perfectly creased down the center and haphazard wrinkles crossed back and forth over his legs. “In the box down the hall. Let me go get it.”

  “We just moved here,” I explained, feeling like there should be a reason as to why our home wasn’t decorated with family portraits lining the mantle. We didn’t have much time to settle in, and even if there were extra hours in the day, Mom and Dad were so busy with our family of ten that homemaking wasn’t at the top of their mountainous to-do list. They did the best they could, but for some reason, under the scrutiny of the two men in our living room, it felt like that might not be enough.

  “Understood.” The officer smiled and his partner jotted something down on a pad of notepaper. “How would you describe her features?”

  Wiping her nose with the now useless cloth between her fingers, Mom gestured toward me with a wave of her hand. “She looks just like Darby. Irish twins. Only a year apart. Freckles, shoulder-length red hair.”

  People had been asking that all of our lives, if we were twins. For my entire seventh year and her eighth, Anna and I let everyone think that. We honestly were alike in so many ways that I often believed we truly were interchangeable, if one person could ever actually be replaced by another. Mom and Dad must have thought it, too, because I got called Anna just as often, if not more, than my given name.

  But one difference was certain. Had the roles been reversed tonight, Anna would have done everything in her power to make sure I’d made it safely home.

  I hadn’t been able to do that, and it was a regret I was certain I’d carry for as long as I lived.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Six Years After

  The floor rumbled underfoot, the familiar vibration of the engine echoing on the ground just before takeoff. My heart adopted the same erratic tremble as the 747 outside the stretch of glass windows. I tried to harness its rhythm, but it was no use.

  “It will be over before you know it.” Lance leaned forward and swept a light kiss across my cheek, just like he did each night before bed. He was kind of a creature of habit, and I’d come to expect certain things from him. Cheek-sweeping kisses were one of those things. “Think about how fast this last quarter went. This is only six weeks—so like half that.” His grasp on my hip squeezed, and his blue eyes softened as he hiked the strap of his duffel bag up onto his arm and angled my direction. “We’ll be fine, babe. Always have been, always will be.”

  I probably would have believed that statement had it possessed any ounce of truth. His delivery was convincing enough; it was the subject matter I had a harder time believing. But even still, the hypnotizing effect Lance had on me since the day of our first phone call hadn’t yet worn off. If anything, it had only intensified. I wasn’t sure how he was always able to do that, but I figured it had to be some gene passed down to him throughout the generations of charmers that branched out of his family tree. I knew very little about DNA but was pretty positive there was a strand specifically tied to this Casanova gene somewhere in that twisty double helix of his.

  I stared straight over his shoulder at the wall listing departures and arrivals, the glowing red numbers and letters obscured by the blur of passengers rushing down the busy corridor with their rolling luggage trailing behind them like obedient dogs. The frenzied bustle disoriented my focus and spread the words on the screen into a fuzzy haze. I’d never taken drugs before—I didn’t even know the correct terminology for saying I hadn’t—but I was fairly certain the dizzying fog had to be similar to tripping on LSD.

  Did you take drugs? Or did you do drugs? Or was it you took drugs from someone and then did them? All I really remembered was to “Just Say No.” And that’s what I wanted to do right now; tell Lance that no, he couldn’t leave me alone for the next month and a half. I was ready to put my elementary school learned refusal skills to work.

  “We’ll be fine,” he assured once more, stooping down to search my eyes. I nodded quickly, trying to believe him because he sounded so sure. If I looked long enough into those baby blues, it would be all the assurance I’d need. He could convince me with just one heartfelt look, that DNA-certified charmer that he was.

  Lance was convincing in all areas of his life. I’m sure that had a little something to do with his selection for the internship in Washington. He was politician material through-and-through, and even I wasn’t immune to his ability to reassure and persuade even the most stubborn of individuals. Not only was I not immune, I think I was completely infected.

  And I could be quite a stubborn and resistant individual. That might actually explain the nickname of “mule” Lance gave me after our chemistry class together our sophomore year of high school. I was adamant we had to note the mass of the volumetric flask prior to filling it with our liquid sample, and he was certain we didn’t. We went back and forth the entire duration of the lab and never did turn in our assignment. It seemed like a silly thing to put up a fight over, but I think Lance saw it as an opportunity to challenge me. And when you were someone like Lance—the son of both an affluent lawyer and a representative in Congress—when the opportunity for an argument arose, you jumped on it. It’s what you did; it’s what you were good at. The challenge was the thrill, and these past six years with Lance by my side had definitely been thrilling, to say the least.

  “Darby,” he whispered against my forehead, “I’ll see you in just a month and a half. It will fly by.”

  I snickered audibly under my breath. “Maybe for you with your fancy galas and political soirées,” I teased, fingering the hem of his red Stanford t-shirt that hugged his toned upper half. “But honestly, the most important thing I’ll do this summer is watch paint dry.” Lance’s shoulders lifted with laughter and he cupped my chin in his hands. I shook my head under his grip. “I’m not joking, Lance. Sonja and I literally have to repaint the townhouse or Gustov’s keeping our cleaning deposit. I’m not being figurative here. We’re totally gonna park our folding chairs in front of the wall and watch paint chip number SW7036 dry. You’re completely jealous right now, don’t ev
en try to hide it.”

  “He’s not making us repaint ours.” Lance popped an eyebrow up that indicated our landlord’s favor for his apartment’s tenants over mine.

  “Because you’re a McIverson. Seriously, have you ever once had to do anything you didn’t want to do?”

  Lance twisted his lips and scrunched his nose as though he was really searching his brain for an answer. I’m sure he was. “Yes,” he said, thrusting a finger in the air, the light bulb of recollection illuminating. “My mom once made me eat broccoli for dinner when I was five. I didn’t want to do that.”

  “She made you eat it once?”

  The last boarding call for his plane echoed over the intercom and I chose to ignore it, hoping Lance was doing the same. If he missed his flight, maybe he’d have second thoughts on leaving altogether. Maybe then we could watch paint dry side-by-side.

  “Yup, just once. Threw it up all over the dinner table and never had to touch it again.”

  “So you’ve been a master-manipulator from a young age then,” I summarized, the reality of those words hitting me square in the gut. Five more passengers rushed through the hallway, and the attendant pulled on the door to the tunnel leading to the aircraft, about to seal it shut.

  “I don’t like to call it manipulative, Darby.” He brushed my chin with the pad of his thumb and drew me into a kiss. “I like to call it resourceful.” Lance tossed a glance over his shoulder toward the plane and folded me into his arms even tighter. “I’ll text as soon as I land, babe. And remember, you have my heart, okay? So I’m always sorta with you.”

  My mind flitted back to that first time he’d said that, back when we were thirteen, sitting on the front steps to my house. My sister had only been missing three weeks. “I’ll never leave you, Darby,” he’d murmured after a quick kiss on my nose, his fingers coiled with mine. “You have my heart. It doesn’t belong to me anymore.” I could see why my sister had a crush on him the moment she’d laid eyes on him. He was completely mesmerizing, and I’d fallen under his spell all too easily, too. “So even when I’m not with you, I still sorta am.”

  Only the truth of it was that even when he was standing right in front of me, even when his mouth was pressed to mine and our chests were pushed against one another, it honestly didn’t even feel like he was with me. Lance was always somewhere else.

  I nodded robotically and my eyes slipped shut, trying to pull all of him into my senses: his expensive cologne that smelled of bergamot and musk, his defined chest that I curled up against so many nights these past years, the sound of his strong, steady heart that pulsed familiarly against my ear. He bent down to press his mouth to mine and I savored his recognizable minty taste. I was very near the brink of sensory overload.

  “See you in six weeks,” he said as he strode toward the almost-closed doors.

  “See you then,” I echoed, my voice trailing off as he slid out of sight to get on a plane that would take him 3,000 miles away from me.

  Once I couldn’t see him anymore I felt like I should go, but I just stood there in the middle of the terminal—unmoving—as the rest of the airport’s occupants rushed toward their gates. I contemplated getting on that plane with him—after all, Lance’s family purchased a ticket for me just so I could get past the security gates to see him off. But I wasn’t meant to follow him. I didn’t have a destination. There was no end goal.

  So I didn’t move, because I didn’t have any of those things. I didn’t even feel like I really had me anymore.

  I might have Lance’s heart, but he was pretty much my life—however messed up our life together had become—and I was fairly positive that ranked higher on the list of things you don’t want someone to take off with. Sure, by holding his heart it meant he couldn’t fall in love with anyone because I owned it already and it was supposed to be off the market. But Lance taking my life with him meant I was essentially nonexistent once he slipped out of sight. Since he was my life, his leaving drove the final nail into the coffin that was my promise of an unforgettable summer.

  This was going to be a painfully long six weeks.

  CHAPTER TWO

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  “What's that?” Sonja pushed a lock of her dark hair back from her eyes with the heel of her hand, simultaneously streaking a strip of white across her forehead. “Damn,” she groaned, tossing the paint roller to the ground. SW7036 splattered all over the drop cloth, decorating it in haphazardly placed, dime-sized circles.

  I shoved the crumpled piece of paper into my pocket and continued coating the wall in a fresh layer, almost acting like I didn’t hear her. “Nothing. Just some camp counselor thing I tore off of one of those papers in the student union.”

  “You getting a summer job?” Sonja flipped her head over to gather her hair in another attempt at a ponytail. Her paint-coated palms left their mark across her black tresses, striping them like a zebra. “I thought we were gonna slum it together this summer. You know, drink all day. Eat Cheetos. Get fat while the boys are away.”

  Sonja’s boyfriend, Rex, will be gone at football training for the next two months, so we swore our allegiance to doing absolutely nothing and enjoying every minute of it. The only thing was, none of that sounded even slightly enjoyable. Not even the Cheetos, and I was a girl with a thing for carbo-loaded, processed foods in unnaturally neon colors.

  “I don’t know.” I swept the brush over the last untouched portion of wall space and chucked it back into the paint can. “This is really the first time in the past six years that I’ve had any time away from Lance.” I plopped down onto the tarp and folded my legs under me like I was sitting on a primary-colored mat in preschool. “If I just mope around, it kinda feels like I’m admitting I don’t have a life outside of him, you know?”

  “ ‘Cause you don’t, Darby.” Sonja gave up on her hairdo attempts and let it spill across her tanned shoulders. She was stunning in a way that she never seemed to actually acknowledge. Maybe that’s what made her even more beautiful. “Lance is your social life. Hell, he’s all of our social lives. No one on the peninsula does anything remotely exciting without the McIverson name attached to it,” she said in a matter-of-fact tone that I couldn’t really disagree with. “So by default, since you’re attached to him, nothing you do will be exciting. Face it, Darbs. This is as good as it gets this summer.” She waved an encompassing hand across the stark room. We never did invest in any furniture during the past two years we inhabited the space. Guess it would make moving out that much easier.

  “Don’t you find that more than a little bit depressing?” I rubbed the paint stuck in my cuticles with my thumb, but it stayed put. My nails looked like I just got the world’s worst manicure.

  Sonja cocked her head sympathetically, but I wasn’t looking for sympathy. I was looking for someone to commiserate with. There was a difference—a subtle one—but a difference still. In one instance it was all dumped on you, like you were the sad, sorry case that demanded someone’s pity. In the other you were like partners; you literally co-miserated together. I wanted that from her because my other partner—the one that had been around for the past six years—was currently residing on the opposite coastline from me. I needed her to help lessen the gap that all those states created.

  “I doubt he likes being away from you, Darby. You guys are inseparable. The next couple months will be hard on him, too.”

  I wobbled my head, honestly wanting to believe her. Like maybe if I let her words rattle around in my brain long enough, they might settle in and sound plausible. “I really would like to think that.” But a beautiful blonde named Lindsay, among others, sort of made it hard to believe.

  “Don’t you think part of the reason he accepted this internship is to save up for that ring he’s been hinting at?
”

  My stomach hopped into my throat. Not really hopped. More like vaulted in Olympic gymnast fashion. I was a little worried it was going to fly right out of my mouth and land on our freshly painted wall.

  Lance and I had been researching engagement rings for a few months now, and the thought hadn’t escaped my mind that this new summer job might be part of that saving process. My tastes weren’t extravagant, but the McIverson family’s were, and if I was going to be one of them someday, I’d need the diamond to match. My finger felt heavy just at the thought of it, like some miniature ball and chain tethered just below my knuckle.

  “I’m going to start calling you Deborah so you can get used to it,” Sonja teased, twirling a strand of her hair mindlessly between her fingers. She had quite the look going on with her paint-spattered hairdo.

  “Please don’t,” I groaned. “No one has called me that for at least fifteen years.”

  “Sorry chica, but you have no choice. Deborah McIverson or Darby McIverson. Which one sounds more worthy?”

  “Depends. What do I have to be worthy of?”

  “Worthy of the McIverson name and all that goes along with it. I hate to break it to you, but if you think your world is swallowed up in Lance’s now, just wait until he’s got his ring on that pretty little finger of yours. They’ll own you.”

  And truth be told, Sonja was not too far off in that assumption. Lance’s older brother, Heath, was married just three years ago to Melissa, a petite debutante with straight blonde hair and piercing green eyes, and they’d already contributed to the McIverson succession plan by producing two little clones that were the perfect blend of both their mother and father. By all standards, Lance and I were really dragging our feet—already nineteen and no proposal, no wedding, and no high-powered internships to boast about in their annual family Christmas letter. We were totally on the McIverson slacker track.