Life, Love & A Little Coffee

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Conflicted Confrontation

Tom was looking forward to this conversation less than his conversation with Ada. But whatever Jeff did or said to him, Tom knew he had it coming. "What do you want to know?"

"When you told me you and Ada were just friends, was it true or have you always been a lyin' asshole?"

Tom leaned his head back and propped his hands on his knees. "We were just friends. Nothing happened between us until last night."

"Ada told her momma that you said you didn't see a future with her." There was almost a bitterness in Jeff's tone as he spoke the words.

Tom looked over at him. "Not how I phrased it, but that's how she heard it and I didn't correct her."

"So what did you say to her?"

"That I couldn't see how her and I could work." His eyes fell from Jeff, not wanting him to see how Tom's own words hurt him.

"Can't argue with that, not that that's gonna stop me from kicking your ass before I leave."

Tom shrugged. "Figured."

"So what made you decide you two couldn't work?"

With a heavy breath and with an even heavier heart, Tom looked down at the hardwood floors. "I'm worried that her and I together would end up tearing your family apart," Tom admitted before risking a look at Jeff. "I won't risk that. With what's happening to Rebecca, Ada needs her time with her mom a hell of a lot more than she needs me."

Jeff stared at him for a long time, seeming to study him, looking for bullshit he wouldn't find. "You just had to have a noble reason, didn't you?"

Tom looked up and watched as Jeff stroked his fingers through his beard, his eyes staring back at him with a mixture of emotions. He let out a huff and looked away. "Ada told her mamma somethin' Britt said to her; that you look at Ada like she's everything."

Tom thought he'd been keeping his growing affections for Ada under wraps, so that Britt could see right through him took him by surprise. Hiding how he felt had gotten shot to shit the last couple of times he'd been around her and Ada.

"Is that how you feel 'bout my daughter? She everything to you?"

His voice came out as a croak, catching in his throat as he answered, "Yes."

"You in love with her?"

Tom couldn't help but let out a chuckle. "Does it matter?"

Jeff shrugged. "Dunno yet. But you can bet your ass you're gunna answer the question all the same."

He leaned his head back against the wall and gave the most honest answer he could, trying to talk to him as if he was still a friend rather than the father of the woman whose heart he just stomped on. "Something tells me it wouldn't take much for me to fall in love with Ada. But right now I'm trying like hell not to because I can't have her. Sort of asking for a life of disappointment falling in love with someone you can't have, isn't it?"

Jeff nodded, taking in the statement one word at a time and letting it all sink in. "Sometimes you don't gotta choice. Even if you stay away from them, they somehow steal your heart anyhow. So quick you didn't even see it happen."

It wasn't until then that Tom remembered their conversation at the coffee shop. "You said Rebecca was your buddy's girlfriend, right?"

"My best friend," Jeff corrected. "Him and I had been friends since we was kids, grew up cross the street from each other. Our momma's was best friends, our older brother's was best friends, and we was best friends."