“It was from May!” he tells me again, more forcefully. “Or maybe even before that. I don’t know, I didn’t see the story. But there has been no fund-raiser since I found out. There’s been nothing. I swear.”
His words echo in the fragrant air around us. They wrap themselves around me, burrow deep inside me. I believe him. I don’t think anyone looking at him now, face stoic, eyes wide and angry and alarmed, could doubt the veracity of his words.
I know I don’t. They make sense—so much more sense than the idea that he ran off and did this during the two weeks we were apart.
And still there’s something inside me that doesn’t feel quite right. Something twisting and turning and making me feel all kinds of wrong.
“Why did they run that story, then?” I demand. “How did they make it look like—”
“They spliced old footage together to make the story and didn’t bother to say when and where that footage was from. It’s not unusual. It’s unethical, but it isn’t unusual. As for why they ran that story? I don’t know. Especially when there was supposed to be a moratorium on coverage of my family. But I can assure you I’m going to find out. Tonight.”
He starts to dial the phone again and I turn away, walk into the house. This isn’t a conversation I want to hear anyway. Not when I’m still feeling so overwhelmed, so off.
I head to the bedroom, to the closet where I keep my spare set of running shoes. Ethan follows me, his hand on my lower back and I try to relax into his touch. Try to be okay. But I’m not. I’m just not.
He’s talking to Anthony about the story that MSNBC ran, wanting to know what other—if any—networks picked it up. Anthony must be Googling as they speak, because a bunch more letters start showing up in the conversation. As do a lot more curse words.
I tune them out. How this happened doesn’t matter to me. What matters is that it did. That it could, so easily.
I get my shoes on without saying anything to Ethan, without so much as looking at him. And then I walk toward the front door.
“Hey, what are you doing?” he demands, suddenly blocking my way. “Anthony,” he says into the phone. “I’ll have to call you back.” He hangs up on the poor man again.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I tell him after he disconnects.
“Now that’s where we think differently. Because I happen to be of the opinion that when my girlfriend is walking out on me, I should be emotionally present for it. Especially when she promised me less than a week ago that she wouldn’t do this.”
“I’m not walking out, Ethan. I’m going for a walk to clear my head. It’s not the same thing.”
“You sure about that?”
I roll my eyes. “I’m sure. I’ll be back in an hour. Maybe two.”
“It’s after midnight. Give me a minute to change and I’ll go with you.”
“I’m a big girl, Ethan, I can take care of myself. Especially in La Jolla, where the crime rate isn’t exactly skyrocketing.”
“I’d still feel more comfortable if you let me come with you.”
“Yes, but I wouldn’t. I need to think, Ethan.”
“And you can’t think with me there.”
“No! I can’t. Not when it’s you I need to think about.”
“What’s there to think about, Chloe? I didn’t do what you thought I did. I would never hurt you like that! I would never—”
“But you did! You did hurt me like that when you didn’t tell me about Brandon. And now you’re doing it again, keeping secrets from me for what you think is my own good.”
“I didn’t want to hurt you any more. You’ve been through enough.”
And there it is, the reason I still feel so icky. The reason everything feels just a little bit off. The reason I’m finding it so hard to trust Ethan even now that he’s saying and doing all the right things.
“You know, that’s exactly what my parents said to me before they forced me to sign that NDA. Before they forced me to recant my statement to the police. That I’d been through enough and they didn’t want to see me hurt any more.”
“Chloe. You know this isn’t the same thing.”
The thing is, I do know. It just doesn’t seem to matter right now. Nothing does but getting the hell out of here before the walls close in around me.