I don’t leave a note, just put the key on the table where she’ll find it. Anything I’ve got to say she knows already, so it seems pointless.
The cold air is instant, biting. I left my coat and jacket in the ballroom last night so I walk to my car wearing nothing but half a suit, the sky in the east turning the blue-gray of a winter sunrise.
It feels like punishment and victory all at once. It feels like penance and triumph, like I’m paying the price for something I shouldn’t have done, but also like I’m celebrating the tiniest of steps forward because we didn’t fight. We could have. The fight was there, waiting, wanting to come out, but we kept it at bay.
And now, back to the rules, I think as I reach my car, get in, crank the heat up. I sit in the driver’s seat for a long time, head against the headrest, letting the warm air soak in until I can really feel it.
Virtual strangers. Polite acquaintances. Hello and how are you and nothing more.
I close my eyes against the sunrise. If this is victory, it feels hollow.Caleb’s car is in the parking spot next to mine when I pull into my complex’s lot, and that’s when I remember: he and his twenty-two-year-old girlfriend are sleeping on the pull-out sofa in my office.
“Fuck,” I say softly to myself, rubbing my temples. “Fuck.”
I don’t want to deal with a happy couple today. Even though Caleb just tanked his entire academic career for this girl — this student — ever since they reunited two days ago he’s been disgustingly, blindingly happy, and I can’t handle that right now.
Worse, Caleb doesn’t like Delilah. I can’t even blame him, because every time I’ve gone to her again only to be left shipwrecked, he’s the one who’s found me and put me back on my feet. If someone did that to him, I’d hate her, too.
I unlock my front door as quietly as I can, praying that I don’t wake them up. I just want to get into my bedroom and into a shower before I have to deal with another person.
It’s quiet as I close the door. It’s quiet as I walk into the kitchen, hit the button on the coffee maker that Caleb set up last night. It’s quiet as I climb the stairs toward my bedroom and the sweet salvation of a shower.
I’m two steps away when my office door opens.
Fuck.
“Did you just get home?” Caleb whispers.
“I went out for a run,” I say, voice hushed.
“In jeans?” he asks, not fooled for a second.
I turn, look my little brother full in the face. His hair is flat on one side and sticking out on the other, voice groggy, wearing nothing but boxers. The door’s shut behind him.
They’re trousers, not jeans, but that point seems unimportant.
“What?” I ask, looking him dead in the eye.
“Don’t do this,” he says, and I fold my arms over my chest.
“Do what?”
Caleb swallows, stands up straighter. He crosses his own arms, mimicking my stance.
“Don’t go back to her again,” he says. “Do you remember the last time? You swore —”
“I was lying,” I say, voice flat.
I don’t say, I’m always lying when I say I won’t go back.
If I ever say it again, I’ll be lying then, too.
“Please?” Caleb says, a soft, pleading note in his voice.
My eyes are adjusted, and now I can see him better: green eyes and light brown hair that favors our mother, his face a vague echo of my own.
“I’m fine,” I tell him, even if I don’t know that it’s true.
“Are you?” he says.
He may be an idiot, but my little brother is too smart for my bullshit.
I turn away again, walk to my bedroom door.
“Of course I am,” I say. “I’m totally fucking fine, just like always. I’m gonna take a shower, see you in a few.”
With that I walk into my bedroom, close the door, and don’t look back at my brother standing there in the hallway.
He’s right. I know he’s right. It just doesn’t matter.
I stand under the hot shower for a long, long time.Chapter Twenty-FourDelilahWhen I wake up, I’m hungover and Seth is gone.
Neither fact is a surprise, but I hate them both. My mouth feels like someone’s glued it shut, my brain feels like it’s been replaced with razor wire, and the other side of the bed is cold and empty. He’s been gone for a while. I don’t know how long.
There’s not even a note. No Thanks for a good time, Seth. No That was pretty fun, Seth. There’s nothing. No clue that he was ever even here aside from the stickiness between my legs and a slow, dull emptiness that I try to ignore.
I told him to leave, I think, lying in the huge bed, staring at the ceiling. We left the fireplace on overnight, and now the room is too warm, the air pressing in on me from all sides.