Chapter 22 Griffin #2
He leans his head back against my stomach.
He closes his eyes. He keeps his hand on mine.
I look down at the top of his head and think the thing I’ve been not thinking, which is that he hasn’t told me what his name was.
He’s told me the new name. He’s told me the old first name.
Reece. He hasn’t told me the last name. The last name on the gravestone.
The last name I would know. I haven’t asked.
I asked once, in a library stack, weeks ago, and he told me he couldn’t tell me, and I haven’t asked again.
He still hasn’t told me. He just told Mendez, on the phone, in the conversation we both heard — but he didn’t say the last name on the call either.
Mendez knows. Mendez has the file. Mendez didn’t need it spoken.
The name was in the room as a thing both of them already knew.
I was on the couch, the third person in the room, listening to a call about myself.
The name was the one piece of information that wasn’t for me.
He hasn’t told me his last name and I’m about to follow him to a new town.
I do not say anything about it. I am keeping track of the shape of what we are doing, and this is part of the shape, that I am with a man whose full name I do not know. I leave my hand on his shoulder. This is going to be a question someday, but it is not a question right now.
“Griffin.”
“Yeah.”
“Thank you for being here.”
“Don’t thank me.”
“Right.”
“Pick a different word.”
“I don’t have a different word.”
“That’s okay. You don’t need one.”
I stay over. He doesn’t ask me to and I don’t ask him if I can. I am at the desk and he is in the kitchen, and at some point it is nine and at some point it is ten and at some point he says, “Stay,” and I say, “Okay,” and that is the conversation.
We go to bed. We do not have sex. We get into the bed in our clothes for a while.
Then we get up and brush our teeth and get into the bed for real.
He turns off the lamp. I lie next to him in the dark.
He is on his back. I am on my side facing him.
His hand is on my chest, palm down, the way he puts it when he is going to keep it there.
“Griffin.”
“Yeah.”
“I want to tell you something.”
“Okay.”
“I want to tell you tonight because I do not want to wait until morning. I do not want it to be a thing I tell you over coffee. I want to tell you in the dark when neither of us can see the other one’s face. Because I am better at saying it that way, and you deserve me at my most able to say it.”
His hand on my chest doesn’t move.
I lie there for a second.
“I am not leaving you again.”
He does not say anything.
“I want you to hear me say it. I want you to hear me say it tonight, after the call, with the flag lodged and the clock running and Mendez deciding what is going to happen to us. I want you to hear me say it before any of the next things happen. Before the move. Before the choice you have to make. Before any of it. Tonight. In the dark.”
“Okay.”
“I’ve been the person who left. For two years.
Here in this town since October. Every time I haven’t called Mendez.
Every time I’ve rerouted around something.
Every time I’ve stood in a post office holding a postcard.
I’ve been the person who leaves people for their own good.
The person who decides for other people what they get to know and what they get to keep.
I did it to you. I did it to my mother. I did it to the version of me who lived in our apartment. I’ve been that person.”
He is very still.
“I am telling you tonight that I am done being that person.”
He is quiet.
“Mendez may move me. He may not. He may move both of us. He may say I have to go alone. He may say something I can’t predict.
I don’t know what he’s going to say. I want you to know what I’ve decided before he tells me what’s going to happen — because if I decide it after he tells me, I won’t know whether I decided or whether the decision was made for me.
I want to decide it now, in the dark, with the information I have. ”
“Okay.”
“Whatever Mendez says. Whatever happens. I am not leaving you. If they move me, you come with me, or I do not go. If they tell me I can’t have contact, I’ll have contact.
If having contact means leaving the program, I leave the program.
If they tell me you’re a vulnerability and I have to choose, I choose you.
If they tell me the people who are looking are closing in and the only safe thing is for me to go alone, I will not go alone.
I’d rather be found with you than safe without you.
I think. That’s where I’ve gotten to. That’s the decision.
I’m telling you tonight so you know it’s the decision and not a thing I drifted into. ”
He is very quiet. His hand on my chest has not moved.
“Reed.”
“Yeah.”
“You do not have to…“
“I know.”
“You do not have to make the decision for both of us. I have not asked you to make it like that. I have been deciding for myself. I have been telling myself that whatever you decide, I would…“
“I know.”
“You do not have to commit to leaving the program to make me stay.”
“Griffin. I’m not committing to leaving the program to make you stay.
I’m committing to it because it’s the truth.
I’ve spent two years being someone who leaves people I love for their own good, and I’ve learned what that does.
To you. To me. I’m not going to do it again.
The program doesn’t get to be the reason I do it again.
The threat doesn’t get to be the reason.
Mendez doesn’t get to be the reason. I’m telling you tonight because if I don’t say it tonight, I’m going to spend the next six months — however long — every time something gets hard, asking myself whether the right thing is to leave again.
I can’t live like that. I can’t be in this with you and have the leaving on the table.
The leaving has to be off the table. I’m taking it off tonight.
Putting it down somewhere I can’t pick it back up. ”
“Okay.”
“I want you to know I know what I am giving up to do that. I’m giving up the thing I’d been telling myself was a backup.
I could leave again to protect him — I’ve been carrying that one in my back pocket for three months.
It has been the thing I have reached for every time I got scared.
I almost reached for it on Friday, when Mendez asked if there was anyone, and I said no.
I almost reached for it that night. I have been close to reaching for it again all week.
I am putting it down. I am putting it down tonight.
I am telling you I am putting it down so that you can hold me to it.
So that the next time I get scared and I reach for it, you can say no, you put that down, that is not yours anymore. ”
He is quiet for a long time. His hand on my chest moves once, the small absent sweep, and stops.
“Reed.”
“Yeah.”
“Look at me.”
“It’s dark.”
“Reed.”
I turn my head. I cannot see him. I can feel him. He has turned toward me. His face is close.
“I am holding you to it.”
“Okay.”
“You said it. I heard you. I’m holding you to it. The next time you reach for it I’m going to say no. The next time you walk into my kitchen with the speech ready I’m going to say no. You’ve given me permission to. I’m taking the permission.”
I don’t answer. I let him have it.
“And Reed.”
“Yeah.”
“I am putting mine down too.”
“What.”
“My version. The one where I tell myself I would understand if you left. The one where I tell myself I would survive it. I’ve been carrying that one for three months too — I would be okay if it happened again.
I’m putting it down. I am not going to be okay if it happens again.
I’m telling you tonight so you know. So you don’t get to comfort yourself with the idea that I would be.
I wouldn’t. Leaving is off the table on my side too.
If you go, I’m not okay. If I go, you’re not okay.
We’re taking it off the table together.”
“Okay.”
We lie there. His hand is on my chest. My hand finds his on top of mine and I hold it there.
The room is dark and the radiator hisses and somewhere a car goes by and somewhere a person is making a phone call and we are in his bed in his apartment with the leaving in a drawer somewhere we cannot reach.
“Griffin.”
“Yeah.”
“Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me.”
“Pick a different word.”
“I…“
“I know. You don’t have one.”
“No.”
“It’s okay.”
“It is okay.”
He shifts. He moves closer. His forehead finds my temple. His breath is on my cheek.
“Sleep,” he says.
“Okay.”
I sleep. I sleep harder than I have slept in weeks. In the morning he is already up, making coffee in the small pot. He brings me a cup. I sit up in bed. He sits on the edge.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
“You said it.”
“I said it.”
“I want to make sure I did not dream it.”
“You did not dream it.”
“Okay.”
“I meant it.”
“Okay.”
He kisses my forehead. He goes back to the kitchen.
I drink the coffee. The sun is coming in.
Somewhere Mendez is in his office. Somewhere a flag is in a file.
Somewhere, in three to six months, a decision is going to be made about what happens next.
The decision is going to happen to us. I’m going to be in a kitchen with him when it does. I’m not going to leave.