Chapter Forty-Nine
forty-nine
Lanie
“How are we back here again, Melanie?” Professor Skinner paused outside his office to speak to Lanie as she sat at her desk. “I come out of my office and you’re back. Not to say I don’t enjoy it but I’d gotten accustomed to virtual meetings.” He sighed in frustration. “Didn’t we talk about this before? Seeing you sitting here every day...again?”
“It’s a little weird for me too, honestly. But my cousin is married. I don’t need to go anymore.” Lanie smiled weakly.
“You know that’s not what I mean, Melanie.”
“Yes, but—”
“I spoke to Dr. Markham, he said he’d received your packet. He was very impressed,” he cut her off and smiled.
“Don’t get too excited, Professor Skinner. Frankly, I don’t know what I want right now,” she said, instead of her usual evasive banter.
His eyes widened in surprise. “Well, you know I think finishing your PhD should be high on that list, but you definitely need to want that for yourself.”
Lanie felt relieved that he was relenting...at long last.
He clicked his teeth in resignation. “Anyway, it’s great to have you back.” Professor Skinner look suddenly glum. “I’d still prefer to see you doing something else. You’re a capable woman. I have confidence that you won’t allow yourself to waste away behind that desk forever.”
She should have known he wasn’t done. Lanie sealed her mouth shut and waited. He seemed to realize after a moment, catching himself.
He looked out the window behind her. “Well, ah, it’s a beautiful day. And you’re going out for your lunch and that’s that.”
Lanie nodded, smiling. “Sure, okay.”
“Lanie.”
Her sandwich stopped on the way to her mouth when she heard him call her name. And as always, she recognized his voice immediately.
“I can’t believe I found you.”
“And saying that will never not be creepy. Stop. It.”
Ridley gave her a wry grin.
Besides, finding her was no great feat. Sitting in the central quad near her office, on a campus that was only about sixteen acres of land and buildings, made locating a big Black woman in the predominately white space not exactly hard.
“Can I sit?”
“You can do whatever you want.”
“Can I?” Ridley sat beside her, never taking his eyes away from her face. “Can I win you back?”
Lanie gritted her teeth. It had been four whole weeks since she saw him last, while fleeing from his house after Gemma’s wedding. “That’s gonna be a bit harder. Like, maybe even impossible.”
“Lanie, I apologize, but I had to focus on Bea. She was going through something.”
Guilt ate at Lanie, remembering what Narcisa had said. She knew how important it was for Bea to know Lanie was no threat to her relationship with her father. But it did not stop the ache that bloomed in Lanie’s chest remembering how it had felt to be put out of his house. Recalling how vulnerable she’d felt.
“You made me feel disposable.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t handle it well. I know.”
“Listen, I get it. Bea needed you right then. But you could have asked me to go upstairs. Told me to go get my coffee down the block, said you needed some time. You don’t kick me out in front of your kid so she can see I’m just some trash that had to be taken to the curb in the morning. Some chick who didn’t mean anything to you.”
Ridley grimaced. Had this not occurred to him? Lanie clamped her mouth shut so the thought wouldn’t slip out.
“You’re right. I’m sorry.”
Lanie kept her chin up, back straight. She couldn’t let him see how much he’d destroyed her with his callousness.
Ridley turned to her fully, propping a knee up on the bench beside her. “Look, I’ve spoken to Bea and she gets it now. And I get it.”
“Do you?”
“I do. I love you, Lanie. I want us to figure this out because we have a much bigger issue to deal with. Namely, this distance. Now that your cousin’s wedding is over, I know you won’t be coming to England as much anymore. And we’ve finally found someone to take over the coinvestigator position here, so I won’t need to come back and forth quite so often either.”
“So, then it’s over anyway, isn’t it?” Lanie said the words in as casual a manner as she could manage while certain her heart was breaking.
“No, of course not.” Ridley shook his head. “Lanie, we love each other. We know this. So, this can’t be it. It can’t be over.”
He reached for her hand and she pulled it away, clasping both in her lap.
“Why? You live there, I live here. That won’t change, right?” She turned slightly, facing him for the first time.
He was stunned.
“Right?” she insisted.
“I don’t know. I’m not sure what you want me to say,” he echoed her thoughts.
Say I’m important. Say you need me. That you want me. That you’ll move mountains to be with me. Tell me the things you must have told Thyra.
Lanie waited. Silence surrounded them. The chapel clock high above the quad struck one. That was her cue.
“Between that day and now, I think you’ve said enough, Ridley: absolutely nothing.”
She thought about Narcisa’s advice. I’m teaching people how to treat me.
“Yes. I think this might be done,” Lanie said, barely keeping the tears out of her voice.
She peered down at the rest of her sandwich in her lap as if that might be what she was talking about instead. Lanie rose from the bench as Ridley watched then walked to the garbage and threw that away too.