Chapter 23
Madeleine
I pushed breathless through the park, the noise of the city miles and miles away, and I stumbled to a stop when I saw her standing there by the Clarence F. Buckingham Memorial Fountain, lit up against the night, quiet right now with the air cold around us—Sapphire, her coat drawn tight, the scarf I gave her tied in a loose knot. She had her hands shoved in her pockets, staring out over the water past the park, and that sad, million-mile stare she had on—it made me feel sick just seeing it.
“Hey—”
She jumped, whirling on me. I put my hands up.
“Whoa. It’s just me.”
“Sorry.” She laughed nervously, scratching the back of her head, and then she shot me the saddest, most strained attempt at a smile I’d ever seen. “Sorry about… this. About a lot of things, actually.”
How was everything so upside-down so quickly? Just this morning we’d woken up tangled in each other’s arms, and I’d woken her up by mistake while picking her loose hairs from my mouth, and she’d stirred and laughed seeing me battling her hair—had a slow morning together with coffee in bed, her head resting on my collar—and I’d been so happy it felt like my nervous, tender heart would explode.
Now, not even twenty-four hours later, I’d been unable to get ahold of her, had gone to her workplace and found out she’d gotten fired after shouting at a customer, and just when I was assuming the worst, she’d texted to ask me to meet her here, out in the park where we’d first met. I wished I could think it was just that she liked the views here.
“Sapphire—what is going on? Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” she said, her voice thick, crackling on the edges. She laughed, a shaky sound. “That wasn’t convincing. No.”
I stepped up to her side, second-guessing if she even wanted me there, and I dared to put a hand on her arm, touching tentatively. She turned to me with a heaving breath, and she fell against me, wrapping me up in an embrace, and she buried her face in my shoulder.
“I’m really sorry,” she whispered.
“It’s okay. I’m not upset. Whatever’s happened.” I stroked my fingers through her hair, trying desperately to stay calm—for her—even though I thought I’d throw up. “You can take your time telling me. I’m not going anywhere, okay?”
“I—I know. But… but I am.”
My stomach dropped. I tightened my grip on her, feeling like the ground was tipping, like… I was getting dizzy. “You can’t tell me you’re going back—that your parents found you and—”
“No—yes. Yes and no. They found me. And apparently they’re losing… patience.” She stepped back from the embrace, forcing herself up taller as much as she could, straining out a smile. “So they’re trying more… heavy-handed approaches. Andrew told me they’re going to try dragging me into some drawn-out litigation over the apartment—”
“Then we’ll find you a different place in the meantime.”
She shook her head, squeezing her eyes shut. “Madeleine—”
“Andrew is just saying whatever it takes to—”
“No, Madeleine, sweetheart, he’s—he’s on my side. He’s helping me.” She dropped her gaze to the floor, wringing her hands. “Probably losing his job in the process, too. But he says it’s not right, the way they’re treating me… so…”
I swallowed. “So—what do you mean, you’re going? ”
She strained a smile at me. “He’s gotten me a job. A nice one, too, with someone who used to work for my family. In Baltimore. Where… where I’ll be far enough away they can’t reach me anymore.”
Ah… dammit. I knew from the start that she was too good to be true. That these things didn’t just wander into a person’s life, that you didn’t just hold out your hand and expect everything you’d ever wanted to fall into it. I stared, breathless, my head spinning, and it took a while to force together enough thoughts to say, “You’re… sure it’ll be safe there? You can trust Andrew? And the person who used to work for them?”
“Mm.” She hung her head. “It’s the best option I have…”
“You could… stay,” I said, feeling like I’d throw up. What was I even saying? Why I was as immature as ever—trying to cling to some childish delusion of love when there were bigger things at stake here—we hadn’t even used that L word, no matter how much I thought it. My silly daydreams didn’t belong in something as serious as this. “You can stay at my place until you have something secure. We’ll find you another job here, and your parents—”
“I don’t want them to hurt you, Madeleine,” she said, tears budding in her eyes. I shook my head.
“I’m not worried about—”
“ I am. I don’t want to ruin what we have by having it be the reason you’ve lost your degree, your dreams… I don’t want to be the thing holding you back, dragging all these things into your life that keep you from doing what you want. I want you to go and design a hotel just like the Peninsula. And maybe one day I can visit.”
God, I knew this would happen—knew it would come to this, that something would come up, something more serious than us, and she’d have to go do something bigger with her life. I’d gotten carried away, believed all the nice things Britt told me, the nice things Sapphire told me, when I should have understood this kind of thing by now.
I swallowed, hard, forcing myself to look at her straight-on when all I wanted was to turn, run away, hide away. “You, um… do you think you might ever… come back?”
She hung her head, tried to speak, strained at it, and she buried her face in her hands. “Madeleine…”
“I’m sorry.”
She shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. This is all my fault. I never should have… I don’t know. I should have done something differently, should have done everything differently. I just…”
“I don’t regret a second of the time we’ve had together, Sapphire. You’re incredible and I’ll just…” God, I wanted to scream, wanted to cry, wanted to rip my own heart out. I threw myself on her and took her in my arms, squeezing her into me, holding her as tight as I could, pouring this anguished feeling out into the embrace, and she met me just as firmly. “I’ll just… miss you… so damn much.”
“You’re going to make me cry,” she choked.
“I’m already crying.”
“Okay, I am too,” she said, voice thick, as she buried her face in my shoulder. “I don’t know… if I will. Come back, I mean. I want to believe I can. But I can’t make any promises… I don’t know what to do with myself. I don’t know how to live life. I thought for a second I’d figured it out.”
I squeezed her tighter. “I’m going to kill your parents.”
“Okay, maybe don’t. I’d be sad if you were in jail.”
I laughed, thick and tear-streaked, into her shoulder. “Is it… a good job? In Baltimore?”
“Mm… working with a stylist my parents had on call for a while. She’s really lovely…”
“A stylist—” I laughed through tears, stepping back just enough to look at her, my hands on her shoulders, looking over her face, looking at her as much as I could, taking in every bit of her that I could. “Oh my god, Sapphire, that’s amazing. You’re practically custom-made for that.”
“I don’t know about that… I’m okay with the makeup, but I’ve always needed you for fashion tips.”
I shook my head, tears hot down my cheeks. “You have a good eye. Good taste. You’ll pick up all the details in no time. You’re going to be so… so goddamn good at it. You’re going to be amazing.”
She sniffled, wiping tears from her chin, her cheeks. “I’ve never heard a compliment sound so sad.”
“I’m not sad, I’m so… happy… you’ve gotten a good job and everything. I’m happy for you.”
“You’re definitely sad.”
“I’m really fucking sad,” I choked, laughed, sobbed, resting my forehead on hers. “I’m being a baby when you need me to be—”
She put her hands on my face, cradling me. “I need you to be you, Madeleine… I like you. A lot. And I don’t want to say goodbye while you’re being somebody else.”
“I’ve just… really… enjoyed being with you…”
“Me too,” she whispered, wiping a tear away from under her eye, and I cracked my eyes to meet hers, as she strained a smile at me. “And no matter what happens, anywhere I go, you’ll always be the one who rescued me.”
“Dammit, Sapphire, I’m already crying enough.”
She sniffled, straining her smile wider. “Don’t hold on waiting for me, okay? Go and be happy and everything. That’s what I want. I promise.”
Happy? She wanted me to be happy? With all this?
I wasn’t making happy. Not in a million years. But happy was just a silly word people used in fanciful daydreams—which, I guess fanciful daydream was the best description for the past two months with Sapphire.
Problem with happy dreams was that you eventually woke up. I wasn’t going to be happy. But I could get serious and live life properly—clean up my damn act already.
I wasn’t telling Sapphire that, though. She needed something nice right now, something… something to hold onto. So I shut my eyes again, buried my face in her shoulder, and I nodded, when all I wanted to do was tell her I love you, please stay, let’s find a way to make it work, please.
“I’m going to miss you,” was what I said instead, the last thing I wanted to say.
And the last thing I wanted to hear was when Sapphire squeezed me and said, her voice just a breath, “Me too. I’ll always…”
She didn’t finish the sentence. Never would, I guess. Wasn’t the only thing left unfinished.
∞∞∞
Britt actually paused her show when I pushed into the apartment, which was how I knew she was serious. Set down her third cup of coffee and fourth cup of ice cream, and she turned to me with blotchy eyes.
“Is she okay?” she said, and I shook my head, pushing past her towards the hall, towards the bedroom where I just wanted to curl up and forget the universe.
“She’s going to be,” I said, and Britt stood up.
“Where are you going? What happened?”
“Stuff to do,” I muttered, but I got vanquished by the bathroom door opening in front of me and Ellen stepping out, blocking my path, stopping and giving me a concerned look.
“Madeleine—what happened? Where’s Sapphire?”
Ugh—hadn’t realized the whole gang was here to interrogate me while I just wanted to crawl under the covers and hide from my life. I looked away. “I don’t really want to talk about this right now.”
“What does that mean?” Britt said, coming into the hall behind me. The two had me blocked off on both sides. Walls were closing in. Guess that felt right. “What happened to her?”
“You’re all so nosy…” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Her parents happened. Forcing their way into her life and trying to drag her back to them by any means necessary. Luckily, she… she’s got an out,” I said, trying to sound more cheerful, which worked about as well as I expected it to. “Nice job and everything, comfy place, safe from all of this. So it’s… good news, actually.”
“ Where is this safe place?” Britt said. I wish she were as oblivious as I liked to pretend she was. Maybe I’d have been able to slip something past her then.
“Madeleine,” Ellen said, her voice soft but imploring, once I’d hesitated for longer than I should have. I shrugged.
“Nice place far away from her parents. Baltimore is nice, right? Charm City.”
“ Baltimore? ” Britt said, her voice cracking. God, talk about timing—this was always going to push Britt to have a breakdown about it, but happening when she was already in the middle of a breakdown? “Oh, god. So she’s leaving Chicago and you broke up and now you’re going to hide in your room—”
“What the hell do you want me to do, Britt, tell her to go back to her parents instead?” I shot, and she clenched her fists, firing me a dirty look.
“Because those are the only two options that exist?”
“Britt,” Ellen said, her voice soft. “Don’t make this worse for Madeleine, she’s already going through it.”
Britt turned away with a groan, raking her fingers back through her hair, leaning back against the wall. “Dammit—I was counting on you two to be happy even if I wasn’t. I can’t deal with this right now.”
“You think I can?” I said, trying to sound snappy but coming out wavering, crackling, broken. I looked down. “If you have any other bright ideas how to resolve the situation, be my fucking guest, Brittney.”
Ellen put a hand on my shoulder. I pushed it away, but she put it back, resolutely, back in the same spot. “Britt’s not the one who did this,” she said. I groaned.
“Britt’s the one who won’t leave me alone to process this myself for one second.”
“Process,” Britt muttered. “Hide from reality.”
“ Britt, ” Ellen said, and Britt pushed out a short sigh, hanging her head.
“Christ. Sorry, Mads. I’m… I’m just emotional.”
“No, I’m…” I put a hand to my forehead, feeling heavy, like I was sinking into the floor. I could feel the tears coming on again, but I didn’t want to cry—not here, not like this, not in front of everyone. “I’m sorry. I’m upset too. I’m pissed off why her fucking parents can’t just let her fucking live. I… I’m sorry, you guys. I just need a second.”
“Mads…” Britt hugged herself. “Tell me that doesn’t mean—”
“I don’t know what it means,” I said, voice heavy, husky, dry around the edges. “Just… that I can’t do this right now. Sorry… sorry, you guys.”
Ellen was the one who responded, squeezing her hand on my shoulder. “Take your time,” she said softly. “We’ll be here. Do you… know when she’s supposed to leave?”
“Tomorrow evening,” I said, voice hazy. “No time to lose… she’s staying with Andrew right now. The butler. Only piece of good news is that he’s… he’s apparently not so bad. The only reason they hadn’t found her and dragged her back already. Said… it’d be too risky for her to go back to her place or mine, anywhere she’s been a lot.”
Britt shot me a look. “And that’s a good idea? That sounds like the perfect setup for the butler to kidnap her where no one’s looking.”
“He’s been the only one among Sapphire’s family who’s known where she’s been living. If he’d been trying to drag her back, he’d have had plenty of other opportunities.”
She didn’t say anything, clearly wanting to argue but not knowing how. I got that—wished I could kick and scream against all of this, but what the hell was there to say?
Ellen gave me a light push in the direction of the bedroom door. “Go get rest,” she said softly. “I’m already here to make sure Britt has everything she needs. I can look after both of you at the same time.”
“Thanks, Ellen,” I rasped, standing up taller, a little shaky but forcing myself to move forward. “Thanks, Britt. Sorry it’s… sorry it’s all like this.”
Britt shook her head. Ellen sighed, with a quiet little, “Don’t apologize,” but it was meaningless—all words were meaningless right now.
I trudged into my bedroom, footsteps feeling monumentally heavy, and I’d barely shed my outerwear before I crawled into bed, looking at the empty spot on the bed next to me, where Sapphire had been just this morning, and it was a long time there before I let out a small, dry laugh.
I’d told myself that if I broke up with Tristan then I’d just be single, focus on myself. That sounded great when I was still together with him.
Now I had it—single and focusing on myself. Didn’t seem so great anymore.