60. Dylan
SIXTY
DYLAN
July rolls in with a heatwave and an existential crisis when I realize I know shit all about what I’m going to do with my life now.
What’s worse? I don’t really even care what happens to me.
It’s funny. You’d think being stuck on a desert island for over two years would be significantly more likely to leave you despondent and apathetic, but I don’t remember ever once feeling that way when I was there.
Desperate? Sure. Afraid for our lives? Only every other day. Angry? Check.
I never felt numb like this, though.
Indifferent.
Without purpose.
Listless.
I try not to show it.
I do my best to keep it together.
To pretend I’m fine. That I’m getting better.
I smile.
I talk to people.
I smile more.
I tell Nina I’m doing great.
I pretend I’m interested in whatever settlement she’s after from the charter company.
I write a letter to Abel’s wife and try to tell her how sorry I am for everything.
I pretend that I’m settling back into my life, even if I don’t know what that mystical thing called “my life” even is anymore.
And I wait.
I wait for him.
Even though I know it’s hopeless.
I try not to think too much about the future.
I should. I know I should. I can’t keep living in Nina’s guest room forever.
She’s been very understanding, but we all know I don’t belong here.
Of course, the problem is that I have nowhere to go.
I don’t even have an idea about where to go.
Stay here? Go back to San Francisco? Indy would take me in.
He’d love to have me. Or I could find a new city altogether?
All of those are options. Possibilities. And possibilities should be exciting .
But I just don’t care.
I don’t care.
I don’t care.
I don’t care!
About anything at all.
It’s not going to matter anyway.
It’s just pointless waiting for the inevitable.
He’s not going to pick me.
I hate that I still hope he does.
I hate that I thought me telling him I love him and that he’s free to go and choose who he wants would bring me some sort of closure. That watching him walk away would get my head back on straight, and I’d finally remember that he doesn’t belong to me.
I hate that I love him.
I hate that I still hope he can love me back.
I hate that it takes physical effort not to go to him and beg him to love me.
All I want is to go to him and beg him to love me.
No.
Scratch that.
All I really want is not to feel anymore.
I want emptiness.
A sweet, blissful state of nothing.
I’ve loved Adrian for half my life. Years and years of nothing but unrequited love.
And I hate it.
I hate this feeling.
I hate everything Adrian makes me feel.
I hate that now I know everything. Everything I’ve been missing and will spend the rest of my life missing.
All I want is not to feel.
But I don’t get that luxury.
I round the corner of the street to my apartment, shrug off one strap of my backpack, and pull the bag in front of me to find my keys. Somehow, those fuckers always migrate to the bottom.
I’ve been in my new place for ten days now.
I say my place, but this is just one of Preston’s rental properties that’s currently vacant.
He offered it to me with surprising eagerness.
Most likely because at his and Nina’s home there are reporters camping out on the street at random hours of the day.
Reporters and just random people shoving their phones in my face, asking questions, trying to take photos and filming me.
I’ve gotten into the habit of wearing baseball caps, pulling them as low over my face as possible, and mostly going out when it’s dark outside.
Or not at all. More often than not, I stay in my apartment.
Going outside makes me nervous. Too many people.
Too much noise. Too many possibilities to get recognized.
It won’t be like this forever. At least that’s what I tell myself. People will calm down. They’ll lose interest.
Nina thinks I should give an interview. She says it’d satiate the curiosity.
The idea sounds horrifying.
Nobody’s figured out my new address yet. Once they do, I have to find a new place to live, I suppose. Again, I don’t have it in me to care.
I’ve been keeping myself busy trying to figure out my next step, halfheartedly applying for jobs I have no interest in doing and failing to go to interviews, too damn anxious somebody might figure out who I am.
It’s not an especially efficient distraction, but I’ll take what I can get, and at least this way I can pretend I’m being normal.
I tell myself to take it step by step. One day at a time.
To not jump to conclusions. It doesn’t work.
Especially because once the day is done, the night comes, and nights nowadays mean lying on the floor of my bedroom, staring at the ceiling, listening to the silence, telling myself to get used to this.
Because this is it. This empty pit of loneliness I’m in will never go away.
I’ve moved in. This is where I live now.
Only Nina and Preston know where I live. I haven’t told anybody else.
I reach the top of the stairs, turn right, and run straight into…
“Harriet?”
She stuffs her phone into her jacket pocket and glares at me. “Finally. I’ve been sitting here for, like, seven minutes already. I was this close to giving up.” She puts her index finger almost against her thumb.
For the first time in what feels like forever, I smile.
“Make me something to drink, and we’ll see if I can forgive you,” she says.
I unlock the door and let her inside. We both take off our shoes and hang our jackets on the hooks in the wall before we head to the living room.
I go to the kitchen nook and rummage through the cabinets. I haven’t really bothered stocking up since I got here.
“Instant coffee?” I ask.
“No,” she says. “I mean, I love you, but not enough to pretend to like that. Water is fine.”
I pour her a glass and slide it toward her. She takes a seat at the counter and holds the glass without taking a sip.
“How have you been?” she asks.
I shrug. “You know. Doing my thing. Getting things in order and myself back… out there.” I wave vaguely.
She leans forward, smiles, and nods encouragingly.
“I’ve been busy making plans,” I say.
“Oh? Do tell.”
I force a smile. “I would. Really would. Dying to talk. But I don’t want to jinx it, you know?”
She rolls her eyes. “Yeah. You are the superstitious sort, aren’t you?”
After that we just stare at each other silently. She’s clearly waiting for me to say something, but I, for my part, don’t know what that is.
“You haven’t been to any of the family dinners since you’ve been back,” she says.
“I’ve… been busy. With?—”
“All your wonderful, exciting plans. Yeah, yeah.” She leans forward and links her fingers. “I know about you and Adrian. He told us.”
My insides go freezing cold with a snap. “Everybody knows?”
Well, yeah. Fuck. Why not? What was I thinking anyway?
That I would lose Adrian but somehow still be able to keep everybody else?
That I could still go to birthday parties and family dinners and movie nights and weddings and just pretend everything is business as usual? That was never going to happen.
So they’re all going to hate my guts for this. That’s just… just life. Consequences of my actions and all that.
It’s… fine.
I swallow past the lump in my throat, look down at the counter, and try to hold myself together.
Harriet’s palm covers the back of my hand, and I jerk my head up.
“Me and Will. Only we know,” she says. “So stop looking like you’re about to hyperventilate.”
I do try, but it’s not going too well.
Harriet eyes me carefully. “They wouldn’t blame you. The others. If they knew. If that’s what you’re thinking.”
“I slept with him. He’s engaged. How is anybody not going to blame me?”
“Well, for one thing, I assume you slept with each other, so there are at least two equally responsible people involved in this. Unless you clubbed him over the head and gave him temporary amnesia. I wouldn’t blame you.
He can be annoying as hell. Is that what happened?
Did he make too many of his stupid jokes, and you eventually snapped?
Because I suspect I would’ve. For another…
it’s not just sex. You’re in love with him.
” She studies me calmly. “He loves you too. You know that, right?”
I ignore the way my chest jolts at somebody else saying those words like it’s a well-known fact. Something that just is. Something that is not just in my head.
“He also loves her,” I say.
Harriet doesn’t say anything to that.
“Aren’t you going to ask me how he’s doing?” she asks.
I almost laugh. If she says he’s doing great, I’ll die inside. If she says he’s doing shit, I’ll die inside. There’s no good answer to this. No, I don’t want to know. I’m too much of a coward to know.
“I can’t,” I say quietly.
Harriet looks like she’s about to argue, but then she nods. “For what it’s worth, I get it. If I were you… I’d want to know too.”
I stare out the window and will her to just go away. Everything feels more manageable when I’m alone.
“That’s not why I’m here, though,” Harriet says.
“Why are you here?”
“To tell you you’re being selfish.”
I snap my head back around to meet her gaze. Okay. I did not expect that.
“Look, I get it. Things basically suck right now. Everything sucks. I know you’re hurting. I may not know just how terrible it feels, but what I’m imagining is pretty bad, so I guess the real thing is a hundred times worse. I. Get. It. But, dude, you’re being selfish to your own freaking family.”
I stare at her.
“Yeah.” She nods. “Mom and Dad are both freaking the fuck out because you’ve cut off all contact with them, and the others aren’t doing any better.
I mean, they’re trying to be all ‘Oh, Dylan just needs some time,’ but then whenever the phone rings they’ll get this hopeful look in their eyes that then shatters when it’s just a telemarketer, or Aunt Liddy, or, like, Will.
” She rolls her eyes again. “My point is, they miss you, and by cutting them off without any explanation, you’re hurting them.
They hurt like you hurt, and you’re the one doing it to them. ”
The whole time she was speaking, it felt like an icy hand was creeping up my neck until it was clutching my throat tightly, adding more pressure the longer Harriet went on.
I blanch.
“Fuck,” I mutter.
I’ve been so stuck in my own misery that I just conveniently ignored everything else, and by doing that I really fucking messed up. I’ve been so stuck on that future where I’m completely alone that I just started preemptively cutting everybody else off, and that’s… that’s an asshole thing to do.
I clutch the roots of my hair and squeeze my eyes shut.
Harriet sits opposite me silently for a while, but eventually she gets up.
“Family dinner is on Friday. As usual.” She hesitates for a beat. “Adrian isn’t going to be there, so you won’t be in any danger of running into him.”
I don’t ask why he’s not going to be there. I don’t want to know.
She grabs her things and walks toward the door.
“Harriet?”
She turns around with a questioning look
“Thanks.”
She nods, and then she’s gone, and it’s just me and my thoughts again.