Chapter Seventeen Jo
Chapter Seventeen
Jo
S taring back at Silas propped against the mess of pillows I keep on my bed would be surreal if it weren’t for the throbbing pain in my back. If nothing else, the muscle spasm keeps me tethered to reality.
Maybe it was reckless and a tiny bit selfish to ask him to stay with me, but I don’t want to be alone. There’s an isolating aspect to being in pain—whether physical or emotional—and for the first time in a long time, there is a person present whose help I actually want. Ever since I moved out of Serena’s place and got back on my feet, she and Amber have always been a text or call away, but they both have busy lives outside of our friendship. Troubling them isn’t worth it when I go through wear and tear so routinely with a job like mine. Muscle spasms, strains, bum knees—none of those are worth dropping everything and rushing over to my little corner of the city.
Yet Silas is here. I now know what it feels like to have his arms around me. Supporting me. Holding me.
And I like it.
I shove that thought into the far recesses of my mind.
“Where are you from?” I ask, my curiosity genuinely piqued at the mention of his family.
“A little nowhere town in Iowa,” he replies. “I mean, it’s not even a town, technically. I guess it’s a hamlet.”
“I knew it.” I give a little hoot of triumph. “You have big Midwest energy.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” He smirks.
“I think it’s your broad shoulders. You look like the people I met in Chicago when I helped open the studio there years ago. Everyone had this look about them. Like they have strong bones or something.”
“I did drink a lot of milk growing up,” he muses.
“Exactly. Big Midwest energy,” I reply smugly. “And you’re the oldest of five?”
A wistful sort of smile warms his face as he stares down at me. “Yep. My mom referred to us as her ‘brood of boys’ when we were younger.”
Huffing out a sigh, I reply, “God, all brothers? I can’t imagine having four siblings. It must have been loud.”
That smile transforms into a smirk. “It was. How about you? Do you have any siblings?”
“Nope. It was just me, mamá, and papá.” I pause to shift on the bed, curving my hips back into a fetal position to relieve some of the ache. This change leaves our legs less than a few inches apart. I can feel the nearness of him, a tangible awareness that spreads up the exposed skin of my calves. “Both of my parents worked a lot, so our house was very quiet when I wasn’t with the neighborhood kids.”
“Are you close with your parents?”
I find a stray feather from one of the pillows and twirl it between my fingers to buy some time. Articulating my relationship with my parents is hard; I’ve never known how to explain that I love them unconditionally, even when I know they don’t understand me or the life I live. There are so many choices I’ve made that I know disappointed them—like leaving Texas and riding a stationary bike for a living—but at the same time, I also know they love me.
“Sort of,” I start as I flick the feather off the bed. “We talk on the phone regularly, but sometimes it feels like we’re from different planets. Don’t get me wrong, I love them, but I think they were expecting a different kid from the one they got.”
Silas’s brows furrow as he slides down the bed so that we’re side by side facing each other. With his cheek pressed against my pillow, there’s a newfound adorable quality to him. “How do you mean?”
I let out a sigh as I consider my next words. So much for keeping it vague. “Well, they immigrated from a small town in Coahuila, Mexico, to a small town in central Texas before I was born, and I think they thought I’d turn out like a classic American kid. Loud, ambitious, with dreams of becoming something like a lawyer or a doctor. What they got was a quiet little girl with big feelings she couldn’t express, who spent her free time doing eighties workout videos. Putting me in soccer was their way of channeling that nervous energy into something that could be… I don’t know, profitable, maybe, or productive at the very least. When I told them I was moving to New York after college without a ‘real job’ lined up, they didn’t understand. Now that I’m successful, they get it. Or as much as they ever will, I guess.”
Aware that I’m rambling, I add, “Does that make any sense?”
His blue eyes are troubled as they search my face. With a quiet voice, he replies, “Yeah, it does.”
“What about you? Are you close with your family?”
“Sort of,” he says slowly. His answer is a mirror of my own. “My parents were like yours—the kid they got was different than what they were expecting. Where I grew up, agriculture was a way of life, and everyone spent their time doing outdoorsy stuff, but I… was just not interested in any of that. I always had big city dreams. They just didn’t get it.”
He clears his throat before saying, “Anyway, thank god four more boys came along, because my parents got the kind of kids they wanted. My brothers look like they were born and raised inside of a Bass Pro Shop.”
The mental image conjured by his description makes me laugh. As my eyes roam over his face, memorizing the constellation of freckles spread across his skin and the fine grain of a modest five-o’clock shadow, clarity hits me with stunning force. Silas and I have so much in common, in our bone-deep, engrained selves.
We might have grown up thousands of miles from each other in completely different circumstances, but a core part of our identities—a fundamental, unchanging piece—sought refuge from a place that didn’t understand us. We found it here, in New York, in friends and jobs and in lives our families wouldn’t have chosen for us, but… we found our own way. And we’re better off for it.
He takes a deep breath, the soft pitter-patter of rain the only soundtrack to this strange, altering moment, and I swear that the warmth of his body reaches me even from a few inches away.
The air between us feels thick and heavy. I wonder if he’s come to the same conclusion.
“Silas, why are you here?” I ask.
Without skipping a beat, he replies, “I had to bear witness to your Cookie Monster bathrobe.”
I wave my hand down the length of my body. “It’s cute, right? I almost bought the purple one that made me look like Grimace, but I’m glad I went with blue.”
His pupils dilate at my gesture, and then his gaze darkens as it sweeps over my body. Something in me pulls taut, tightening and coiling, a different feeling than the muscle spasming across my back. He’s deflecting; so am I. But I’m not ready to give up yet.
“Seriously, though. Why did you come here tonight?” My voice comes out low, almost husky.
Outside, a car horn sounds, slicing sharp through the soft rhythm of rain on my windows. “I don’t know,” he replies quietly.
In the soft glow of my bedside lamp, I watch as his brows furrow. His blue eyes hold mine as we stare at each other, perfectly still on our sides of the bed.
“I’m guessing most journalists don’t rush over to their subject’s house to peel them off the bathroom floor,” I say.
“No.” His lips form a tight line in the scruff of his jaw. “They don’t.”
I don’t know what to do with the man lying opposite me. Part of me feels compelled to repay him for what he’s done tonight—coming here, helping me, distracting me, even when I declined his call and ignored his text messages.
I decide to tell him the truth. “I know we’ve had a difficult start to this,” I begin, forcing myself to hold his gaze. “It wasn’t always this bad. My anxiety was more manageable before Haven exploded in popularity. Do you remember when I said there was a ‘situation’ a few years ago?” When I pause, he nods, his face open and calm, free of judgment or criticism. “Well, I had a breakdown. Like a full-blown, needed-to-be-temporarily-hospitalized, couldn’t-work-for-a-while kind of thing.”
His hand finds mine in the space between us. His skin is warm and soft—a comforting, reassuring touch—as I fight against the tears pooling in my eyes. I allow myself a deep breath before I continue. “It was the launch of the Haven Home that did me in. My social media just… exploded.” His grip tightens, then loosens, and his thumb starts brushing mine in a comforting circle.
“It wasn’t all bad,” I clarify on a shaky breath. “Some of the messages I got were really kind and heartfelt. But the others were… well, they were cruel. Corporate wanted us to keep up with it, to keep promoting ourselves and the company, but that made me feel like I couldn’t talk to anyone about how much it hurt when people said I was ugly or whatever vile thing they came up with that day. I would seem so ungrateful, you know? This was supposed to be the dream .”
I pause to wipe the tears that are slowly dripping down my cheeks. Silas grabs a handful of tissues off the nightstand and hands them to me as he says, “I don’t think you’re ungrateful, Jo. No one should have to hear shit like that from anyone.”
“Do you ever get ‘shit like that’ as a journalist?” I ask as I dry my tears.
“Sometimes,” he replies. “But it’s usually focused on what I published, not me. It’s different from what you’re going through.”
“It’s better now than it was, now that Tracey handles my socials.” I sigh. “But I’ll never forget the DM that broke me. I checked my phone on the way to Z’s office after class and there was a fresh DM sitting at the top of my inbox. All it said was big titty bicycle bitch .”
Silas closes his eyes briefly—tightly enough to form lines across his forehead—before grabbing my hand again. Outside, the force of the rain against the window increases as the storm intensifies.
“I tapped on the guy’s profile. It was public. He was just a regular dude from Connecticut. He had a wife and kids. A boat. A business. But he took time out of his day to degrade me… to try to get a rise out of me, and it worked . I walked into Z’s office, at the lowest of my lows, and she’s all excited, telling me and Mike how we’ve been invited to demo the bike on one of those big national morning shows. I just… lost it.”
Lightning cracks outside my window as I take a deep breath. “I started hyperventilating and crying. I couldn’t handle everything—the pressure, the constant barrage of messages and feedback and ‘big titty bicycle bitch’ guy. The thought of even more press broke me. I was such a mess that Mike had to carry me out the back and took me to the hospital in a taxi.”
Maybe the pain is distracting me, or maybe I’ve learned to trust Silas more than I thought, but the tears stop and I’m calmer than I expected to be. Almost as if this confession is some kind of deliverance.
“Anyway,” I say, as lightly as I can muster. “That experience changed my life forever. I was diagnosed with a nervous breakdown brought on by severe generalized anxiety disorder and depression. Mike and Z sat with me the entire time. They discharged me the next morning with a referral to two mental health professionals. I started seeing a therapist and a psychiatrist the next week.”
“There isn’t anything wrong with getting professional help,” he says softly.
I say nothing. Instead, I nod my head with an awkward jerk. I know what he’s saying is true, but it didn’t feel that way seven years ago. It didn’t feel normal or common to have a mental breakdown, to need the support of so many people just to get through life.
“Can I tell you something private about myself?” he asks. “Because I think we have even more in common than we realize.”
His choice of words—“even more in common”—leads me to believe that he made the same connection I did earlier. “Please do,” I reply with a wet laugh. “I’m tired of spilling my guts.”
He gives me a tight smile. “I don’t have anxiety, but I have struggled with depression for most of my adult life. I know they’re not the same thing. That’s not what I’m saying at all. I just know what it feels like to face an invisible monster that no one else sees.”
“Silas, I’m—”
“Don’t say you’re sorry,” he interjects, his tone light. “I was officially diagnosed in my freshman year of college, but I think I was struggling with it for a lot longer. I just never knew what it really was until I left home. Losing my dad, the guilt of leaving my mom and brothers behind, starting over in a new city, all of it just… sent me to an even weirder place. I saw a therapist, got on meds, and worked through it. I’m okay now. My family is fine. I’m in a long-term relationship with a low-dose antidepressant and a PCP on the Upper East Side. We get along great.”
There it is—the lighthearted side of him that has slowly been charming me. Somehow Silas manages to see the silver lining in every cloud without being condescending. I see it in the way we talk and the way he writes, in the little jokes he tells after delivering a serious statement. He looks at things both sincerely and critically before passing judgment.
I never would have guessed he fights his own invisible monster daily.
“Then you do know what it’s like,” I reply. “I’m proud of you for finding the balance. I’m trying to do that, but… it’s easier said than done.”
“Is that the homework you mentioned?” he asks, and I’m once again floored that he remembers the flippant details I share with him. “And why you suggested the interview to begin with?”
“Yeah.” As much as I wish I could tell him just how unhappy I’ve been with my job, I know that I can’t—not with the promise I made to Z as she works on the deal.
“Well, you’d get an A if I was your teacher,” he replies.
“If you were my teacher and you gave me anything less than an A-plus after seeing me in my bathrobe, I would be personally offended.”
When he laughs, his dimples appear. My entire body tingles at the sight. I don’t even realize what I’m doing when I smile back at him.
“I think you’re braver than you give yourself credit for,” he says, his tone suddenly serious. “It takes guts to put yourself out there.”
His statement echoes in the silence that followed our lighthearted moment. A flurry of emotions whips around inside me at his words—at the idea that I do have what it takes to make the changes I’ve been afraid of for so long. One way or another, Haven will unlock my golden handcuffs once my boss gets through that acquisition. Maybe then, the cliff won’t be so scary.
Latching on to that brevity he brings, I smile as I say, “You mentioned something about massages for muscle spasms, right?”
He gives me a single nod, a dimpled smile, and motions with his hand for me to turn over.
When I wake up in the morning, Silas is gone. In his place is a little brown bag that I recognize from the bodega on the corner, along with the keys I gave to Amber ages ago.
It takes me a minute to realize I’m wrapped in a throw blanket, still in my Cookie Monster bathrobe, my hair a wild mess across my face. I must have drifted off mid-conversation once Silas started rubbing my back.
The whole experience feels like a dream.
Carefully I rise to a seated position. My back is sore, but the pain is minimal compared to before. Running my hands over the indentations of his body in the duvet, I have no choice but to come to terms with the fact that last night really did happen. Silas and Derek really did come here to check on me. Silas peeled me off the bathroom floor, stayed with me for hours, massaged my raging muscles, and told me about his life. And then he went to the bodega to get breakfast, like any good New Yorker should.
My heart skips a beat in a way that I’ve nearly forgotten.
I pull the brown paper bag into my lap and open it. Inside is a folded piece of paper, a Gatorade, and an everything bagel with a schmear. My stomach growls as the scent of fresh carbs and seasoning hits my nose. With trembling fingers, I unfold the note:
Had to go to work, but there’s nothing a NY bagel can’t cure. Let me know how you’re feeling.
Your fellow monster fighter
PS—I think leaving food qualifies as big Midwest energy.
A sound somewhere between a laugh and a sob escapes my throat. As much as I want to sit here and reread his words a hundred times, however, there are things I have to do, so I haul myself out of bed and take several cautious steps toward the bathroom. After my morning routine, I snatch my phone off the bathroom floor where I abandoned it last night, grab the bag off the bed, and plant myself on the couch.
I work my way through a flurry of missed texts while I go ham on the bagel. After promising Z, Amber, and Serena that I’m fine, I book an emergency sports massage with my usual gal for later in the day. It’s when I pull up my text conversation with Silas that I stop short.
I have no idea what to say to him.
I type, erase, retype, and erase again. If my body weren’t so stiff, I would be pacing the length of my apartment. I give it one more go, finally settling on a balance of humor and sincerity that I pray reads correctly:
Thank you for last night. Feeling better this morning. The bagel really is the cure.
A few minutes pass while my heart races. This time, it’s not from my usual dark anxiety cloud; the nerves are of a different variety, ones that I try to smother with enormous bites of cream cheese and bread. I’m so wound up that when my phone vibrates in my hand, I nearly jump out of my seat.
Silas’s response reads:
Glad to hear it. Anytime you need help off the bathroom floor or fighting monsters, you know where to find me.
The shit-eating grin on my face doesn’t disappear for hours.