Chapter 37
TWO YEARS AGO
“I didn’t know you actually quit your job,” said Austin. He sounded worried.
“It’s fine, I hated it there. I’m not sure what I’ll do now, but … I don’t know, being here has made me wonder if I’m all that happy doing what I’m doing.”
“I think everyone feels that way on vacation.”
Didion could feel something changing. Some wall building back up between them.
“Right, sure,” she said.
Did she dare venture further, to tell him what she wanted? This hurt already.
“I think I need to do something different. Not this, exactly. Just something.”
He nodded. “Not this,” he confirmed.
She thought he looked relieved. “No,” she clarified, trying to save some face. “Obviously not.”
“So … not getting on a flight tomorrow? Why wouldn’t you…”
“Oh.” She backpedaled as hard as she could. “I only meant not back to New York.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Didion, what exactly are you trying to say here?”
“Nothing.”
Tears—of embarrassment maybe, or hurt, or dread—rose in her eyes, hot and sudden. So unlike her to feel without thinking first. To feel without curbing it. But she physically couldn’t.
“Didion, no, don’t cry.” He exhaled. “Dammit, I was afraid—dammit.”
She flew to the bathroom, where she slammed the door and then collapsed against it, hyperventilating silently for several minutes, crying in that awful way that wrenches the gut, suspending your breath.
After a while, he knocked softly on the door. “Didion?”
“Yeah,” she said, her voice completely normal. “Washing my face, I’ll be right out.”
When she re-emerged, he tilted his head at her. “I’m sorry, Didion. I didn’t mean anything by that, I only meant … I hurt you so much last time I saw you and I didn’t ever want to do that again. You never answered me after you left, and then years had gone by, and…”
“It’s fine. I’m tired, that’s all. Don’t want to go back to real life. It was fun. Thanks for inviting me down here.”
The air in the room was so taut, you could practically pluck at it like a guitar string.
“Hey, why don’t we play cards or something,” he said, his voice almost a whisper, as if he too were close to tears. “Why don’t you put on some music?”
“Okay, sure.” She tried so hard to sound like she didn’t care.
He tossed her his phone, which was the one connected to the portable speaker they’d been using. “I’ll go get some ice. The sotol is still pretty hot from the car.”
“Cool.”
He propped open the door, and then left.
She put his password into his phone and it opened right up to the last-used app, to a text message with someone named Aliana.
Aliana: When’s her flight?
Austin: Tomorrow morning
Aliana: You’re coming back after that?
Austin: Yep
Aliana: Amazing, I can’t wait to see you and meet our new dog lol
Austin: looking forward to being back, I’ll head to you as soon as I drop her off
The texts were followed by two kiss emojis from Aliana, and a responding one from him. Didion had never even seen him use an emoji, let alone that one.
Didion shamefully pulled the conversation down another inch and saw texts from a few days ago, when she had been here with him, and it was clear as day that this was his girlfriend.
Didion dropped the phone in horror. She didn’t want to believe what she was reading, wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt but how could she?
The words were right there. This wasn’t some stupid romance movie with a misunderstanding.
She read the words over and over, the letters starting to float and spread like alphabet soup.
She was going to throw up. Seeing herself referred to as her, as some sort of parcel he needed to unload. Our new dog. It was all too much.
Maybe it would have been different if she hadn’t been so open for those few days.
Or if she hadn’t taken the leap and put herself out there, just then with Austin, suggesting that she not get on that plane.
Because the truth was, she wanted him to ask her to stay and he already hadn’t.
He was fine to send her back to her life, to sever this again.
Then, when she asked for it, the connection between them snapped.
Had she imagined it? It was already in the past. But even dreams feel so real when you’re in them, don’t they?
Sometimes even for a while after you wake up, the logic holds or the pain stays.
She didn’t think about it as she raced to her shoes, grabbed her bag, the bandana. She was about to run, but then picked up his phone one more time.
Nothing made Didion angrier than to be embarrassed, and nothing had ever humiliated her like this before.
Birdie blinked at her from the bed and wagged her tail softly a few times. There had never been a sweeter puppy. Somehow, until just this moment, it hadn’t occurred to her that she really might never see her again. Birdie was a part of someone else’s life.
Her heart didn’t break. It turned to dust.
She clutched Austin’s phone with shaking hands. In one last moment of recklessness, she deleted her own number.