Chapter 24 Las Vegas #5
The clock glowed over Abby’s shoulder. Two in the morning. The dim lamplight enveloping the sterile hotel room and the casinos flickering outside left her tired and sad. Empty. Shiny but spiritless. She wondered how they got this far away from each other. She could’ve cried.
“I should go.”
“Don’t.” Abby’s voice cracked, and she grabbed her hand. “Please.”
“You know we can’t—”
“I know. I don’t want that. Just stay and talk. Or don’t talk.” She cupped her cheek. “Please.”
Kate exhaled and closed her eyes. “Okay.”
They talked for a little longer. Abby gave Kate a shirt and shorts to wear for bed. She melted into them like she did at Insley, the memory of Abby’s body left in the fabric.
“I don’t want to fall asleep,” Kate said as they wrapped together.
Abby rubbed her back, chin resting atop her head. “Me neither.”
But then the day caught up with her. The anger and the joy and the anxiety pressing down on her eyelids. Kate drifted with her face in Abby’s neck, breathing her through the dawn. And it wasn’t sex. But it was more.
When she woke up to Abby spooning her, she thought it might be a dream. And when it wasn’t, the heaviness returned. The heaviness of leaving, and of Ryan, and of Abby. But she didn’t move. She watched Abby sleep, aroused but older, wise enough to be wary even as her body hummed.
“We missed our flights,” Kate whispered when Abby’s eyes blinked open.
“Good,” Abby croaked.
“Also, don’t check your phone. The group blew mine up. I’m sure they’ve done the same to yours.”
Abby pinched her forehead and sat up. “I can book you a new flight.”
“No, I should get it.”
“Right.”
They hovered, pausing at the place where a good morning kiss once lived. Kate sighed into it and Abby raised a crooked half smile that nearly reeled her closer.
“Are you okay?”
Kate nodded. “Yeah. I just need some aspirin.”
She retreated to the bathroom, hating herself for not outgrowing this, for still faltering in the face of Abby.
And yet the person she saw in the mirror, tired, hair askew, Abby’s baggy shirt hanging from her shoulder, didn’t alarm or send her spinning.
She looked like herself. An old version of herself with a glow she almost forgot.
It didn’t last long. Not after she rifled through Abby’s bag for aspirin and found an orange bottle instead. The instinct rang in her ears. She found three more buried with it. All prescription painkillers. All prescribed by different doctors.
She charged back into the bedroom and chucked a bottle at Abby. “What are these?”
“They’re for my knee.”
“Oh, really? All of those for your knee? Your surgery was almost a year ago.”
“Yeah, and the doctor isn’t sure that it took.” Abby’s brow hardened. “Why are you going through my things?”
“Are you hooked on that crap?”
“No!”
“Those are all from different doctors! I’m not an idiot!”
“Why do you care?” Abby shouted.
“Because I love you!”
Kate threw another bottle at her, and Abby narrowly dodged it.
She reached for her, but Kate put her hands up to keep her at bay.
The tears burst out of her. The cry of being together and apart all at once.
Of Abby falling further from her grasp, somewhere she couldn’t follow, no longer the one who could help her.
“Don’t you break my heart twice, Abby,” she whimpered. “Don’t you do something stupid. Do you understand me?”
Abby nodded. She eased to Kate again and this time she let her, sniffling into her arms when they embraced.
“It’s okay,” Abby whispered. “I’m okay.”
“No, it’s not. You’re not.”
Abby squeezed tighter, her words wobbling. “I love you too. I promise I’ll be good,” she said. “You don’t need to worry.”
But she worried all the way to the airport.
They shared a ride and held hands in the back seat.
She gripped on, scared that when she let go, Abby would be lost to her.
When they parted at security, she nearly wept again, but kept firm, returning to the person she didn’t recognize in the mirror.
The one who loved Ryan and didn’t need Abby anymore.
“You still hate flying?” Abby asked her as they lingered across from each other, motionless in the bustle of travelers.
“You know I prefer my feet on the ground,” Kate said. “I guess I’ll see you at the wedding.”
“Yeah. Looking forward to it.” Abby strained with a painful smirk.
Kate laughed. “No, you’re not.”
“Yeah, I’m not.” Abby chuckled and hugged her. “What happens in Vegas, right?”
“Right.” Kate’s throat tightened at their release.
Abby tilted her head. “Listen, I still—”
“Don’t.”
“Okay.” Abby grabbed her hand and pecked the top of it. “Get home safe.”
“You too.”
They merged into their separate streams of people. Kate strode against her desire, glanced over her shoulder for a last glimpse of Abby, and frowned when she didn’t spot her. She exhaled, weaving through newsstands and travelers, internally listing the many reasons to move forward.
“Kate!” Abby’s footsteps pounded behind her.
“You’re going to miss your flight—”
Abby folded her in her arms and stopped short of a kiss. Their foreheads met in another flood of memory. The car at the mouth of the driveway. Eyes closed, lips never touching.
“I should’ve never left or stayed away.” Abby breathed against her and Kate swore she detected her heart in the brief skim of their skin, pounding the same as hers. “I’ll see you next week.”
As Abby backed away, nodding with one last glimmer of those amber eyes, something frightening roared in Kate.
She knew, with a confusing mix of hope and dread, that Abby wasn’t ready to let her go.
But more than that, as her plane took off for San Francisco, she knew that something horrible awaited.