63. Rendezvous
Rendezvous
Rafe
Iwake up to chaos.
Someone’s shaking my shoulder and someone else is swearing and for a second I think we’re late for the flight until I make out Ronan’s voice, incredulous:
“Jesus Christ, Rafe, get up, you’re everywhere.”
The room swims into focus, Rithy perched on the edge of the bed with a grin too big for morning, Kiri standing at the foot of it scrolling furiously on his phone, Ronan by the window with his arms crossed like a teacher about to hand out detentions.
“What—” I rasp, voice gravel. “What the hell’s happening?”
“You might want to sit up for this,” Kiri says.
“I am sitting up.”
Rithy holds up a paper like a priest brandishing a cursed relic. The front page shows a grainy, super-zoomed shot, me and Emily at the café last night. Her hand over mine. Her face turned toward me mid-laugh. The headline, in block letters across the top:
OBELUS’ SECRET RENDEZVOUS: REKINDLING AN OLD FLAME?
“What the fuck,” I breathe, snatching the paper out of his hands.
There’s another shot blurry, her leaning in to kiss my cheek. Cropped just enough to make it look like a kiss. Rithy’s grinning like a cat with a mouse in its mouth.
“Congratulations, lover boy. You’ve got a ‘mystery woman.'”
“She’s not a mystery!” I snap. “It was one coffee. That’s it. She kissed me on the goddamn cheek, not my mouth!”
Ronan just crosses his arms tighter. “Then why’s it splashed over half the internet, eh? French rags are running it like it’s gospel. It’s already trending. Some of the fans remember her from the old days, when she used to come to shows. It’s not hard to verify.”
“Jesus fucking Christ.” I drag my hands down my face. “We went out the back door. I didn’t even tell anyone where we were going.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Kiri says, still scrolling. “Someone saw you. Maybe staff. Maybe a fan waiting for you to show. They’ll piece the name together soon enough.”
I sink forward, elbows on my knees. “Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck.”
The three of them exchange a look, a mix of pity and we told you so.
Ronan sighs. “What was she even here for, Rafe?”
I hesitate. Then, quietly: “Her marriage is over. She… wanted to see if something was still there. There isn’t, I told her that. I told her I love Kasia.”
Kiri groans. “That’s exactly the kind of tragic romance headline they dream of. Give it two hours; the vultures’ll have poetry written about it when they track down her name.”
I grip the paper until it crumples. The guilt in my stomach twists hard.
“Oh my God,” I whisper, fumbling for my phone. “Kasia.”
Rithy’s head snaps up. “What about her?”
“I didn’t call her last night. I fell asleep before—”
“Before what, Rafe?” he cuts in, eyes wide.
“Before I could tell her I saw Emily.”
That’s when it hits them all at once, three sets of eyes, round and silent like owls perched on the same damn branch. Even Rithy, usually delighted by my unfortunate bouts of chaos, loses the smirk.
“Rafe,” he says carefully, like he's trying to diffuse a bomb, “maybe let me look at your phone first, okay?”
The silence that follows is worse than the headlines.
It’s the sound of inevitability. Rithy doesn’t wait for me to answer.
He just reaches for the phone and I hand it over, grateful and nauseous at once.
His eyes move fast, thumb flicking up the screen.
The room’s still except for the buzz of the minibar and Ronan pacing behind him.
Kiri’s standing with his arms crossed, chewing at his thumbnail like he’s watching a car crash he can’t look away from.
Rithy exhales, low. “Okay. First text, three hours ago.” His voice shifts into something calmer. “‘Hope the show was smooth. Tell me when you’re up. Miss you already.’”
He glances at me. “Still soft. You’re good so far.”
He scrolls again. “ ‘You must be exhausted. Sleep in. I’ll call after clinic.’ ”
Another pause. “And then… yeah, here’s the turn.” He taps the screen once. “‘Did you get my calls? I just want to make sure you’re okay. There’s a lot of noise online. I don’t care what they say, but please just tell me it’s not true.’”
The words hit like cold water. I can feel the blood draining from my face.
“Shit,” Ronan mutters.
Rithy scrolls again, slower this time. “‘I know we promised to always tell each other things first. Please, Rafe. Just say something.’” His voice softens; no teasing left in it. He stops reading aloud and looks up.
“That was forty minutes ago.”
I drag a hand through my hair, still half asleep, but primarily in hell. “So she’s seen it.”
“Everyone’s seen it,” Kiri says flatly, holding up his phone. “It’s on tabloid reels, gossip accounts. Half of them are already saying your ‘ex-wife’ came back into the picture.” He snorts. “You were never even married.”
“Details never mattered to tabloids,” Ronan says. “They’ll build the myth faster than we can argue with facts.”
I take the phone back from Rithy. The unread messages are stacked now, little blue lines of panic and grace mixed together. My chest feels tight. “She’s gonna think I lied. That I didn’t call because I was with her.”
Rithy crouches down, hands on my knees. “Then call her now.”
“I can’t—” I stop myself. “Not like this. Not half-dressed, with you three breathing down my neck.”
“Rafe,” Ronan says. “This is the one thing you can’t leave for later.”
He’s right. They all know it. I do too. But I can already feel my throat closing, the words forming and failing before they leave my mouth. How do you explain to the person who finally made you believe in peace that the world just put you back in the worst version of your past?
Rithy reaches out, taps my arm. “Listen. You tell her the truth, yeah? Word for word. She came to see you, you told her no, you went home, you fell asleep. You didn’t do a goddamn thing wrong.”
His voice is steady, too kind for his usual self which makes me even more nervous. “You just forgot to outrun the flashbulbs.”
I look down at Kasia’s last message glowing on the screen, her name, her heart, her disbelief and I feel it in my bones.
He’s right. That’s all I did. I forgot how fast the world moves when it smells blood.
He stands, looking down at me with eyes kinder than I probably deserve, then turns to leave, ushering the rest out with him.
I wait until the door closes behind them.
The silence that follows feels too wide, like the air itself is judging me.
“Good luck,” Ronan had said on his way out. Kiri had muttered something about damage control, and Rithy, strangely quiet, just gave me a small nod before disappearing into the hallway.
I scroll past every headline, every mention of my name paired with hers, and hit “call.”
The phone rings once. Twice. Then she answers. Her voice is calm in that way people’s voices get when they’ve already spent hours trying not to cry.
“You’re awake.”
“Yeah,” I say. “I am. I just saw it all. I’m so sorry, Kasia.”
She doesn’t say anything right away. I can hear the background of her kitchen, water running, maybe the sputter of her coffee maker. Her silence feels worse than shouting would.
“So,” she says finally, “you didn’t think to tell me that you were meeting her?”
“It wasn’t planned,” I say, pressing my palm to my forehead. “She showed up after the show, asked if we could talk. Just talk. I meant to tell you. I fell asleep before I could find the right words.”
“Mm. Talk. I’ve heard that one before. Men’s version of talking is different than women’s. I saw the pictures,” she says. “You were holding hands... Kissing.”
“She reached for me. I didn’t pull away fast enough, that’s on me.” I take a breath, fighting the urge to fill the silence. “But I told her. About you, about us. That I love you. That whatever she thought might still exist, it doesn’t.”
“You told her that?” she repeats.
“I did. I promise, there was nothing else. It was one coffee, then she kissed my cheek, said goodbye and that was it.”
There’s a rustle on her end. Maybe she’s pacing. Maybe she’s trying not to throw the phone.
“Kurwa. I believe you for some stupid reason, against my better judgment...” she says finally. “But not calling, after?” her voice catches, “it looks bad, Rafe. It feels like hiding, lying by omission. You ignored my calls. Ignored me.”
The ignored me lands deep. I close my eyes. “You’re right. I should’ve called the second I walked out of that café. I just—” I swallow, throat raw, “You matter so much to me, I just needed to find the perfect way to make sure I didn't make it sound worse than it was. It was nothing.”
“Nothing?” She snorts. “Tell that to the world, they definitely don’t think it was nothing.” She takes a deep breath before continuing, “And you've managed to make it as awful as possible for me, forget about just worse.” she says softly. It isn’t cruel. It’s just the truth.
I let the silence hold for a moment, because I can feel her pulling back, not out of anger, but out of exhaustion. The kind that says I can’t patch holes I didn’t make.
“I know, I know I did. It’s how I manage to ruin everything good in my life.” I say. I let the words hang there, taking a moment to collect my thoughts. Trying to stop them before they spin out of control, into just begging her to forgive me.
“I love you,” I say finally. “I know I fucked up here, but that hasn’t changed, I swear.”
She exhales, long, shaky. “Then fix this,” she whispers. “Whatever it is that makes your brain push me away. Stop making me feel like I'm standing outside your life, looking in, like I'm just a fucking fan.”
“I will, I promise. I'm sorry.”
She hesitates. “I need to go, to try and sleep. I have surgeries tomorrow.”
“Kas—”
But the line clicks dead before I can finish. I drop the phone on the bed and press the heels of my hands into my eyes until all I can see is red. Paris is busy outside and all I can think about is the sound of her voice, hurt, disappointed, already slipping away.