by Hayes, Liv
Turning as the sea of people parted not unlike Moses had the Red, I spotted Evan chatting it up with some guy with a ridiculous-looking braided beard.
I sighed. I was ready to leave. I wanted nothing to do with this crap anymore.
But he saw me, because of course he did. Because this is that part of the story, where Ex-Boyfriend confronts Ex-Girlfriend, and damn, I wish it didn’t play out that way, but it did.
Evan made his way through the crowd, his cheeks and nose reddened in such a way that I knew he was already more than slightly inebriated. And when the following words stumbled like building blocks out of his mouth, it was painfully obvious:
“Is it true?” he demanded. “Are you seeing someone else?”
“Jesus Christ,” I muttered. “Goodbye, Evan.”
I placed my cup of adult beverage gingerly down on some side-table and immediately stormed out the door. And Evan followed, because as these things go, he had to.
Aimee, who was standing outside and sort of making out with Eric, turned to me, alarmed.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
I glared at Evan, then her, then sputtered:
“There are moments in life that make me feel like a fucking idiot, Aimee,” I snapped. “This is one of them.”
“Who is he?” Evan demanded. “Who is the guy?”
“Oh, why the fuck do you care?” I asked him. My voice was raised at this point, but it’s not like I was going full-on Jersey Shore. “You left me, remember, Evan? You left me. And I’m just over it, alright? Jesus, why won’t people just leave me the hell alone?”
I didn’t have a car, so the dramatic exit didn’t work all too well. Instead, I was forced to stand there and wait for a cab, suffocating in the horrible humidity and intermittently snapping at Evan, who refused to leave my side.
Aimee, on the other hand, left with Eric and went inside. They didn’t want to stick around for the shit-show. I didn’t blame them.
“You don’t know him,” I told Evan. “So it doesn’t matter.”
“So you are seeing someone,” he said. “It’s true.”
“Who told you?”
“No one,” he said. “I just know.”
“Oh?” I mused. “Please tell me how you’ve become privy to information by just having a hunch.”
“Well…” he stopped. “You never tried getting back together with me, and you never tried texting or calling or anything. Never tried talking to me. So I just assumed there was someone else.”
A part of me was relieved that this was Evan’s form of piecing things together; his splattered rationale sewn haphazardly together by the simple assumption that because I wasn’t still trying to keep him tucked away in my back pocket, I was fucking someone else.
And yet, another part of me was aggressively pissed-off that his inflated ego rendered him completely unable to believe that I could exist as someone independent of him. That I was still that red-faced girl, collapsed on the floor of her apartment, drowning in my own tears.
Like a film reel, my thoughts flashed to Dr. Greene, and how I felt so helpless at the thought of his perennial absence once I was overseas. How my privileged success felt like spare change in the light of losing him.
And I had to say it, even if the thought made me sick: maybe Evan had a point. But I still didn’t want to nurse the notion.
“You have no idea,” I told him. “You don’t know anything about me, Evan. But you know, I now know that I’m damn glad I never tried stringing this along again.”
A moment later, the cab arrived. I got inside, shut the door, and didn’t roll the window down to give him some kind of dramatic parting remark. I was ready to go.
I texted Dr. Greene, but never received a response. Which wasn’t a big deal, because this wasn’t something galactic, and I refused to breathe life into the reality that I now existed as some orbiting planet that revolved around him. Some isolated, lonely planet.
Pluto. I had become Pluto.
But, as luck would have it, I wouldn’t have been able to read his response, anyway. Because when I got out the cab and began running up the steps, one of my sandal wedges collapsed, and my phone went hurtling from the second floor down to the first.
Nothing like a flight of stairs to break a phone.
I picked it up, my throat clenching when I saw the sliver of broken glass.
And then, inside the apartment, I tried to turn my computer on: blue screen, then, bleep. Dead.
“Are you absolutely kidding me right now?”
I curled up in a ball, reminding myself that I was a grown up, and that these things were just that – things – and I shouldn’t cry about them. That, despite the evening’s excessive amount of bullshit, I had many great things going on in my life. I had awesome parents. I had achieved a proper college education. I had a roof over my head until summer ended, a job, and a spot at the University of Cambridge. What could I really complain about?
But of course I cried. Because I’m human. And because I loved my stuff. The little things. The little, stupid objects that we become so freaking attached to.
I sat there, legs against my chest, half-sobbing until my phone finally rang, and I picked it up, and Dr. Greene’s voice melded softly against my ear:
“Everything’s breaking,” I told him, sniffling.
“What’s wrong, honey?” the concern was immediate, washing over me in such a way that I clung to it. A small bit of comfort. “What’s breaking?”
“Everything,” I wiped my face. “I’m sorry. I’m being stupid.”
“You’re not being stupid,” he insisted. He sounded almost paternal. More of a grown-up than I obviously was. “Are you at home? Is anyone with you?”
“Yes, no,” I answered. “Can you come over?”
“I’m at the hospital,” he answered smugly. “On call. I’ll be here for another few hours.”
“Well,” I said. “What if I met you at the hospital? I need to see you.”
“Mia…” he sighed. “How much money are you spending on cab fare?”
“I don’t care,” I answered, and he said quickly:
“You should,” and then. “Fine. Meet me in the cafeteria. I’ll reimburse your cab expenses.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I want to,” he said. “See you soon, little fox.”
A female voice clipped the background. And then, just like that:
Click.
He hung up.
The cafeteria itself was long closed, but there was still a vending machine where you could get a cheap cup of coffee. I waited at one of the tables, stirring the cream around and watching it swirl. The hospital itself seemed deathly quiet.
When Dr. Greene arrived, he looked exhausted. He had a red stain on his usually clean lab-coat. His hair was rumpled, his eyes heavy. The only pang of disappointment I felt was when I reached out to squeeze his hand, and he withdrew.
“We can’t here,” he said, hushed. “I’m sorry.”
I nodded. Took a sip of coffee. Dr. Greene watched me intently, warmly.
“Please tell me that’s not blood on your coat,” I said. “Ketchup, maybe?”
“Red ink,” he explained. “Or, you know, it might be blood. I don’t think you actually want an answer to that.”
I cringed. He chuckled lightly.
“So what broke today?” he pressed. I sighed.
“My computer, and my phone screen,” I told him. I slid my phone out, showing him the evidence. “And when I went home, and tried to turn on my computer, it gave me a big ol’ blue error screen, then just up and died on me.”
It felt weird and honestly a little bit uncomfortable, complaining about these things to him. It was one of those few collective moments where I could really feel the things that divided us. Not just age, but social status, financial status, and the simple wedge of time and experience that I didn’t have yet. I could see it in his eyes when I looked up at him. Almost a sort of: oh, when I was you
r age…
Glancing around first, making sure all was clear, he touched my elbow. I guess it was something.
Reaching over, he took the coffee that was sitting in front of me, and drank it down in three gulps. When he wiped his mouth, it reminded me of being back in the examining room, and how I’d gone down on him, and how I’d wiped my mouth after. Swiping the back of my hand against my lips.
“Too sweet,” he remarked. “The doctor in me wants to lecture you on excessive sugar intake, Miss Holloway.”
“I won’t listen.”
“I know,” he said. “That’s what I like about you, little fox. You’re your own person. You live and breathe on your own terms.”
But barely without you, I thought. Only he had no idea.
I accepted the folded bills he slid across the table for cab fare. He told me that I really needed to consider getting a car. I told him obviously, and hoped he didn’t have some kind of ulterior motive running through his head. Of course, you know, those kind of knee-jerk fantasies pop up. I hated myself for thinking about it, but I did. There was that quick, snap-shot of a thought: waking up to some kind of shiny, brand new car sitting in the parking lot.
Suppressing the image, I closed my eyes. If my phone wasn’t destroyed, I would have texted him some little goodnight message.
But honestly? When I got home, I was tired. I fell into bed, still in my jeans and sweatshirt, still smelling vaguely of house-party and hospital, and disappeared quickly into sleep.
And even though, deep down, I knew I would be leaving, and I knew of the sheer audacity in believing that I could actually have something with Dr. Greene was completely ludicrous, and that come fall I would be departing for Cambridge, for a life across the pond, and that in due time I would never see the doctor that I’d fallen in love with. It would end, like so many things do.
I still dreamt about him. Because he was all I ever dreamt about. My life, my thoughts, my heart, were tangled around him like thorns.
Chapter 20
ALEX
“Elaine knows. I’m fucked.”
“Jesus, Nick.”
Dr. Weisman sat in a puddle of his own tears, slumped over his desk. He was staring, dazed, at a blown-up photo of his family against the backdrop of their sprawling estate. His three kids, Elaine, and their Terrier, Vince.
“Well, fuck, man,” I muttered. “How did she find out?”
“A fucking hair elastic,” Weisman proclaimed. “She found some stupid hair elastic laying around the house, of all things, and started connecting the dots like a fucking constellation.”
It was hard to feel sorry for him, but I wanted to. I wanted to feel some sort of empathy for his plight, and for the fact that everything he had so intricately built for himself was now slowly burning to the ground.
But the guy deserved it. What do you say to someone who asks for trouble to fall into their lap?
“I’m sorry,” I told him. “Are you still seeing the girl?”
He nodded.
“Yeah,” he said. “I care for her, Al. I really do. I didn’t think I would, you know? I thought I’d just have some fun, enjoy the throw around. But I’m in deep, and now I don’t know what to fucking do. I’m forty-five years old. What have I done?”
I watched him as he clutched the framed photograph in his hands, his face drained of all color, and I knew that was something I never wanted to create for myself. The same kind of hell.
“Why don’t you go home,” I suggested. “Give me your files. I’ll handle your rounds for you. Lie down, think about the shit you’ve got going on. You’ve got to, Nick.”
“My kids despise me,” he sank lower into his seat. “What do I say to them?”
I shook my head.
“I don’t know,” I answered. “I’m not a father yet. But if it’s real, what you’ve got with this girl, she’ll wait while you figure it out.”
I picked up his files from the desk, the manila folders heavy with stapled paperwork. I’d be working straight until it was time to leave for the office at this point.
As I turned to leave, Weisman remarked:
“You will,” he said. “Soon. You’ll know what it’s like soon enough.”
“What?” I asked, turning to him. “What will I know?”
“What it’s like to be a father,” he answered quietly. “It’s not fucking easy, Al. The lives we build and try to maintain. But you’ll figure that out soon enough.”
Later that night, as I drove over to Cait’s apartment, I tried not to think about what Weisman had said. Even as I looked around her kitchen, her living room, and saw all of Mason’s belongings littered here and there. A coat draped over a dining room chair, or a pair of glasses sitting on the counter.
When I went to use the bathroom, absentmindedly leaving my phone on the kitchen counter, Cait was holding it in her hands when I walked out.
“You missed a phone call,” she said. She was leaning wearily against the faux-marble, her free hand resting on her stomach. “It was Mia.”
My skin prickled. Our gaze caught like a snag, a deadlock.
“The patient, right?” she asked. “The patient who means nothing to you.”
A hard, sour swallow.
“Yeah,” I said.
Cait narrowed her eyes, but there was no outburst. Frankly, she seemed not to give the slightest genuine fuck about what I was doing, and it was starting to startle me.
“How old is she?” Cait asked. “She looks like a child.”
“Why does it matter?”
She rolled forward, straining against the weight of the baby. I offered her an arm, but she seemed offended. She sat down at the kitchen table, still holding the phone, staring at the empty black screen.
“Are you fucking her?” she asked.
“Excuse me?” I balked. “She’s a patient.”
“Was,” Cait corrected me. “She was, right? She’s not anymore.”
“Give me my phone, Cait.”
She didn’t protest. She set it aside, sliding it across the tiled table. I picked it up, the blood in my veins pulsing.
“You didn’t answer me,” she said. “My question. You didn’t answer my question.”
“And what exactly are you demanding to know?”
Cait glared at me, her pale eyes like a wash of ice-cold water.
“Are you having sex her?” she asked, her voice cracking. “Are you having sex with that girl?”
“I told you. I told you she means nothing to me. She’s just some girl that showed up at the ER one evening, and I treated her for anxiety, and now she’s gone. She’s nothing.”
Another arrow to heart. I was slowly bleeding out.
Cait winced, pressing a palm to her stomach. The baby was kicking, hard.
“Our daughter is going to be here soon,” she said, breathing heavily. “And you’re lying to my fucking face.”
“I’m not lying to you,” I spat. I lied. A cold, bitter lie. “And what is this, anyway? With Mason, and his shit scattered all around the apartment.”
“He lives with me,” she answered coolly. “Because we’re back together. Because we’re working things out.”
“While you’re pregnant,” I started, taking in a breath. “With my daughter. While you’re playing house with an on-again-off-again boyfriend in an apartment that I’ve paid for, furnished, and even kept the goddamn fridge full. All of this – all of this stuff, Cait -” I gestured dramatically. “I’ve taken care of all this for you. I’ve bought all this shit for you. And for what?”
Her eyes flickered to meet mine. The tension was excruciating.
“I’ve found a job,” she snapped. “I’ll pay you back.”
“You are fucking impossible,” I snapped. “I don’t want you to pay me back, Cait. I want to know why all you’ve given me in return for my attempt at giving you what you asked for, is silence.”
Her face softened. Blonde hair brushed against her cheeks as her head fell forward, and she press
ed two fingers to her temples.
“I can’t do this right now,” she said. “Please leave.”
“Are you serious? No,” I said. “I’m not leaving. Not until you talk to me.”
“Mason will be home soon,” she said. “So I think you do want to leave. I think you need to leave right now, Alex.”
I stared at her. I felt as if she had a knife to my throat. Standing there, still in my lab-coat, straight from the office to see her. And this is what I got.
“Fuck this,” I muttered. “Fine. I’ll give you what you want, then.”
In the Porsche, my phone vibrated again. Mia.
Rain started to fall against windows in a soft mist. Eventually the clouds would open up, and everything would go straight to Hell.
“Honey,” I said. “My sweet little fox.”
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
“I need you be inside of you,” I told her. “Are you at home?”
“Yeah,” she said softly.
“I’m coming over,” I told her. “Wait up for me.”
The rain started falling. I could feel my chest opening up with the clouds. The pain was frightening.
“Always,” she said.
Her apartment smelled like one of those bath and body stores. Like bath salt, perfume, powdery deodorant. She had clothes littered all over the floor; shirts, camisoles, jeans. Everything was an organized mess, as if she like to keep it that way, and maybe she did.
I poked at a the chabby-chic chandelier that hung from her ceiling. The crystals reflected the moonlight, carving little slivers of light that danced like stars across the walls.
When she emerged from the bathroom, I turned to her. She stood in the doorway, looking timid. Nervous.
Quietly, for a moment, we just looked at each other. I slid my eyes down her frame, my lips parting, my heartbeat jumping in my throat.
“Take off your clothes,” I told her.
When she started to yank up her shirt, I grabbed her wrist.