She doesn’t commit herself fully to school because she isn’t sure enough in herself to, but the little she gives is more than most people’s hardest try. She laughs easily and has a passion for life that I’ve never witnessed in anyone. She loves the absolute shit out of everything.
I glance at her and see her sit up, fiddling with her hands almost timidly, as though she’s preparing for an outburst of meanness from me. Being mean to her has never worked before. And it won’t work now.
“Katy, you’ve got to stop acting like this shell is everything you are. Because I know it’s not. You’re smart, even though you try really hard not to show it. I don’t know why. I don’t know why you dumb yourself down for me, for the world. But I think it’s because you don’t love yourself enough. Or maybe at all. I need you to know something. Despite everything, I think you are a good person inside. And you do deserve to be happy. I’m sorry I can’t be part of that. You just really…you’ve got to stop sabotaging yourself.”
Her brown eyes seem to stir when they meet mine. She doesn’t speak for what feels like a long time. When she finally does, the words sound more like a croak. Tears roll down her cheeks.
“I—I’m…” She trails off, wiping her face on the backs of her hands. I wait, but she doesn’t finish her thought. Instead, she takes a deep breath and gives me a hesitant smile. “Goodbye, Leo.”
I give her a nod and watch as she gets out of my car. She glances back at me as she walks up to the front of her building. For the first time, I feel that this is a real goodbye from Katy. I feel like I got through to her on some level. Putting my head down on my steering wheel, I shut my eyes, feeling the flood of relief of waking up from a long nightmare.
XLI
Alexis
I said it before and I will say it again. I’m eternally grateful that Emily is visiting. I’ve never been afraid of being alone, I actually prefer it. But right now, as much as I hate to admit it, I need company.
I feel alone in a way that transcends physical closeness. I feel alone within myself. It feels like I’m standing in a room I don’t recognize, a room with walls that are inching slowly toward me. And that room is my entire body.
The night of the Christmas party, I come home to an empty house. But I am expecting to; Emily made plans long before I remembered about the stupid party and thought to invite her.
In a way, though it didn’t end on the sweetest note, I’m glad I went with Jacob. I feel like I was able to give him a sense of finality to whatever was or wasn’t going on between us.
There is no chase anymore; the race is over. I never even left the stables. Because I’m stubborn and I refuse to run for anything I’m not guaranteed to win. Maybe that’s cowardice, as well.
I’m finding out all these great words that describe me: coward, weak, stubborn. I started out thinking I was a strong person and now I don’t even remember who that person is.
I undress and crawl into bed, where I lay awake for an hour or two before exhaustion finally overtakes me. My last thought as I’m drifting out of consciousness is that the battle is over. The battle was getting through the day and today is history. Now it’s time to forget it all.
XLII
Alexis
There are thirteen days from the day of the Christmas party to the day after New Year, when the office reopens. I count the days, wishing there were more. Wishing I could double or triple them. I wish I could extend them indefinitely. Being away from the office, not having to see Leo or feel him close by, is supposed to help cast him out of my mind for once and for all.
Why doesn’t it work like that? Why does love have to be this ass-backward? Why does distance fan the flame? Why does silence sound so loud?
Every day I hear his voice in my head, telling me he’s in love with me. Such perfect, incredible words, I almost relish in the sound of them before I remember that I didn’t reciprocate them. And that I don’t intend to.
Emily and I spend Christmas with Julia and her family. We all pitch in and cook a big meal, Julia’s mother handling most of the cooking. Emily helps her and I mostly babysit. We try to give Julia and Giles time to wrap the presents, which they purchased late considering all they’ve had to deal with.
I can’t remember the last time I had such a good time. Being around this family causes the weight I’ve been carrying to lift and, though it seems to hover over me, I am at least free to pretend it doesn’t exist for a few hours of laughter and good food. I have a huge lump in my throat the whole time, seeing Julia’s interactions with her children and thinking of how close life came from making these memories impossible to make.
A few days after Christmas, I get back to the condo after running some errands and find Emily staring off into space in the kitchen.
“What’s up?” I ask evenly, my sixth sense prickling. There is something foreboding about her silent deliberation.
She straightens up when she sees me and brings up a hand to the back of her neck, stalling a few seconds before she speaks.
“Leo came to see me.”
I freeze. The rush of emotions that comes over me is just a wave of indiscernible heat, I don’t know if I’m angry, shocked, or upset.
But when I speak, my voice is all edges and shards.
“Here? He just showed up here?”
I set my purse down and cross my arms. My eyes dart toward the bathroom door. I think for a ridiculous second that he is still here. That he will come out and demand to speak with me. My stomach seems to shrink at the thought.
Emily shakes her head.
“No. We met at a coffee shop. He emailed me first—”
He emailed her? Since when do Leo and Emily email each other?
“How did he get your email?”
“I don’t know, maybe from my website. I didn’t ask—” Emily sighs as though this is beyond the point. “Anyway, Lex, listen…”
I clench my jaw to keep from saying things that will only delay whatever she’s trying to tell me. I listen.
“I think you should go see him. The day after tomorrow. New Year’s Eve. I think you should go to that address he gave you.”
My mouth literally drops. I can’t believe she’s saying this.
The day after the party, I told Emily everything that happened between Leo and me, all of the things he said, his cryptic request. Her reaction was exactly what I expected. She said Leo was full of shit, that I needed to quit him like a bad habit. I’m not sure when Emily made up her mind to hate Leo, but it was made up. If I’m hardheaded, she’s a bull. Emily sets her mind down the way most people set their foot down. It weighs a thousand pounds and doesn’t budge an inch.
But now this? Now she’s suddenly warmed up to the idea of him? Just a week later? After meeting with him once?
“What did he tell you?”
I’m speaking through my teeth, feeling angry because it’s the easiest thing to feel.
“That’s between him and I—”
“The hell it is!” I snap.
Closing my eyes again, I take a breath, and remind myself it’s not Emily I’m upset with. It’s Leo. How dare he drag my sister into this?
“Just listen to me, Lex. We talked for like an hour. I have to admit—and you know how hard it is for me to admit this—but I was wrong about him. I can see it now, he’s coming from a real place.”
I let out a humorless laugh. “Emily—what the hell?! I don’t need this right now. I don’t need to be dragged back into things with Leo. I simply don’t want to be with him.”
She shakes her head slowly and the pity in her eyes makes my anger lash against my face. She’s looking at me as though I’m confused and don’t know what’s best for me. I fucking hate that look.
“Lex, look at yourself.” Her gaze softens. “You’re in love with him. And I get it—loving him doesn’t mean you have to be with him. I get that. I get the way your fucked-up mind works. But I also know that if you don’t go, if you don’t at least hear him out, you will regr
et it. And if there’s one thing that scares you more than the unknown is the certainty of regret.”
She seems to realize I can’t possibly speak right now. I need to process this information. She turns to leave but hesitates before disappearing into the guest room. “Just go. You have a lot more to lose if you don’t.”
XLIII
Leo
I lean on my car, which is parked along the circular driveway, and glance at my watch again. 2:07 PM. The gate to the driveway is open and I resist the urge to look for her approaching car. Because every time I glance over and see movement on the street, my heart jumps to my throat because I think it might be her. And I’m beginning to realize that I haven’t prepared myself for the possibility of her not coming at all.
Going to Emily was difficult for me, but I knew that I needed to win her over if I’m ever going to have a chance with Alexis. Getting Emily to believe in what I was saying was an exercise in torture. That woman is stubborn, miles more so than Alexis. I felt worn to the ground, after beating my head against the iron wall that is Emily Stone. But it was worth it, because in the end something shifted in her eyes and, though her arms remained crossed and her tone impassive, I could sense that she believed me, maybe just a little. And that was enough, that was all I needed.
Last night I felt certain Alexis would meet me today. But now…
I glance at my watch again; 2:11 PM.
I asked her to meet me here at 2. Alexis isn’t the type to be fashionably late.
She isn’t coming.
The certainty doesn’t come from my gut, doesn’t have the same conviction as a deeply rooted truth. It comes from a small voice at the back of my mind, the one nagging at me that my mistake is one I will never be able to undo. That Alexis isn’t going to give way to anything she considers risky, not when her heart is at stake. That, perhaps, she just isn’t capable of allowing herself to love someone. That I’ve fallen in love with someone who doesn’t even know how to start. I want to shake the thoughts away, I really do. But the longer I stand and wait, the more I glance at my watch—2:15PM—the drier my mouth becomes. The river of hope I had just last night is evaporating into a thin stream, then a sliver, right before my eyes.
I hear a car door shut; my eyes somehow land on her without me even trying. She pulled up right behind my car. How I didn’t hear her, I have no idea. But that doesn’t matter because she’s here. She walks up to me slowly, an unreadable expression fixed on her gorgeous features as her eyes gaze our surroundings. The stone walkway leads to an arched entryway. The sun is beaming down on the house and its Spanish-style features. The pale-yellow stucco walls seem to glow almost gold against the lawn, spotless and verdant, framed by neatly trimmed shrubs.
“Hey,” I say to her. The word is almost a sigh, betraying my relief that she came.
She stops before she is within arms’ reach of me and rubs her hands along her arms as though she feels cold. The afternoon sun prickles the back of my neck.
“Thank you for coming.”
I try to gauge some sort of emotion from her eyes, but she won’t allow me to. She glances toward the house again.
“Leo, is this your brother’s house?”
“Come on,” I say to her, moving up the walkway.
I turn back and see she has not moved.
“I really don’t want to meet anyone. Just tell me what you need to say.” As though realizing how cold she sounds, she adds, “Please.”
She is chewing her lip as I watch her. This is going to be harder than I thought.
“Alexis, you came all this way. Just humor me for a few minutes. You can leave whenever you want.”
She glances toward the open gate, probably considering breaking out into a run toward it. Then, her shoulders drop slightly and she begins to walk toward me, though her eyes are still on the house. “Jesus, this place is huge. What does William do again?”
I don’t answer her. I’m hearing my own voice in my head, deliberating where to start. This could go really, really bad if my preamble isn’t good enough.
I stop at the front door and glimpse at her. She looks at me and for a few seconds our eyes communicate silently, perhaps hers are reliving the things we can never forget. But mine are in awe. She is glowing under the light of the sun, its rays pulling golden streaks in her hair that I’ve never noticed before. A ream of dark green surrounds her pale eyes and threads of pale gold are there as well. She takes my breath away just standing there, waiting for me to speak, not knowing that what I’m about to say may just change our lives.
I clear my throat because I don’t know how else to segue out of the silence.
“I’m going to tell you something and at first it’s going to sound crazy. You’re not going to want to believe it. It’s going to go against everything you’ve told yourself over the years, all the walls you’ve built to protect yourself. But please, please try to resist the urge to run away. Please stay and wait for me to finish.”
She doesn’t speak, doesn’t promise me a thing. But the fact that she is still here gives me hope. I take the key from my pocket and turn the lock.
“What—” The word seems to catch in her throat. The doors open into a wide entryway with a vaulted ceiling, the smell of fresh paint and polished dark wood floors trickles toward us. The house is empty. Farther up the hall, a white banister runs up the staircase that leads to the second floor.
She looks from the key in my hand, to the door, to the vast emptiness of the house, the bare walls, all peering back at her from behind me. My footsteps echo as I cross the threshold into the entryway.
“What is this?” She looks rooted to the spot, her eyes darting around, decoding a message written in invisible ink along the walls.
I offer a hand to guide her inside but she doesn’t take it. Perhaps she doesn’t even see it; her eyes are fixed, entranced, on the sight of the empty house beyond me. My hand lowers to my sides again and I remind myself that I prepared for this. I knew that the beginning would be the hard part.
I draw a breath before I speak.
“Alexis, I thought I was drowning in you, but that isn’t true. Drowning implies a struggle and I’m just not willing to fight it. I am absolutely, out of my mind, hopelessly in love with you. And this house?” I gesture behind me. “This is an investment in something I believe in more than I’ve ever believed in anything. A future with you. Alexis, this is our house.”
She goes pale and I’m pretty sure she stopped breathing half a minute ago. I let the words settle before I continue, “This is our future house. It’s not for us to live in today, or tomorrow, or even next year. But it’s where our future will live, starting today. Everything we can have, every struggle we will overcome, all the joy, the laughs and the mind-bending sex, it lives here, filling every space with the memories that are yet to come. And this is where they will remain until you are ready to live them with me.”
I turn from her and walk farther into the house, passing the large archway on the left that leads to the living room. Instead, I turn to the stairs on my right and lay a hand on the white banister that runs up the length of it. She doesn’t move, still standing just outside of the open door. I say, “These stairs? Our son will scoot down those steps on his stomach when he’s just a toddler. That driveway?” I point beyond her out of the door; she seems to resist the urge to turn her head back.
“That’s where our son will fall and scrape his knee when he’s learning to ride a bike. That porch is where we’ll sit and wait for the rainstorms that never come, because San Diego’s always in a drought.”
I notice the way her hand rises to her parted mouth. She takes a step inside, her eyes moving up to the vaulted ceiling and taking in the chandelier overhead. I turn from her and walk farther inside, toward the second archway at the end of the hall, which gives way to the kitchen. There’s light from the large sliding glass doors that leads out back.
“And that backyard? That’s where we’ll have barbecues and you’ll te
ll all our friends the story about how I bought this house for us when you weren’t even speaking to me.” I turn to see her and she is only a few feet behind me. Her expression, beyond shock, is unreadable. I go on, “And you’ll laugh and tell them you thought I was crazy because it was an absolutely blind leap of faith.”
Her eyes finally move toward my face. They’ve been averting my line of sight this whole time. I latch my gaze to hers and can almost hear it lock in place. I know she isn’t going to look away. Her breaths are slow. I take a step toward her and she doesn’t try to step back.
“But you know what I will tell them?” I lower my voice with each deliberate step I take in her direction. “I’ll tell them that it would’ve crazy of me not to take the leap of faith. However slim the hope may be, you’re worth the risk of trying, and the risk of failing in the process. Because my biggest regret in my life would be letting you walk away, not putting up a fight, not convincing you that the best parts of your life are not behind you, they are in front of you. In our future together. And all you have to do is let down your armor and let me in, give our future a chance to live.”
Her breath hitches in her chest and she lowers her hand to the base of her throat. She begins to shake her head with what I hope to God is disbelief.
XLIV
Alexis
There’s a weight in my chest. Something is pressing my heart into my ribcage. Something heavy. He’s coming closer and I can’t move. It’s like tree roots are growing up from the floor, wrapping around me and securing me to the spot. My eyes burn and I’m terrified they will flood with tears. The surge of emotions I’m feeling is mind bending.
“Leo, this is too much.”
My last words are almost a whisper. Why words seem to fail me right when I need them the most, I’ll never know. I meant to say that what I’m feeling is too much. I’ve been pulled underwater. I don’t even know if I’m being held down or if I just never learned how to swim.
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