My sister smiles up at me but it’s watery and wobbly.
“If you needed some help I could get you some shifts at the restaurant. Just until you’re back on your feet. But only if you really want them,” she says. “And you can say no. I won’t be mad.”
I smile. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”
Her face falls. “I feel like...like I’m losing you again,” she warbles.
I stand and wrap my arms around her shoulders, rest my head on the top of hers. “Not at all. You’re not losing me. You never did. We’re just starting over. Instead of Amy and Wes, now we’re Amy. And Wes.”
She squeezes my rib cage. We stand together for a long time.
“I wish Mom were here,” she whispers.
I wipe a tear on the top of Amy’s head. “Me, too.”
“That better not have been snot,” she warns.
Ignoring her, I say, “At least if we’re not living together anymore, I don’t have to worry about walking in on you ever again.”
Amy pinches my triceps through my sweatshirt.
“Ow.”
“What did I tell you?” She grabs her coffee mug and turns out the doorway, stomping toward the stairs. “We never speak of that again.”
I take a nap, read a book, and watch five minutes of daytime TV before I realize that a) I haven’t relaxed in so long I don’t know how to do it anymore and b) unemployment is going to suck. My phone rings while I scroll through a job board; it’s a Hill City number.
“Wesley?” Emily says. “Can you come into the office sometime this week?”
For one long second my heart stops from excitement. Maybe I’m getting my job back. For that one second, I kind of do still want to work there, even if it’s without her.
“HR needs to do an interview with you about Richard and his intern, Mark Gutterberg.”
“Oh.”
There’s a long pause where neither of us speak and I realize that she’s waiting for me to confirm. “Umm...why do they need to interview me?”
“Well, I mean, everyone kind of knows now about why you and Corrine were both fired,” Emily says in a hushed tone.
“Right. Of course.” Okay. So Richard probably told everyone.
“But Corrine sent an email detailing months’ worth of inappropriate behavior by Richard and Mark and HR already had complaints on file for both and, well... I might have raised a bit of a stink about how they weren’t taking it seriously. They wanted to get the whole story and it turns out you featured prominently in both.”
“I’m not getting my job back.”
“Ohhhh. Oh no, honey. I’m sorry, Wesley.” She laughs in a way that sort of reminds me of me. “I mean, you were...you know...on company property. With another employee. Absolutely not.”
My chest constricts but I laugh, rubbing at the spot that hurts, right over my heart. I miss Corrine. Touching her, kissing her, making her laugh, making her smile. But I’m proud of her, too. My body doesn’t feel fully present here in my house because part of it is out the door trying to get to her. To hug her for what she’s done. To tell her how brave she is. As much as I want to be already on my way to her, I won’t go. She deserves the space to heal and so do I. I’m willing to be patient. I showed her who I am and she’s shown me. Now all we need is time.
“That’s okay,” I tell Emily. “This is good, too.”
Chapter 48: Corrine
Three months later
The trade show floor is crammed. There are enough people that I can’t take a step without brushing into someone. Conventions are loud and exhausting. The A/C always too high. The seminars and workshops have value but everyone knows they’re just here to network, drink too much, and pat each other on the backs about their latest, greatest campaigns.
But I’d still rather be here in the middle of it all than sitting in my hotel room. My speech was on loop in my brain, mixing with the sound of someone else’s television murmuring through my walls, and the constant pulse of New York through the windows. Losing myself down here is exactly the distraction I need. But even with all the noise, the blast of cold, dry air, I can’t be distracted from him. If we still worked for Hill City, he’d be here with me. I haven’t let myself imagine what that could have been like; freeing, probably. For weeks his absence has been a low hum like a headache I can’t tame. Mom is doing better. I’ve found a new trajectory for my career.
