“Dude, it’s great.I needed a minute.”He smiled.“It’s going weirdly well.”
“Oh, aye?”
“Yeah, unfortunately the hype is real.”He sighed.“Delia’s awesome.I really,reallywanted her to suck.Now I hatemyselffor how much I like her.”He watched me for a few moments, then: “Ready to talk about it?”
I shook my head.“So, you like her.Does she like you?”
Finch avoided answering by having a brief but intense cuddle session with a gray-muzzled mutt introduced as “Bluto,” who stared at me through the phone with alarmingly human eyes.“I think so,” Finch said finally.“We talked about art for like three hours.Her paintings are really good.And she says she wants to read my screenplay.”
“Well, that’s something, innit?”I rubbed a hand over my face.
“Doyouwant to read my screenplay?”
“Nah, Titch.”I lit another cigarette and closed my eyes.“But I will, if you ask me.”
“Okay.You need to talk about it now.Ready?”I could vividly imagine the look he was giving me, all pinched brow and big eyes.
“We had a row,” I said.“At the exhibition opening.It ...I was in the wrong.”
“Did you apologize?”
Fuck.Fuck.“No.”
We sat in silence while I watched Finch pet dogs, and he watched me quite possibly slowly freeze to death.
“I’ve also had a bit to drink,” my body said without input from the rest of me, “some time ago now.”
“How long?”
I squinted at the time on my phone.“Nearly twenty-four hours.”
“And you’re not gonna have any more?”
“Not if I can help it.”I clenched a hand in my hair and scrubbed at my scalp.“No, I’m not.Sorry for putting you out.”
“Yeah.”He grinned.“I really prefer it when you thumbs-up everything.”
I laughed; it sounded helpless and high-pitched.“You should get back to your family, er, and friends.Give my love to Skyler—”
“Don’t you hang up.”Finch jabbed a finger at the screen, and I felt the ghost of it against my sternum.“Now, what’s the plan, Stan?”
“Pardon?”
“How are you going to get Lucas back?”
“I ...”I swallowed.“I rather suspect I won’t.”
“Bullshit.You guys haveonefight and you’re calling it quits?See, this is the problem with your generation, no resilience.”
This was my due for befriending people whose frontal lobes were still cooking.“That’s not how it works, Titch.I can’t simply apologize.”Though it would, undoubtedly, be a good start.“I can only hope he looks past—” And it was at that moment I realized all the myriad horrible deaths I’d rather experience than explain to Robin Finch, twenty-year-old bright-eyed American dreamer, about Jean.
And thatwastelling, wasn’t it?
“Looks past what?”he asked, giving me the perfect opening.Fuck.
I started slowly, kept the detailsverysparing, and to his credit, Finch didn’t react with any of the scandalized delight I’d expected.I’d thought there’d at least be some jokes at my expense, some reaction to the revelation of my past as a sex worker, but Finch merely followed along, petting his dogs, frowning.When I was done, he asked a few clarifying questions, mostly about how long I’d let Lucas build a relationship with my ex without saying anything, and whether I’d talked to the police about any of this.
“Being a creepy git isn’t a crime,” I reminded him.
