“Oh, nothing as complicated as what you’ve got going on.” Lucy sipped again, as if pondering her next words. “Casey and I ran into each other at a party. It was one of those stupid one-night things, really. I wasn’t in a very good place, neither was he, we used each other for warmth for a few nights, and that was it.” Her eyes caught mine. “A single blink in time was all it took to leave a mark.”
I sighed, her words ringing far truer than I wanted to believe.
“I worked in the psych department for two years.” I sucked in a shallow breath. “Far longer than a blink, and I should have quit the first time he asked me to come into his office and lock the door behind me.”
Lucy’s eyes bled with compassion, one hand reaching across the table to lock a finger with my own.
I shook my head, trying to swallow back the tears.
“I thought I could control it. I know it’s stupid to think thatI, this naïve nineteen-year-old girl, could have any control over a fifty-year-old man!” I held a hand over my mouth to lock in the rest of the story, painfully aware of every person within earshot.
“That shouldn’t have happened. It sounds like he should be hung up and publicly shamed. I’d force-feed him his balls if I met him in a dark alleyway for what he did. But just because you stayed doesn’t make you at fault, or him any less culpable.”
“I stayed for two years.”
“Did you have another place to live?”
“Not without the scholarship.”
“A place to work?”
I shook my head. “I looked, but he just kept piling up my workload, practically forcing me to work after hours with him. I needed the money. I was living off a twelve-pack of stovetop noodles and condensed soup. I couldn’t turn down the work, but every time I tried to turn him down…”
“Tressa.” Lucy came around the table, wrapping me in her arms and holding me fiercely. “If I find him, I’ll kill him for you. That bastard needs to suffer.”
A weak smile split my cheeks. “I’m okay. Finish your drink before it’s cold.”
I wiped at the tears wetting the corners of my eyelids, some odd, newfound sense of calm settling into my bones from sharing even a fraction of the most horrible time in my life.
Correction.
Just one of the most horrifying.
There wasn’t enough coffee in all of Philly to get me through the rest of it.
Not now, maybe not ever.
“I’m gonna miss you so much when you’re gone.”
“If I don’t leave, Bastien and I will destroy each other.”
“Yeah.” She popped her head to one side. “There is that. And you’re sure leaving me to fend off the ghosts of St. Mike’s alone is the right thing to do?”
I laughed, thankful as ever for her wit. “I’ve been up and down all the halls of St. Michael’s far into the night. Anything lurking in the shadows is friendly.”
“Oh?” She quirked a naughty eyebrow up and winked. “How friendly are we talking? Do I need birth control?”
I nearly choked on the hot latte. “I think you’ve got birth control covered for at least a few more months.”
She whistled softly, patting her tummy again beneath her dark puffer coat, and we both laughed until at least half a dozen eyes were on us and happy tears were stinging my eyelids.
Maybe I could find a place sort of close to Lucy; the thought of her all alone the next few months while her baby grew was almost unbearable.
And losing one soul mate who made me laugh this hard felt like a tragedy anyway. I didn’t think I could bear to lose two.
