“What is he doing here?” Safie asked.
“I have no idea.” My words had been coming out wrong and I’d upset Tyler and now I’d lost my chance to set it right.
“He’ll get this whole thing shut down,” Safie said. “Some of these kids are so spoiled.” She bent to pick up the cup he’d left behind.
“It’s not that big a deal.”
“It kind of is,” Safie said. My face felt hot and patchy, throat parched. The lights of the Christmas bulbs burned red and harsh. I wanted out of there, out of this conversation. “I think I saw him at your talk. Is he a student of yours?”
“What does that have to do with anything?”
Safie blinked and stepped back. “Excuse me?”
“I had a handle on things, you didn’t have to interfere.” Safie and her meddling, thinking she knew what was best for everyone else.
“I was just helping.”
“I didn’t need your help. That was humiliating.”
“What?”
“I know you like to be in charge of everything, telling everyone what to do. But I was dealing with it—I’m not a child, I don’t need a babysitter.”
And then a voice interrupted—“Here you are.” We both turned to look—it was Maria. “Oh sorry, I’m one short.” She’d brought Safie a drink. “The infamous Mark. Hello.”
Safie lifted the drink from Maria and looked directly at me. “Mark was actually just leaving.” I stared back at her, her stony expression, like I could be anyone.
“That’s right,” I said. “I was.”
And then I left.
I stalked my apartment in a storm of fury and shame. Why had the conversation with Tyler gone that way? I felt belittled, a nobody. As if nothing of these last weeks had happened.
How had I ended up here?
Hours later, the phone rang.
“What?”
A long pause.
“What are you doing?” Tyler’s voice gauzy, distant.
“What am I doing?” I had finally calmed down but everything jerked back alive, kicking inside me. “What the fuck was going on tonight?”
“I’m really sorry.”
“Is this a game for you?”
“No. I just—”
“You have fucked up my life, Tyler.”
“Don’t say that.”
“You have. You have fucked it up completely.” I was heaving, quick, sharp breaths. “This is such a mess.”
Tyler’s voice broke. “Please. Stop.” And then he was crying, great, wracked sobs, deep and desolate.
