“What if I don’t want to?”
The spike of fury that lanced her was almost a shock. She was never this angry at Sam. But how dare he? Why was he doing this now?
“But I need you to. Because ... this is absurd. The timing of all of this is absurd. We’ve been friends forever.Forever.We’ve never even almost kissed.”
“Thatyouknow of,” he said.
Her whole mind went blank, and she chose not to entertain that. Chose not to go deeper with it. “My marriage is dissolving. It’s a ridiculous time to try and introduce physical attraction to our relationship.”
He lifted his hands and scrubbed his face. “Introduce it.Introduce it?Are you for real, Nora?”
“Yes, Sam, I’m for real. We’ve had a wonderful, platonic relationship—”
“Get over yourself. Wedon’t. We never have. I’m your goddamned husband with no benefits. Because who fixes your electricity? Who do you go to when you need to talk about something you feel is just a little bit too intimate for anyone else? It’s me. It’s not him. It never has been. You play a character for him.” He let out a hard breath. “I’ve never understood it. I have never understood it. Why do you think I didn’t go to your wedding? Because I couldn’t stand that. You were trying to be some quirky Stepford wife. Forthatguy. For what? What did he ever give you?”
“Ben gave me love,” she said. “A beautiful life. He gave me—”
“He gave you a script to his play. The one you’ve been so devoted to ever since you met him. Because you had this idea in your head that you wanted something normal, and you had an idea of what that was, of what it meant. But it has always required you to pretend you were something you’re not, Nora. Whenever you needed a break from that, you came to me. Whenever you needed something real, you came to me. You’re here now because you need someone to listen to you. Because you need somebody to make you feel like it’s going to be okay, so you’re here with me. You’re not with your fucking husband.”
“Well, I’m divorcing him.” She sounded small, she felt small. And angry. Sam was supposed to be safe. He was taking that from her at the worst possible time. “It’s just not fair of you to do this right now because—”
“The hell it’s not,” he growled. “I’ve been there for you. Endlessly. I haven’t asked for a goddamn thing, but youuseme.” His voice wasrough, fractured. Pained, and she hated it. “You use me as a security blanket, and it never gives me anything back. You’re not a safe space for me, Nora Clarke, you are hell. You are constantly teasing me with a look into a future that we could have, but you won’t give it to us because you would rather have a spineless dentist just because he has two parents and grew up in a cul-de-sac. I’m not walking you through a divorce. I hit my limit.”
“Sam . . .”
“No. I can’t do it. You know it’s not him. You know that’s not real. You know he sucks, and you still don’t seethis. I can’t wait for you anymore. You looked at me, and you asked me why I haven’t had a relationship, and I ...” He shook his head. “Get out.”
“Are youthrowing me out?”
“Yes. I am. Because you won’t even listen.”
“I ... I’m listening,” she said. “I’m listening, but you have to admit that the timing is psychotic.”
“It isn’t to me, it’s all the same. I have been living in the hell of not having you for all this time. And I’m ... facing the fact I’m still not going to have you. Because you are never going to—”
“So you’re going to cut off our friendship because I won’t fuck you? Is that it? We’ve known each other our whole lives and you’ll just end this because I won’t sleep with you right now?”
“That’s unfair,” he said. “It doesn’t even surprise me, because that’s you. Backed into a corner and you try your damnedest to hurt someone so you don’t get wounded.”
“Like you don’t do that.”
“You’re right. I do. With pretty much everyone but you, but you can’t even give me that. I’ve known all this time I couldn’t tell you how I feel. Not ever. You compartmentalize your feelings into these little pieces, so you never have to be honest. Because it is never going to be a good time for me to talk about mine because you want to use me as a crutch rather than see me as a person. Ben told you that you were emotionally unavailable, and he was right, Nora. You aren’thonest with any one person, including yourself. He got the housewife, he got to sleep with you, he got your marriage vows. I get your trauma. I’m over it.”
What you did to me, be returned but times three. Head to toe. Skin and bone. It is time for fate to reverse. It is time to feel the pain you inflicted on me.
He wasn’t going to be there for her anymore. He was abandoning her. Taking this shelter away from her. This thing she needed so, so badly.
Pain wrenched her.
She had tried, all this time, not to disturb her relationship with Sam. He was breaking it apart now. Even though she had never given in to temptation. Even though she had never ...
“I never said anything, I never did anything.” She knew it didn’t make sense to him. But it did to her. She had kept it the same. He wasn’t honoring that. He wasn’t ...
“I’m not a security blanket.”
She wasn’t entirely sure how she walked out of Sam’s house. She didn’t fully come back to herself until she was in her driveway, holding the steering wheel of the car. Her heart was thundering hard. It hurt. Had she really been using him all this time? She hadn’t meant to. She loved him. She loved Sam, but she needed to keep herself safe and ...
His words were like poison darts, and everywhere they’d hit, she felt stung. She was ...
