Whitney 5:26 p.m.
I need to talk.
Henry 5:27 p.m.
Busy. Later?
Whitney 5:28 p.m.
It’s important.
5:30 p.m.
Henry. I’ll call your mom if you don’t call me.
This is a new low.
I call her, even though it’s loud in the restaurant.
She answers with a hiccupping sob. I can’t help it—I grimace. She’s used tears to manipulate me in the past, both before and after our breakup.
It was stupid to take a flying leap the second she told me to jump.
She launches into a rundown of every emotion she’s experienced since March. Guilt about the decision. Relief. Guilt about the relief. Justification. It’s all one garbled run-on sentence, but I’m softening. It’s hard to maintain distance from this girl when we’ve been treading in the same shitty sea.
I give her a version of the platitude my mom’s given me: “You did the right thing. It’ll get better.You’llget better.”
“But you got over it so fast,” she wails.
I picture her in her room, on her bed, surrounded by crumpled tissues. It’s not a hard image to conjure. I’ve seen her exactly this way more than once since spring break.
“I haven’t gotten over it, Whit,” I say, competing with the noise of the dinner crowd. “I’m surviving it. Same as you.”
“You took the easy way out.”
“That’s not fair,” I say, waving to Mateo. I slide off my stool and head for the door. My face is going hot, my forehead prickling with sweat. On the off chance Dad decides to pay attention,I don’t want him to know how worked up this call’s getting me.
It’s not much cooler outside, but it’s definitely quieter. I park on a bench and listen to Whitney cry like she’s in physical pain.
Maybe she is.
“It wasn’t fair of you to leave,” she slurs through a series of hiccups.
“Jesus, have you been drinking?”
“Does it matter?”
“Fuck yes, it matters. If you need to talk, I’ll talk to you, but don’t drunk text me.”
“I’m not drunk. I’msad.”
“Yeah. Me too,” I say quietly.
She’s silent for a second. And then: “I can’t wait for you to come home. I want us to work through this together.”
I know without a doubt that I can’t work through my emotions alongside Whitney.
I owe her understanding. Patience. An apology, maybe.
