“Because I was scared.”
“Of what?”
“Of everything I just said.”
It didn’t make much sense, even to me, but Meera wrote it down all the same. “Tell me,” she said. “Why have you continued to allow Sam to believe you took drugs the night you went out with Freddie? You said he thinks you didn’t come home at all. But that’s not what happened, so why haven’t you told him the truth?”
It was a question I’d asked myself a thousand times since the scene in the alcove. Sam was hot-headed, but he was a listener. There was no sensible reason I couldn’t have turned the conversation around. I’d chosen not to. I’d fuckingchosento let him believe I was an indifferent fuckhead. “I guess it’s easier to let him down now rather than a year down the line when we have more to lose.”
“More?”
“A longer friendship.”
“Why are you so convinced you’d let him down? You don’t owe him anything, Micah. If you make a mistake, there’s no one it affects more than you. Also, Sam has been a loyal friend to you so far. What makes you think he wouldn’t forgive you?”
And so it went on. Meera dissected my relationship with Sam until I didn’t know which way was up. The only thing I was certain of was that I’d fucked it up by not telling him the truth about that night. I wasn’t guilty of what he’d accused me of, but I was guilty, nonetheless.
I left only a little more grounded than when I’d arrived. As I always did after therapy, perhaps a test of sorts, I took the Tube home. It wasn’t far, just two stops, but it was long enough for my brain to take a trip down memory lane. The track I’d got hurt on was miles from where I was right now, in every sense of the word. All tube trains smelt the same, though, and if I closed my eyes, I was right there, teetering on the edge of something I couldn’t control. A despair so deep it had almost drowned me.
“Micah, were you trying to kill yourself?”
I’d always answerednoto that question, but I’d yet to figure out what else I could’ve been doing. Maybe I never would.
And maybe it didn’t matter.
The train pulled into Moorgate. I pulled my hood low over my face and braved the weekday commuter crowds, thankful this corner of the city was more concerned with stock markets than fragile ex-footballers. I dodged my way through the suited and booted until I reached the ancient building where Sam’s grandparents had once lived. Out of habit, I checked the time to see if he’d be home. It was Thursday, and he usually spent them hunched up with his books on the couch, but when I let myself into the flat, he was in the hallway, a packed bag in his hand.
My heart dropped. “What are you doing?”
Sam fished his keys from the dish by the front door without looking at me. “I’m going to stay with my parents.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re my parents, and I haven’t seen them since Christmas.”
It was February, and his parents had been in town two weeks ago. I’d seen them. He’d seen them. The whole fucking world had seen them—his parents were the life and soul of the party. “Why?”
“Don’t do this.”
“Do what? Ask you why you’re running out on me when you’ve barely spoken for a week?”
“Not everything is about you.”
“Never said it was. Just thatthisis. I know it. So you could at least look me in the face and tell me.”
“Tell you what? That I feel awkward as fuck in my own home? Because if you haven’t figured it out yet, you’re more dense than I thought.”
He still wasn’t looking at me. And he spoke quietly, but his words cut deep. This was his home more than mine. If he wasn’t comfortable here, I was the one who should be packing my bags.
I had nowhere to go. I pictured Freddie’s Kensington loft and wanted to die. That shit wasn’t me. Never had been. My quiet life with Sam was so fucking precious to me. I couldn’t lose it. I couldn’t losehim. “Sam, please.”
Exasperation rolled off his hunched shoulders in waves. He turned to face me, jaw set, but the second our eyes met, something—everything—changed. He sucked in a shaky breath and held out his free hand. “Come with me.”
7
Sam
My trip to my parents’ house was supposed to have been an escape from Micah. Not literally from him, but the angst that came from sharing a space with someone you wanted to love on and throttle all at the same time. But his stricken face had broken me. I couldn’t leave him.
