My best friend follows me into the room, the silence between us heavy. “That was…unexpected,” he eventually says. “You left some details out last night.”
“Yeah, well…” I swallow thickly, pulling a suitcase out from under the bed.
“Yeah, well,” he echoes. “That’s not a complete sentence, Charlie Girl.”
I don’t answer because I’ve got nothing to say. All of this was unexpected—a blow to the solar plexus that’s still stealing my ability to breathe.
Yesterday, I was in a loving relationship with the man I thought I would spend the rest of my life with. We were building something safe andreal. And now I’m learning that I didn’t really know him. Dillon lied from the beginning—if not to my face, then by omission. And last night can’t be the first time his friends have used me as a verbal punching bag.
“I just…” I shake my head, turning around to open the closet. “I just want to get out of here, Barry. I’m tired, and this has just been…It’s been a lot, and being here isn’t helping.” I grab an armful of clothes, hangers and all, dumping them into the suitcase.
Barrett watches me warily, like I’m a bomb about to explode. “Okay,” he says gently. “We’ll get out of here, and then we’ll go for a drink. I think you need it.”
I send him a tight smile before directing him to get more clothes. As soon as he disappears into the closet, my eyes catch on the photo beside the bed—a selfie of me and Dillon from the day we moved in together. Our cheeks are pressed tightly together, our smiles wide and matching.
I don’t think a drink—or several—isgoing to fix what happened today. Honestly, the fractures that are splintering through my heart feel permanent and irreparable.
I’ll be okay. My family, the people who are supposed to love me unconditionally, have dealt far worse blows than anything I heard last night.
I survived that. I’ll survive this.
But I’m kind of sick of surviving and, more than anything, it’s breaking me apart that Dillon was the person I thought I was going tothrivewith. I thought we were solid, and it turns out, I was just trying to hold onto smoke. Now, it’s curling through my fingers, disappearing into the wind like it was never there to begin with.
I feel it, though. The hurt lingering behind tells me it wasn’t just for nothing. But at the same time, it also feels like that pain might be the only real thing that was ever between us.
“Charlie?” Barrett prods, making me realize I’ve been standing here frozen, staring down into a half-filled suitcase, my vision blurry with tears.
I sniffle, dropping the shirt I’m holding into the case. “Yeah,” I murmur. “A drink sounds good.”
Chapter 8
Dillon
I’m startling to realize just how quickly Charlie was able to pack up her belongings—herlife—and disappear through the door, leaving me with no idea where she was going.
I made myself scarce, knowing it was the least I could do…especially once I calmed down enough for reason to slink in. That rationality forced me to acknowledge how much worse I made everything by reacting so badly and running my mouth.
Still, I couldn’t force myself to leave. If I walked out that door before Charlie did, I was admitting I was okay with what was happening; that I was accepting we were done.
And Iwasn’t.
I wasn’t okay, and we weren’t done.
We couldn’t be.
I look around now, seeing all the empty spaces next to my stuff that shouldn’t be there, wondering how everything went up in flames so fast.
This was my apartment before Charlie. She had been hesitant when I first asked her to move in, unsure about living in a place that had essentially been a bachelor pad…And yet, she made the apartmentoursin subtle ways: the bright canvas above the guest bed, colorful ceramic owls lining the bookshelves, perfume lingering in the air, making it seem like she’d always just stepped out of the room.
Charlie is a self-proclaimed neat freak, so she nevercluttered the space, putting everything in its rightful place as soon as she was done—and leveling me with looks if I didn’t follow suit. Her only “mess” had been books. Usually a pile of three, stacked carefully on the end table by the couch.
I teased her about it because Charlie only ever read one book at a time, but she claimed that she needed the other books there to remind her of what was coming next.
Whenever there was an NHL game on, she would curl into the corner of the couch with a book in her hands. I would sit close enough that my leg was pressed up against hers, feeling like every breath came easier without an inch of space between us. Our attention would be on completely different things, but my hand always ended up tucked between her thighs.
It became a ritual, a way for us to connect, even while doing our own thing. Now, I stare at the black television screen, already knowing those books are gone without looking.
The lingering quiet slams into me with brute force, and that’s what chases me from the apartment, barely sparing a second to grab my wallet, keys, and phone. There’s no plan, just a desperate need for air that doesn’t feel like it’s burning my lungs from the inside out.
