The pressure inside me grew and grew and grew until I got to Deena’s building. I was out of the car in a second, taking in the drab brown brick and dirty windows. No doorman. No security door. Just a flimsy glass partition between all the crackheads and junkies in the world, and the woman who was my heart. She couldn’t stay here. She belonged withme. My pulse jumped, and I punched the button for Deena’s apartment, then punched it again.
The intercom crackled. “Yes?”
Even that one word made my knees buckle. I leaned on the brick, fingers curling into the gap filled with old mortar, and exhaled. “Deena. It’s me. Let me in.”
The silence stretched, and finally Deena answered. “No, Cal. I’m not going to do that.”
The calm in her voice chilled me to my core. I blinked, willing my brain to understand. Willing myself to come up with the perfect combination of words that would make her see what needed to happen. Her, with me. This spat, over.
“Listen, I’m sorry about last night. I don’t…” I trailed off. What did I want to say?
Ididwant her to stop working. I wanted to wrap her in miles of bubble wrap and keep her chained where she’d be safe. I wanted to be in charge of every morsel that passed her lips and every exercise that moved her body. I wanted to control her in every way.
“I can’t do this,” Deena said, her voice distorted by the speaker. “You… Cal…”
My fingers dug into the edge of the brick so hard a trickle ofblood ran down my palm. I slammed my hand against the rough surface. “Deena! You can’t just run away from this.”
“This isn’t working. It was never going to work. We need different things. I’ll have my lawyer contact you about custody.”
The speaker crackled again, and I knew she was gone.
Just like that. Foiled by an ancient intercom and a door that one solid kick would shatter. But that wasn’t all that stood between us, was it? There was the vast chasm of our clashing needs. The things she needed that I couldn’t—wouldn’t—couldn’t—give her. The things I needed that she couldn’t give me.
This wasn’t how this ended. My body felt light and heavy at once, and my vision was wobbly around the edges. I couldn’t accept this. I would die without her. Iwas dyingwithout her, and it had only been a few hours. How would I survive days? Months? Years?
I backed up, standing in the middle of the sidewalk, and yelled up at the building. “Deena!”
Sweat trickled down my back, and fluffy white clouds passed by above the buildings that towered all around me. It was a sweltering day. The kind of day that brought all the smells of its millions of inhabitants and their trash, the heat of the car exhaust fumes mixing with the dead heat of sun-soaked concrete. The kind of day that dragged me down to the sticky, inescapable darkness. I stood on the pavement, choking on the oppressive heat, on the thick, muggy air, on the weight of the memories that chose this moment to rush back to me. My sister had died on a day just like this.
“Deena!”
“Shut the hell up!” someone yelled from a neighboring building.
“Fuck you!” I yelled back.
Deena’s building loomed, silent and ominous. I looked at thedoor. I could break it down. I’d probably get arrested, but maybe I could get to Deena’s apartment before the cops got here.
And then?—
And then? What?
“Sir?” My driver was behind me, hands clasped as he stood next to the car. I glanced at him, and he gestured to my hand. “Should I get the first aid kit?”
I opened my palm to find it bloody. Staring at the red spread all over my skin, I sucked in a few hard breaths through clenched teeth.
And I knew the truth.
I’d ruined this, just like I ruined everything. I dragged Deena into my apartment like I’d dragged Gracie into the neighbor’s yard. No one was safe with me. I wasn’t able to care for people the way they needed. My love was toxic. It killed.
My heart turned to stone as I watched blood drip from my palm and splash on the pavement between my feet. My throat was full of rocks, and I couldn’t get a full breath into my lungs no matter how hard I tried.
Deena was gone; she wasn’t coming back. And maybe she was better off without me. Maybe our child was better off without me. Maybe I was destined to ruin everything around me. Erica and Lila needed to leave before I ruined them too.
I nodded at my driver and let him dab at my hand, but I felt nothing. I stared at the smears of red on my palm until they were wiped away. My shoulders bowed under the weight of the thick, heavy, muggy heat. The weight of my failure. My grief.
This was the end of me and Deena, and maybe it was exactly what I deserved. A part of me died on that sidewalk, and I knew nothing would bring it back.
THIRTY-FIVE
