"You didn't have to ask. You just assumed."
He opens his mouth. Closes it. Then, quietly: "I didn't assume. I just... I thought this was working."
"Itwasworking. When it was easy. When it was just sex and rebellion and no one had to think about what happens when it stops being fun."
"It's still fun."
"Is it?"
He doesn't answer.
I close the laptop again. Stand. Walk to the window and stare at the same black mountains he was staring at a minute ago.
"You want to know what I think?" I say, not looking at him. "I think you're terrified that I'll leave. But you're even more terrified that I'll stay and start thinking that you're not enough."
"Élise."
"And instead of dealing with that, you're just... pushing me away. Little by little. So when I finally do leave, you can tell yourself it was my choice."
He's behind me now. I can feel him. Smell him. The sweat and the cold and the faint chemical tang of the ice pack.
"I'm not pushing you away," he says.
"Then what are you doing?"
"I don't know."
I turn around. He's so close I can see the exhaustion in his eyes, the way his shoulders sag under the weight of everything he's carrying.
"I don't know how to do this," he says quietly. "I don't know how to be the guy you need and the guy everyone else needs at the same time."
"I don't need you to be anyone. I just need you to letmebe someone."
He reaches for me. I let him. His hands cup my face, and for a second, it almost feels like it used to.
Then he kisses me.
It's desperate. Rough. Like he's trying to fix something with his mouth that his words can't reach.
I kiss him back because I don't know what else to do.
***
He's packing when I wake up.
Not the slow, lazy kind of packing where you fold things and double-check the list. The efficient, mechanical kind. Duffel open on the bed, suit and base layers rolled tight like he's done this a thousand times. Because he has.
I watch from the doorway, arms crossed, still in his T-shirt from last night.
"What time's the bus?" I ask.
"Seven." He doesn't look up. Just keeps moving: knee brace, tape, extra socks, the small bag of supplements he pretends aren't a big deal.
"That's early."
"Yeah."
I step into the room, sit on the edge of the bed. My knee brushes the duffel. "I could come with you."
