The sun was sinking toward the horizon when Alex finally returned to the cabin, exhausted in a way that had nothing to do with physical exertion.
He'd walked the entire island. Every beach, every path, every spot where her laugh had once filled the air. A self-inflicted tour of his own failures.
Now he sat on the porch—their porch, where they'd shared coffee and watched sunrises and slowly stopped being enemies—and let the silence press in around him.
This is what you chose, the silence reminded him.This is what safety feels like.
It felt like drowning on dry land.
A memory surfaced, unbidden. Megan's voice, sharpand knowing, from a phone call three weeks ago. Right before he'd left for the island.
"So,"she'd said, in that tone that meant she was about to poke at something he didn't want poked."Any romantic prospects I should know about? Or are you planning to die alone surrounded by fish specimens?"
"I'm going to a deserted island for six weeks, Meg. Not exactly prime dating territory."
"Right. Because location is definitely the problem. Not the fact that you've been single for—what is it now? Three years? Four?"
"I've been focused on my career."
"You've been hiding."
He'd bristled at that."I'm not hiding. I'm just?—"
"Avoiding. Deflecting. Convincing yourself that the reason you're alone is because relationships are too complicated, when actually you're just terrified of letting anyone get close enough to leave."
"Thanks for the amateur psychology."
"I'm not being amateur about it."Her voice had softened, which was somehow worse."Alex. Mom dying didn't teach you that love hurts. It taught you that loveends. And instead of accepting that and loving anyway, you decided never to start."
"That's not?—"
"That's not what? Not true?"She'd laughed, but there was no humor in it."You've dated exactly four women since grad school, and you found reasons to push away every single one. Too clingy. Too demanding. Too present. You know what those things actually have in common?"
He hadn't answered.
"They wanted you to show up. Actually show up, emotionally, and you couldn't handle it."
"I show up."
"For your research, sure. For your fish. But for another human being?"A pause that felt like a finger pointed straight at him."You don't avoid relationships because you're bad at them, Alex. You're bad at them because you avoid them. And at some point, you're going to have to decide if dying alone is really preferable to risking something real."
He'd changed the subject after that. Made some joke about her nursing degree not qualifying her for therapy. She'd let him off the hook,because Megan always did, but her words had lingered like a splinter under his skin.
He'd dismissed them. Told himself she didn't understand. That his solitude was a choice, not a prison.
But sitting here now, in a cabin that still smelled like Lily's shampoo, surrounded by the evidence of everything he'd let slip away...
He couldn't dismiss it anymore.
Megan was right. She'd always been right.
He didn't avoid connection because he was bad at it. He'd made himself bad at it so he'd have an excuse to avoid it. Built walls so high he could pretend they were load-bearing, essential to his structure, when really they were just keeping out the light.
"That's not protection,"Megan had said."That's just loneliness with extra steps."
God, he was tired of the extra steps.
Night fell slowly, the sky shifting from orange to purple to the deep blue-black of a tropical evening.
