She shakes her head. “It was selfish and wrong. I know that. I’m embarrassed, and I’m sorry. I had a chance to see what you really felt, and I took it.” She closes her eyes and rubs them. “I’m sorry, Dorian.”
Her apology feels genuine, but the ick won’t leave. I twirl pasta around my fork and take a bite, but I don’t taste anything. “You could have stopped me.”
“I know. I should have.”
There isn’t much more to say.
“But the thing is, I agree with you,” Piper says. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have put him in the hospital so early; it showed my hand and gave away too much. You’re brilliant, you know that? Maybe if you’d been my beta reader, I’d be the one topping the charts.”
“You almost are,” I say, ignoring her joke and trying to eat another bite. I don’t want to overreact here, but I’m hurt. It makes the words fall from my lips much more bitterly than I mean them.
Piper catches on, though. She pushes back from the island and stands. “You know what? I’m gonna go.”
“I picked you up.”
“I’ll order a rideshare.”
She walks around me, leaving the kitchen with hurried steps. She can’t get out of here fast enough.
I should stop her. Iwant tostop her. But it’s like my spirit has detached from my body, watching the ordeal unfold from above, seeing her request a ride on her phone and pull on her coat and shoes while I sit at the island and do nothing.
My brain is screaming at me to go after her, to tell her to stay so we can talk things through. But, like every time before, my mind and my mouth don’t connect, and I don’t say any of the things I want to.
I stand, walk to the front door, and find her sniffling, which breaks my heart. I want to pull her into my arms, despite the hurt she’s given me.
“See you later,” she says, then catches herself. “I hope. I mean, you don’t have to finish the class.”
“You could do it. You said it had to be a published author.”
Her eyes shoot to mine. Low blow? Her status is a secret. I understand why she can’t teach.
But still, that’s all that comes out of my mouth.
“Good night, Dorian.”
I stand at the door, watching her walk down the driveway and turn down the street. She must have dropped her pin farther away from my house so she wouldn’t have to wait out front, which stings a little.
It shouldn’t, though. I pull out my phone and send her a text.
Dorian
Let me know when you make it home?
Piper gives my message a thumbs-up, so I go back inside and shut the door. I don’t return to the kitchen. My appetite is completely gone. Instead, I need to write. There’s a bone-deep urgency compelling me into my office.
I sit at my desk, turn on my computer, and navigate to my writing software. The sting of betrayal makes my movements jerky, but there is no shortage of words. Anger flows from me onto the page for a handful of paragraphs before my hands freeze.
What am I doing?
Yes, Piper hurt me. But if anyone understands the desire to keep a pen name private, it’s me. When would she have told me? I’ve only been back in her life for a few weeks.
Am I overreacting? No. I won’t say that. I need to process each of these emotions. She shouldn’t have let me go on about her book for as long as she did. But pushing her away doesn’t seem like the right answer, and pouring all this emotion into my characters feels wrong. It was a coping mechanism that served me well in college—or maybe it only served to keep me safely inmy own little world, tucked away from facing hard things. From facing Piper.
I’d rather spend my energy on her.
I push away from the desk and find my shoes. My house is far enough out of the way that it could take a while for a car to reach her—there’s every chance I could catch her in time. I blow through the door and run down the driveway, booking it in the direction she’d walked.
When I see Piper standing at the end of the road, my heart leaps. I’m not too late. This can still turn around. She looks dejected, which kills me.
