“I’m managing.”
“You’re not, but you’re also not going to listen to me tonight, so—” He pushed to his feet and zipped up his jacket. “Just … don’t stay here all night, okay? Go home. Shower. Sleep in an actual bed.”
“Yes, Mom.”
He flipped me off with a grin that didn't quite reach his eyes, then walked out the door.
The office fell silent. Just me, the glow of my laptop, and the remains of a pizza I didn’t have the appetite to finish.
My phone buzzed again.
I told myself not to look. I lasted about twenty seconds.
Wyatt
I don’t know what game you think you’re playing, but this is getting old.
I stared at the message, my thumb hovering over the screen. Part of me wanted to type something back. Wanted to manage him the way I’d always managed him, smoothing things over, keeping the peace, making sure Wyatt Hastings never had to sit with discomfort for longer than absolutely necessary.
But I couldn’t be that man. Not anymore.
Because a much larger part of me needed to be someone Taylor could be proud of.
I locked the screen and went back to work.
At eleven o’clock, I put the finishing touches on the plan and emailed it to Kendra, David, Michael, and Maya, then sat in the dark for a few minutes, feeling the strange emptiness that seemed to always follow the completion of something I’d poured myself into.
I grabbed my jacket and walked across the street to my depressing apartment, David’s voice echoing in my head.
You look like shit.
I dropped my bag by the door, plugged my phone into the charger on the kitchen counter, and forced myself to walk away from it.
In the bathroom, I avoided the mirror for as long as I could. When I finally looked, I saw that the shadows under my eyes had developed their own shadows, and my skin had that chalky, grayish look of someone who was running on fumes. And the beard I’d been letting grow—first, because Taylor had liked it, and then later, because I’d stopped caring about the details—made me look haggard.
I opened the medicine cabinet and pulled out my razor. The scrape of the blade against my skin revealed something closer to a version of myself that I recognized. It wasn’t a fix. I knew that. But my appearance was something I could control, and right now, control was in short supply.
I showered until the water ran cold, standing under the spray with my palms flat against the tile and my head bowed, letting the heat work through the tension I’d been carrying in my neck and shoulders.
When I finally shut the water off, the silence pressed in on me from all sides. I missed talking to Taylor as I got ready for bed. I dried off, pulled on sweats, and walked back to the kitchen to fill up a glass of water.
I bypassed the sink and went straight for my phone. I had the fortitude of a fucking toddler.
Of course, there was yetanothermessage waiting for me.
Wyatt
Pick up your goddamn phone, Sebastian.
This is your final warning.
I deleted it, then gripped the edge of the counter, my knuckles white against the granite, my head hung low. I breathed through the pain, through the frustration, feeling my eyes burn.
After several minutes, I picked my phone back up, scrolled to my contacts, and hit the button before I could talk myself out of it.
“Sebastian?”
A low sob tore out of me. “I miss you.”
