“Wow,” Everly breathed and straightened, raising her brows. “Looking for the truth amongst your lies?”
“Looking truth, yes.”
The words came out wrong — I always second-guessed myself — but they were all I had now. And she had to understand. She had to see. She had to.
English had too many words. And they were always the wrong ones.
Her expression stalled, her eye twitched, and she pulled down the handle of the suitcase.
I stepped back, sighed, and gestured to the room. “Fia’s drawer.”
She tiptoed over one of the notepads and opened the bedside drawer before opening the suitcase on the tiny space on the bed. She emptied everything without paying much attention. When she closed the drawer and looked around for anything else, I reached around her to the photo frame of Fia and me with Vincent after she’d taught him to roll over. We were grinning.
I’d spent the last four nights falling asleep staring at it, cursing myself for ruining everything.
I inched it towards the suitcase, but Everly stopped me with a hand that covered Fia’s beautiful face. “No,Zoltán.”
“Please.”
“She doesn’t want to see you. In person or in a photo.”
I sat beside the suitcase, clutching the frame tight, staring down at her smile. I didn’t have much left to give, but I would give her my all.Everything.
Everly moved around the room, her boots trying to avoid my mess. She emptied Fia’s side of the wardrobe, took the shampoo and toiletries from the bathroom, and then the silk dressing gown I’d cried into last night.
Would my tears still be there when she pulled it, crumpled, out of the suitcase?
What I wouldn’t give to see her smile like the photo again.
My finger stopped brushing across her cheeks when the violent sound of the zip sounded beside me. Everly tried to lift the suitcase to the ground, but I waved a hand and offered to do it for her.
She stood there, stared at the case, then up at me. “Are you…” She sighed. “Are you okay?”
Her eyes had softened from the blazing anger in them five minutes ago.Maybe she would listen.
“Is she?”
Everly avoided my gaze.
“Your health.” She spun one of the many rings around her fingers. “Are you okay?”
“Not dying,” I said with a shrug.Feels like it though.
“Fia?” I asked. “She okay?”
I lifted the sleeves of my jumper and gestured at my forearms, where the red marks had been on her.
Fia’s sister — Fia’s favourite person in the world — swallowed, nodded, and finally looked me in the eyes. “I’ve never seen her — I’ve never seenanyone…” Her breath stuttered, and her voice broke. “She’s heartbroken, Zoltán.”
It wasn’t a comfort. My lip trembled, eyes stinging. The pain flared in my chest, a burn that seemed endless.
“But she hasn’t done that again. I think it was the shock.”
I hugged her, hard and fast, squeezing her because that was the only good news I’d get. If I caused her that pain… if it was my fault…
She hugged me back, sniffing, and when she eventually pulled away, we were both fighting tears.
Everly laughed awkwardly once, a strangled sound from the sob she kept silent. “Look after yourself, Zoltán.”
