They’re not even from the same conversation.
By the time I get to the end, I feel hollowed out. There’s nothing left but spite and static.
I hand the phone back. I don’t trust myself to look at Darius, but I do.
He’s not watching the water anymore. He’s watching me, face still calm, but his hands are white-knuckled, thumb pressing so hard on the phone it’s a miracle the screen doesn’t shatter. “Ididn’t believe it at first,” he says. “I thought, maybe it’s just the draft, maybe he’s reaching for drama.”
He looks at me, searching for something I don’t have. “But it’s all you. All your words.”
“He made me feel like I mattered,” I say, the taste of it thick and metallic in my mouth. “That was the whole trick, wasn’t it?”
Darius nods, just once. “He does that. He’s always done that.”
I want to throw up. Instead, I run my tongue along the edge of my teeth, tasting blood and old whiskey.
There’s a long silence. It’s the kind that should be broken with a punchline, but I don’t have one.
Darius finally speaks. “We can go to Coach,” he says. “PR. Get ahead of it. If this goes live?—”
“No.” I don’t even recognize my own voice. “If we do that, it’s just more meat for the grinder. Let me handle it.”
He blinks, surprise flickering across his face for the first time. “You sure?”
“Yeah.” I look at him, really look, and there’s a tremor under the surface, a ripple of anger so deep it makes my own hurt look like a paper cut. “Let me handle it,” I say again.
He nods, slow, and we sit there, just the two of us, the cold seeping through our jeans and the city spinning out around us.
The wind slaps my face, stings my eyes, but I don’t wipe them. I let it freeze the tears where they are.
For a second, I think he’s going to put his arm around me. He doesn’t. Instead, he bumps his shoulder against mine, just once, hard enough to remind me I’m still real.
When he stands, I stand with him. He doesn’t say goodbye, doesn’t make a speech.
He just holds my gaze for a second longer than I can stand it, then turns and walks back up the path, shoulders squared, ready to murder anyone who tries to hurt me again.
I stay on the bench, watching the water until the sky goes full black, the phone heavy in my hand.
I know what I have to do next.
But for a minute, I just sit there, letting the cold settle in, letting the ache get comfortable.
I close my eyes, and for once, I don’t flinch from the pain.
I welcome it.
Because it’s mine, and no one else’s.
Not anymore.
———
The walk back to my apartment is a half-marathon through cold and memory.
Every step away from the waterfront bench is a step into some version of myself I used to be, except now the old tricks don’t work and the jokes aren’t funny and the only thing I want is to scream until someone tells me it’s not my fault.
The apartment is exactly the way I left it, socks on the radiator, pizza box by the sink, a hockey stick balanced on the coat rack like it’s waiting for a better owner.
I drop my bag, peel off my jacket, and leave it on the floor because nothing matters except the pounding in my chest and the knowledge that tomorrow, or maybe sooner, everyone who ever mattered will know the story, Vincent’s story, not mine.
