Noah gave her a cruel look. “It means I’m getting retargeted ads for vasectomy clinics,” he said. “We’re on the same internet. Why are you looking at that shit?”
Her cheeks burned. “Sorry, I didn’t realize this was a totalitarian state,” she said. “I should have though, that’s totally my bad. How did Eudora put it?Noah doesn’t trust anyone but himself.”
Noah glared at her. AJ took that to mean she had an advantage and pressed on. “She thought we should be together,” she said. “That’s why she put me in the will. You must see that.”
Noah gave her a pitying look. “Eudora put you in the will because when I go you’ll be the only one left who gives a rat’s ass about her work. Even from that urn, she’s still using you.” He shook his head and looked down at his hands again, his face shuttering. “I’m not going to do that,” he said more to himself than to her. “You’re not going to be my caregiver.”
“Why not?” The words exploded out of AJ in a dry sob. She was asking him, but she was also asking herself. “Truly, what is so bad about having to care for someone you love?”
The question rang around the room, ricocheting off the ceiling tiles, and in that moment, AJ knew her answer.Nothing.As long as his heart beat, she would love him, whatever form he took.
Noah’s face was drawn. “It won’t be someone you love,” he said, a tear escaping down his cheek. He wiped it with his sleeve. “It will be someone you pity. It might be someone you despise. Trust me, I know what I’m talking about.”
It was the first time he had alluded to what it had been like to care for his mother. AJ heard a note of finality in his voice and charged ahead anyway. “We are not all built the same,” she said beseechingly. “You weren’t born loving someone worse off than you. I was.”
Noah shook his head. “You’re not listening. We are not going to live like that.”
“You don’t know what it will be like,” AJ insisted, hot tears welling in her eyes. “You still have good years left—maybe more than you think. Your life doesn’t have to end when you get symptoms. You’re not in this alone.” She took a step toward him. “We can do this together.”
Noah peered down at her without expression. “Tell me—in all of your searching, did you ever watch a video of what this disease actually looks like?”
AJ glared at him. “I met your mom, remember?” she said defiantly.
Noah smirked. “Yes. And as I recall, your response was ‘I couldn’t do it.’ ”
The air left AJ’s lungs. “That wasyearsago.”
“No. That was the truth,” he said. “And by the way, that day? That wasnothing.” He let that sink in. “I won’t do it.”
AJ was panicking now. This was thirteen years ago all over again. He was going to deal with this by leaving her, and there was not a thing she could do to stop it. She had burned through most of her ammo to get them to this point in May. The walls were closing in.
“You’re a fucking coward, you know that?” she said. Noah opened his mouth to respond but she plowed on. “You said you’d try your best, but you won’t actually try anything different or new. Even if it would mean keeping this thing we have alive, or forget that—getting yourself some substantive emotional support. You would literally rather die than give up control.”
Noah’s face turned in disgust. “Talking isn’t a fucking panacea, Age,” he said. “It’s what healthy people tell sick people to do so that they don’t have to feel guilty for being healthy.Just talk about it.I have an incurable, progressive, degenerative disease. I know those are just words to you, and that’s how they’re going to stay. But fuck if I’m going to stick around for it.”
AJ felt a surge of nauseous warmth. “If our positions were reversed, I would stick around,” she said unevenly. “I would stick aroundfor you.”
“If our positions were reversed, I would never ask you to,” said Noah quietly.
“You cannot kill yourself,” said AJ.
“Yes, I can,” he said. “And I’m going to.”
AJ shook her head. “Fucking coward.”
Noah glared at her. Too long passed before he spoke. “Fine,” he said dispassionately. “I’m a coward.”
AJ gasped. “Noah, I—”
“This isn’t what I thought it would be,” he said. “You need to leave, do you understand? You’re not wanted. Please go pack. I will drop you at your parents’ or at the train if you prefer.”
He stared at her unfeelingly. AJ listed, sluggish with shock and humiliation. She tried to summon her anger—what was left of it propelled her from the office. But by the time she reached the second-floor landing she could hardly breathe. The pink light from Eudora’s room looked safe, like the inner ear of a shell. AJ shut herself inside, flung her body onto the bed, and wailed.
Sometime later, she revived.She sat up and attempted to take calming breaths amid a dead woman’s throw pillows. In a bleak way, she supposed it was appropriate, given that Noah viewed himself as a dead man, and that was who she slept with every night.
A fresh pang of anguish welled up at this thought, instantly quelled by disbelief.
He was scared. He was scared, and lost, and she had walked in on him, butfuckif this didn’t hurt. Two hours ago they had been planning dinner. They could get back to that.
