“I can manage.”
“Damn it, Andrea...”
“No,” I said, and turned on him. “You don’t get to yell at me. I told you I didn’t want to talk and you followed me here and you’ve been glaring at Peter for two hours when Peter hasn’t done a single thing wrong. You’re acting like I’m being unreasonable when you just walked past my desk with Lorraine hanging off you like a goddamn ornament.”
He ran his hand over his face and his shoulders dropped. “I know. I’m sorry. Please, just let me drive you home and give me the car ride to explain.”
I looked at him. Sweaty, wrecked, covered in cat litter. I wanted to stay angry because staying angry was safer than what I actually felt, which was hurt. Deep, ugly, bone-level hurt that made my eyes sting every time I blinked.
“Fine. You get the car ride. That’s it.”
In the car he started talking about her being a family friend, their families being close, how she showed up unannounced and caught him off guard, and I cut him off.
“Are you fucking her?”
The car swerved. Just slightly, a twitch of the wheel, but I saw it. His head snapped toward me. “What?”
“Are you sleeping with Lorraine. Yes or no.”
“No. Absolutely not. Andrea, I would never...”
“Then what was that? Because from where I was sitting it looked a hell of a lot like a man walking out with his girlfriend on his arm. She was hanging off you like she owned you, Finneas. In front of me. At my desk.”
“She’s a childhood friend. Our families are close. She showed up and I...”
“Don’t.” I held up my hand. “Don’t give me the childhood friend speech. I know she’s a childhood friend. Everyone knows. She told me herself, weeks ago, to my face, that you were taken and I should get over my little crush before it became a problem. Problem. That was her exact word.”
The car went quiet.
“And I sat there and took it because I couldn’t exactly say ‘actually, I’m sleeping with your so-called future husband, but thanks for the advice.’ So I swallowed it.” I took a breath. “Thentoday you paraded her right by my desk. Looked right at me, saw me sitting there, did nothing.”
“Andrea...”
“She wants you. You know she wants you. You’ve always known. So calling her a childhood friend is bullshit. She’s not acting like a friend, she’s acting like a woman staking a claim, and you’re letting her do it.”
His jaw was tight, hands white-knuckled on the wheel.
“The issue isn’t Lorraine. I don’t give a shit about Lorraine. The issue is you.” My voice was shaking and I hated it. “You let another woman who is not your girlfriend, who is not your partner, who has no claim on you, hang all over you right in front of me. You didn’t stop it. Didn’t pull away. Didn’t say a fucking word. You just walked past me like I wasn’t there.” I pressed my hands flat against my thighs to stop them from trembling. “Do you know what that felt like? Sitting at that desk, watching you walk by with her on your arm, knowing you saw me? I felt invisible, Finneas. You made me feel invisible in a building where I work for you, where I sit outside your office every single day.”
His hands were tight on the wheel. Neither of us spoke.
“It’s either a proper relationship with mutual respect or nothing at all,” I said. “I told you before and I’ll tell you one last time. You pull this again and we’re done. There won’t be a conversation, there won’t be a car ride, I’ll just be gone.”
He was quiet for so long I thought he wasn’t going to respond. Then: “You’re right. I’m sorry.”
We pulled up at my house and I reached for the door handle. He said my name, rough and low.
“I’m sorry, Andrea. It won’t happen again. I want to be with you. Only you. Nobody else.”
I looked at him. His face was open, miserable, genuine, and I hated that I still wanted to lean across and kiss him because I was supposed to be angry. I was angry. Wanting him didn’t make the anger smaller, just made it harder to hold.
“I need time to think,” I said.
I got out, went inside, closed the door. Leaned against the hallway wall with my palms pressed against my eyes.
The house was dark and quiet around me. No Fin on the porch, no warm body pressed against my leg. Just me and the silence and the image of him walking past my desk with her arm through his, burned into the backs of my eyelids.
I slid down the wall until I was sitting on the floor with my knees up, head back against the plaster. Angry, hurt, tired. I could still hear him saying “only you” through the door. I wanted to believe it. Wasn’t sure I could.
