My entire life feels wrong and there’s no scented candle to make it okay. It’s too quiet, clean, and empty. Too much like before, when I was licking my wounds – except much worse because now I know what I’m missing.
What I’ve been missing all my life.
I miss him. Not the sex or the banter. Him, in all his chaotic, unfiltered glory. He never tiptoed around my edges. He barged in, filled the place with life, and made it feel like a home instead of a hole to hide in. His presence made my tightly-wound world less controlled, but also less lonely.
Pressure builds behind my breastbone again, a knotted mass of unshed tears and unspoken words. It needs to go somewhere. I turn to the bookshelf, a chaotic jumble of genres and sizes. If I can’t fix the gaping wound in my heart, I can at least organise something.
I ditch the tea and move to the shelf instead.
‘Red goes here,’ I mutter, pulling books from shelves and stacking them on the floor. ‘Then orange, yellow, green…’
Elvis watches from the sofa as I sort novels by their spines. The mindless task is supposed to soothe me. I sit back on my heels, surrounded by piles of books that suddenly mean nothing to me.
‘What am I doing?’ I ask Elvis, who blinks once, deeply unfazed by the question and my general existence outside of serving him food and giving him belly rubs on demand.
I pick up my phone, Instagram is still open, and I’m greeted by a wall of red hearts. Notifications I haven’t cleared. Comments. Stories. A flood of hearts and fire emojis and little gifs of cartoon couples kissing. One photo in particular – me in Finn’s lap, both of us in full, unguarded smiles– is still getting likes. Comments.
* * *
So cute!! Obsessed with these two. Can’t wait for the wedding!
* * *
The thought strikes without warning, a snap behind my eyes and the sick lurch of my stomach catching up a second later.
Fuck. Fuck!
Our fake relationship hasn’t ended.
Not publicly. Not for the cameras or the fans or the sponsors. As far as the world knows, Finlay Lennox and Theodora MacMickin are still very much together, still Edinburgh’s favourite sporty couple du jour.
The thought is a cruel joke. One last piece of shrapnel lodged deep where no one can see.
Our contract isn’t up, our story not over. I’m still his fake girlfriend. I should be drafting a press release, a gushing social media post about being a supportive partner in his move to France. Long distance love and all that bollocks.
My eyes settle on the riot of colour on my floor, the piles of red and orange and yellow. An organised rainbow of my own making and a pathetic attempt to impose order on a feeling that has none. I abandon the books, drift to the sofa, and sink into the cushions. There’s a faint scent of his aftershave, a scent that clung to my sheets and my skin and now it’s fading.
I press my face into it like a goddamn junkie.
Finn didn’t just fill the space in my flat. He filled my silences and hollows. He saw the fault lines in my defences, and, instead of exploiting them, he settled in beside me and made it feel okay to not be perfect.
I’m a caretaker and project manager. I fixed his reputation. That was the job. But he saw me, not the schedule or the polish or the woman who always has a contingency plan. He caught the slack in my smile, clocked the tremors under the surface – and liked it.
My fingers find the remote. I flick through channels, the noise a meaningless blur. A cooking show. A nature documentary. A game show where people are squealing with joy over a new washing machine. I let the remote fall onto the cushion beside me. Elvis hops onto my lap and nudges my chin with his head.
And that, for some reason, is the thing that finally breaks me. A deep, shuddering breath escapes me, a sound that is half sob, half gasp. I wrap my arms around my cat and nuzzle my face into his soft belly, letting the tears I’d been holding back fall. Silent, hot, and pointless.
The truth is: Finn didn’t leave. I pushed him out, I told him to take the offer, because I was too scared to say what I wanted:
Please stay.
Chapter 22
Finn
My lungs are full of razors.
I’m sitting on the bench, head in my hands, trying to breathe without my chest collapsing. Every muscle screams, each joint aches. I pushed myself until the world went fuzzy at the edges, chasing an exhaustion that might finally shut my head up.
