The tears fall faster even as I find myself nodding. I'm lying to Kaz. The man I love.
I think he was pressured.
But I have no choice.
Kazeyuki wipes my tears and kisses the top of my head. "It's alright," he says softly. "I'll take care of it."
His gentleness breaks my heart. He's always so, so gentle, and maybe that's why...
He was pressured?
I can't seem to get the words out of my mind, and it's giving me an out-of-body experience as I listen to Kazeyuki talk to the manager, the manager talk to us, and then somehow we're back inside his limo, the jewelry shop fading out of view behind us.
The partition between us and the chauffeur is up. The leather is cool against the backs of my legs. The city slides past the tinted glass like a movie someone else is watching, and Kaz is sitting beside me without touching me, and the silence in here is too big.
"Can you...can you drop me home first?"
"Of course."
It's great that Kazeyuki agrees without hesitation, but what's not so great is when I realize ten minutes later that 'home' now ishishome because Emily's already terminated my lease.
"Kaz?"
"Hmm?"
"Remember the granola bars you left for me?"
That's one of my most treasured memories of him. The dark chocolate and sea salt ones.
"Do you mean the ones Nurse Prasida asked me to give you?"
But as it turns out, even that memory of his is also a lie.
“What about it?”
“I just...remembered, that’s all.”
It’s the closest thing to the truth that I can come up with. Because unlike someone here, I’m not good at lying, and I just...
God. Oh God.
I’m so, so tempted to ask him other questions, hoping that at least one of them would show that not everything I thought to be true about him—about us—is a lie. Surely there has to be at least one thing that’s real, and it would be enough to prove to myself that I’m wrong—
I think he was pressured.
But in the end...I just couldn’t speak. Couldn’t bear taking the risk of asking. Because a part of me is already starting to spiral into the truth, and all I want right now is to keep it together.
Just don't think.
Don't think.
We arrive at his apartment, and already I can feel Kazeyuki starting to notice that something's wrong when he helps me out of the backseat, and I can't...
I can't make myself hold his hand. Can't make myself even meet his gaze.
"T-Thank you. I'm s-sorry. I just...I'm sorry. I-I can go up on my own—"
"I know."
