“I brought a few other things, but Nate said none of it made sense in his place.”
“What a dick.”
“He wasn’t really being a dick. He was just stating the obvious. He already had stuff, and he didn’t like mine. I think if I’d said I wanted to keep everything, he would have been fine with it. I guess I just wanted him to like it on his own, you know?”
It was the first time I had doubts about whether I was makinga mistake. What if it didn’t end with plates? What if all the things that made memewere stamped out so slowly I didn’t even notice? But I shook myself out of it. Moving in with someone meant compromise.
“You chose each one of those plates,” George says. “They’re more than plates, and that lamp is wrapped up in your childhood. They’re part of you. You’ll have another apartment, and you can make it yours again, bring back all of your Frankie bits and bobs.”
“I got rid of everything.”
For a moment George looks sick, and I think maybe I wasn’t nuts for caring so much about my things. But then he rallies. “When I’m back from Mexico, we’ll go hunting. We’ll find old plates and frilly lamps and the old-fashioned crystal glasses you like.”
“Okay,” I say, my throat tight. I don’t want to dwell on the fact that we only have three days left together. “Why didn’t you like him?” I ask quietly.
“Honestly?”
“Yeah. Please.”
George swallows. “Despite what I said at Christmas, he wasn’tthatbad, but it all happened so fast. One day you were dating and then you were engaged. I didn’t want you to make a decision you couldn’t reverse.”
“Marriage is actually fairly reversible.”
“If you had married him, you would have done everything in your power to make sure it worked. I know you, Frankie. You’re a Jo March, through and through. You would have lived and died for him.”
He’s referencing one of Christian Bale’s lines from the movie, and I know he’s right. I don’t like to fail, and while I don’t see divorce as a failure in general, I’d likely hold myself to a different standard.
“Maybe,” I murmur.
“Absolutely,” George says. “I can’t believe you’d ever question whether you were a good partner. I’ve always felt like I won the lottery having you as a friend.”
“Really?”
Lines form between his brows. “You’d do anything for the people who are important to you. Moving next door to you remains the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”
Now my nose tingles and I look away.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” I say, but the word comes out choked.
“You can tell me anything. Please don’t shut me out.” George’s voice is calm. Soothing. I shift so that I lie facing him, and he does the same.
“I feel like you left me behind. You’ve been traveling overseas nonstop for the past three years. Then you pulled away after our fight at Christmas. George, I really didn’t know if you were going to come to the wedding.”
“I’m sorry,” he says. “I know I was a shitty friend to you. I felt blindsided by your engagement. I was angry that I found out the way I did. But if I could take back the way I behaved, I would.”
“You wouldn’t have told me I was making a mistake?”
His mouth slants. “No, I’d still tell you that. But I’d do it very differently.”
We watch each other for a moment, and I realize that mypulse is fluttering like hummingbird wings. Somethingisshifting between us.
“It’s not just the last six months,” I say. “Things have felt off for a few years.” Ever since he came back from covering the fires. I thought he’d spend more time in Toronto after that, but he journeyed farther and farther away. “Did I do something wrong?”
He shakes his head. “You’ve done nothing wrong. It’s all me. I’ve been trying to figure some things out, and I needed to do that on my own.” He pauses, his jaw flexing. “I didn’t mean to hurt you, or make you feel like you don’t matter. Nobody matters more to me than you and Mimi.”
My lungs are two balloons beneath my ribs, and I’m not sure my chest will be able to contain them. As I stare into George’s eyes, at that electric blue ring around his pupils, it hits me.
