I’m thirty minutes deep into today’s courageous plan of attack: hiding in the shower. That’s a full thirty minutes after Reed wrapped himself in a room-temperature towel so he could get ready for the day. At least twenty-five minutes after I rinsed conditioner out of my hair.
I’m literally standing under the hot spray, thinking about birds rather than facing the music waiting for me in the other room.
I’m not resilient. I’m neither brave nor cautious. My happiness is superficial. And I’m not thriving. In fact, I’m barely surviving.
Despite the hours we spent wrapped up in ecstasy after those beautiful professions, I’m once again in shambles. Not even all the orgasms could keep the reality away for long. My consequences are waiting in the other room.
Unfortunately, I can’t hide in here forever.
Resigned to my fate, I exit the shower. Once again, the towel’s temperature makes me pout. I never knew I was such a diva. Which bird is that, I wonder? A flamingo, maybe?
“I put your clean clothes on the bed,” Reed announces as he passes by the bathroom door.
“Thanks,” I toss as I rise to my toes at the bathroom sink and reach toward the top of the mirror so I can retrace the half heart.
My hand freezes before my fingers make contact with the foggy glass. The air gets clogged in my throat.
The half heart I drew last night is still there, but it isn’t how I left it. And not because it’s faded, as I would’ve expected it to be.
This is awholeheart.
Two sides.
The right side is easier to see, as if it were freshly drawn this morning. It doesn’t quite match my half, so I know I didn’t do it while floating on the THC cloud last night. Someone else must have done it.
Zara?
“The ghosts are real,” I mumble under my breath as I shift back instinctively. I whip my head around the room, keeping my vision low to the ground as if I’ll be able to see her. Like a first-class idiot.
Of course, I can’t see her. I sigh and shake my head in self-recrimination.
Even if ghosts were real, Zara hasn’t been haunting Reed’s condo for over two decades, waiting for this precise moment to finally draw her half of the heart.
She’ll never do that again.
Which means . . .
Reed obliviously bounds into the room right as I realize what he did. Meanwhile, I’m a statue of emotion overload as the implications set in.
A tremble rocks through me. My heart—the one inside my chest—plummets to the floor. Unable to look away, I stay locked in onZara’sside of the heart.
Reed stops behind me, wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling my back to his front. He kisses the curve of my neck and whispers, “Breakfast is ready.”
I don’t respond. I can’t.Heck, I still can’t even move.
All I’m able to do is stare at the mirror. It blurs as my vision fails. I force a blink, faintly noticing tears leaving damp paths down each cheek.
“What’s wrong, cookie?” Reed asks, shuffling around to face me.
Like before, no response materializes.
All I can do is cry while staring at something Ineverthought I’d see again.
I lose sight of the mirror entirely when he wraps me in his arms, cradling my head to his chest.
“Hey, it’s okay,” he coos, rubbing my shoulders lovingly. “Whatever it is, we’ll figure it...“
His consoling words are drowned out by my growing wails.
