“I haven’t been sleeping,” he said. “I’ve been thinking.”
“You could have fooled me.”
“And we have to talk about this.”
I took a deep breath. I took my earbuds out and he calmly started to talk.
“I’ve been pushing this around in my mind, and I keep coming back to two basic options. And, to be perfectly honest, they both seem a little crazy to me. The first one is that we say good-bye at the airport and that’s it. We said our farewell to Jonah, so our reason for... being together is gone if you think about it in one way.”
I watched his face. It betrayed nothing.
“And the second option is that I go back home, and in a couple months, back to school, and then...”
“Don’t say it,” I said.
“I have to say it at least once.”
“No you don’t.”
He sighed.
“Long distance,” he said.
“E-mails?” I said.
“Among other things. I mean, you have to admit, it’s how we started.”
“It’s howyoustarted,” I said.
This stung; I could tell. But he didn’t break eye contact.
“I don’t think I can do it,” I said.
He rested his hands on his tray table. His fingernails were chewed to nothing.
“What if there were rules?” he said.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “Things to make it more...”
He paused for longer than he needed.
“Real,” I said.
“Yes. That.”
He slumped lower in his seat and looked at the screen in front of him.
“What if we can only send one message a day, and therest is by phone or video chat, so that there’s something more to it. And...”
“I can’t do it,” I said.
“Tess.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m not trying to be unreasonable. I just can’t do it. It sounds like hell to me. Returning to hell.”
This quieted him. I hadn’t meant for it to come out so harsh, but there it was. I’d said it. I watched Daniel’s face fall. I took a sip of ginger ale and the bubbles stung my nostrils.
