I paused. “I meant the royal ‘she,’ like when Whitney Houston said ‘I’m every woman.’?”
“What?”
I kept going. “If she and Jay find out on their own, it’d be worse than if we’d just confessed.” I didn’t add that my relationship with Jay would also be irrevocably ruined.
“I know.”
“You seem so… calm.”
Tristan took my hand again. “I’m not calm, Cat. I’m on fucking antidepressants.”
I burst out laughing. Then I said, “You don’t feel bad?”
“I never said I didn’t feel bad. I feel awful, but half the time I feel you and I exist on a different timeline.”
I watched him, annoyed. “What do you think Nia would say to that?”
“That I’m full of shit.”
“Are you?”
He paused for a long time. “I know you think I have zero integrity, but I do have some.”
I didn’t think he had zero integrity. It was more like on a scale of one to ten, his integrity was a three and a half.
The wind blew forcefully off the water. Tristan shielded me from it with his body. An overwhelming sadness settled over me, a sadness that encompassed everything. Trash bobbed in the river: yellow McDonald’s wrappers, metal Coke cans, plastic bags crumpled like the face of a depressed clown. Darkly, I wondered if there were parts of the plane and helicopter floating by.
Tristan softly fingered my cheek. “You and I are more alike than you think.”
I scoffed. “How?”
“I might be monogamous and you—”
“Are you monogamous? You’re fucking two women. The math’s not math-ing, love.”
Stepping closer, he cradled the back of my neck. “We both want what we want.” His voice dropped in a way that was both hot and scary, like, what in the dark romance was happening? “And we’re willing to pay the price for it. Even if it bankrupts us.”
My stomach turned from the ugly clarity of that statement. “So you just want to lie forever?”
“Of course not. I just—what should we do then?” His voice cracked. For the first time, I registered his agony over what we were doing. The emotion seemed to come from nowhere. Maybe he was as good at hiding his guilt as he was at compartmentalizing.
I’d been telling myself that Tristan was simply a side quest on my polyamorous journey. But the more time we spent together, the more false this felt. All arrows pointed toward walking away from him, salvaging what I had with Jay. But it was like I was being physically held back from the exit.
He took my cheeks in his hands and kissed me on the forehead. I wanted to laugh, to say,youarefull of shit, but really, I wanted to cry. I felt safe then despite both our safety nets in the world, already flimsy, disappearing from underneath us.
Chapter 46
My blood jumped when I saw an attachment from Anwar in my email. I was afraid he was going to start sending me unsolicited dick pics. But it was a picture of the tree.
from: [email protected]
Hi “Cat,” I wanted to share a picture with you of the tree. Also I’m curious how you can afford to pay hundreds of dollars. You seem young from talking to you. You don’t have to answer if you don’t want.
Sincerely,
Anwar
