“Have a seat. I made you some eggs.”
I turn back around as he sits, hiding my face under the guise of monitoring the food. My throat burns, head foggy with fear. I’m not ready for this conversation yet. I don’t like being rushed, and I can’t make big life decisions at the drop of a hat like Ewan can. I’m a thinker and a planner and a list-maker. I’m notreadyfor this conversation. I’m not fucking ready for him to leave.
“Shiloh?” he asks softly. I clear my throat, shaking my head and turning around to meet his eye.
“Sorry, did you say something?”
“I was just explaining the opening.” Ewan’s voice is sad, and his eyes are sadder. Saying goodbye before he’s even spoken the words. “I mainly sell my art to private collectors. They lend things to galleries on occasion, and this opening happens to involve a collector who’s bought quite a few of my pieces.”
Naturally, they’d want him there. It makes sense. I followed his career closely over the years, even made a few social media accounts so I could see more than what was shared on his website. I’ve seen plenty of pictures of these gallery shows, seen plenty of pictures of Ewan hugged by a slim black suit, striking and handsome as he smiled and laughed and chatted with the rich and famous. I hadn’t once looked at those photos and wished I could be at the party. I had wished to be next to him, though. To share the excitement and joy of creating something that others love, of hearing everyone tell him things I’d known long before he was famous.
Plating the food, I bring it over to the island and meet his eyes. Still sad. I can only imagine what he can see in mine. I take a deep breath and blow it out slowly, scattering those last few grains of sand before they can hit the bottom of the hourglass. Time’s up.
“Do you want me to go with you?” I offer, dread twisting my stomach when he looks shocked by the offer. If I’ve failed to impart to him how much I love him these past few weeks, then we’re doomed.
“To LA?” he asks in the tone of one clarifying I hadn’t meant the moon. “For the show?”
“Sure. If you didn’t want to go alone.”
His brow crinkles as his eyes bounce between mine. It’s scaring me that this offer has him so surprised. He can’t possibly think after all of this that I’d ever let him go without a fight again.
“You don’t have to. I’ll only be there for two days. I’ll fly outlate tonight, the opening is in the evening tomorrow, and then there are a few things I need to take care of in person the next day before I’m back on a plane.”
I fiddle with my fork, not wanting to say out loud the things I’m thinking in my head. I’m not sure I trust him enough to come back. Or rather, I’m not sure I trust him to come back right away. Time moves differently for Ewan than it does for the rest of us. He’s blown about by whims more often than he’s controlled by a schedule. I love this about him. I want to love it with the promise of proximity, not from hundreds of miles away.
“You’re coming back?” I clarify, wanting to ask for a promise on that front but not wanting to frighten or smother him.
“Yeah. Daniel booked the flight already. I emailed it to you.” He watches me, fingers tapping a beat against the marble island. “It’ll be a late night. The flight doesn’t land until close to midnight, so I’ll probably stay at the cottage so I don’t bother?—”
“You live here,” I correct immediately. Why didn’t I say anything sooner? Did I really learnnothingfrom the first time around?
“Yeah, I do,” he agrees softly. Inhaling deeply enough for me to see the outline of his ribs through his shirt, he looks down at the food he’s not yet touched. Not that I’m any better, with my food waiting in front of me. I doubt I’d be able to swallow around the panic if I tried.
“You’re coming back?” I ask again, truly unable to think beyond this. “I’ll come with you. Seriously, Ewan, it’s not a problem.”
“You don’t want to go to one of these galas, Shi, trust me.They’re awful. I’ll go and come back and…” He looks away, trailing off and frowning out the patio door toward the sea. I’d been hoping to go to the beach today, take him for a swim and lick the salt water from his skin later. Now he’ll need to pack, and instead of a day spent in the sun, I’ll get a goodbye.
Panic nips at my heels the rest of the day as I help Ewan gather his scattered things. Half is at my place, and half is at the Kelpie Kottage, still strewn about in a haphazard mess that makes packing a suitcase a hell of a lot harder. The fact that he’s packing a suitcase at all is actually starting to worry me. He has a home in LA. Surely there are unwrinkled, washed clothes there that he could wear instead of the mess of things that are currently being shoved into a suitcase.He’s not coming back, I think, watching him track down a stray Chuck Taylor.
Seven years ago, the days immediately following Ewan’s departure from Siren’s Point are hard to remember. They aren’t vivid and clear the way most of my memories of growing up with him are. Perhaps it’s because I took those out so often, shined them up and admired them the way one might do to a favorite keepsake. The time after he left isn’t like that, though. It’s nothing more than shadows and numbness and the crushing weight of saying goodbye to something you thought you’d have forever.
I’m reminded of it now, watching Ewan load his bags into the Jeep. I want to drive him to the airport—offered, even—but he’d reiterated how late his return flight is, telling me it made no sense for me to drive all that way when he’d want a car anyway. Slamming the trunk, he wipes his hands on his jeans.
“I’ll see you in two days,” he says, voice wavering but eyes steady on mine. “Two days.”
I can hardly swallow, let alone unstick my throat enough to manage my own goodbye. Two days. Two short days. I survived seven years without him; what’s another two days?
Everything, I realize, arms around his shoulders as I hug him. Two days is everything.
Chapter Twenty-Three
EWAN
Two hours after I land in LA, I feel it. The dissonance that comes with being separated from Shiloh and the ease with which I could slip back into my life here. Siren’s Point often feels like a little town tucked into a snow globe—beautiful and isolated and something to take out and enjoy, like a pretty little memory for a rainy day. It could be on another planet for how other it feels from Los Angeles.
Standing in the center of my apartment, I turn in a slow circle and look. Really look, for the first time. It’s not a living space, as such, even though it’s meant to be. I own two floors, this one and the loft above, which is meant to be a studio. Yet even here, in the space meant to be a home, brushes are stacked in a cup next to the sink. Paper is strewn about, partial drawings and measurements scratched into them and then forgotten. Itsmells strongly of acrylic and oil, and there’s a crate pushed directly in front of the television. Canvases. I remember taking the order before I left for Siren’s Point, not even bothering to tell the deliveryman to bring it upstairs. I could paint in the living room just as easily as I could in the studio. And hell, I wasn’t painting then anyway, so what did I care where the canvases were stored?
Blowing out a breath, I idly flick through the sketchbook on the kitchen island. I’m not super skilled at line drawing, but history has proven me to be a doodler. The book is filled with random notes in between the random drawings—a badly penciled centaur next to a partially constructed to-do list, “ask Daniel” written amongst a page filled with squiggles and random shapes. What I was meaning to ask Daniel, I will never know.
