I need to be there for her. I need to be that tiny sliver of hope in the darkness she once was for me. I need it more than anything. I needherand the fire she creates in me that nothing or no one else has.
Silent minutes pass over us. There is only our rapid breaths and the soft murmur of shuffles in the hallway to fill the weighted space. We stare at each other, her chest rising and falling like she’s trying to hold herself together. Finally, her lips part, voice barely above a whisper.
“I need you to leave.” she breathes.
The words smack into me like a tractor trailer carrying cinderblocks of heartbreak.
For a second, I consider I’ve misheard her, like the air itself might take it back if I just wait long enough. But the look on her face is unflinching. It’s not anger staring back at me. It’s something worse.Surrender.
My chest tightens, heat clawing at the back of my throat as I try to swallow everything I want to say. My mouth opens, but I hesitate, caught between the ache in my heart and the ache I can see in hers, the kind that lives in the hollow spaces no one else can reach.
“Fine,” I say, though it comes out broken, a word dressed up as indifference. I step past her, every movement heavy and deliberate, like if I move too fast, the floor might give out beneath me. My shoulder brushes hers, and for a moment, I swear she almost turns toward me, almost saying something. But she doesn’t.
The door swings open, and I let it close hard behind me. The sound travels down the empty hall in a final and definitive way.
I stop halfway down the stairwell, my hand gripping the railing with white knuckles. My pulse is a drumbeat in my ears, drowning out everything else. My throat is tight and my eyes sting. I want to turn back. I want to tell her I don’t care how broken she is, that I’d take every shattered piece if it meant she doesn’t have to face it alone.
I don’t—because I knew she’d ask me to leave.
Because staying would only break her more.
So I keep walking, each step feeling like I’m losing something I’ll never get back.
By the time I hit the sidewalk, the air is thick with the coming rain. Except when the first drop hit my cheek, I realized it’s not rain at all.
I don’t slow my pace the entire way home. My head continues to spin, caught in a whirlpool of wants and brokenness and all the things it keeps you from. Stuck between a truth I don’t want to face and the pain I can’t escape.
I can’t believe I’m here, feeling like I’m losing aneverythingI never meant to want in the first place. The closer I get to home, the heavier it all becomes. The absence, the what-ifs, the things I didn’t say.
By the time I reach my door, I’m not sure if I want to go inside or turn around and run back to her. But the truth is, there’s nothing to run back to. I’ve already lost her.
And the worst part? She was never really mine to begin with.
Track 15
“Night Lights” Nat King Cole, 1956
JAKE
IT’S BEEN A long few days. I’ve tried to put my last encounter with Alana behind me, but it’s burned into my memory, branded onto my heart. The twisted way she’s learned to think about herself has me clawing at the edges of my mind on how to make it right. How to make her see how absolutely perfect she actually is. Never mind how beautiful she looked.
Every time I replay the conversation in my head, all I hear are the things she didn’t say—that she wants me exactly as I want her. That her mind wanders to the same shameful places mine does. That she doesn’twantthis to be the end, but she thinks it has to be.
There’s nothing I can do about any of it.
“What up, what up!” Nate yells, tossing me out of my thoughts. He leans against the colorfully-lit bar in his Santa hat, which reminds me that it’s Donn’s Christmas party tonight.Strands of tinsel hang from various areas, and frilly gold garland drapes most of the banisters, accompanied by thick round Christmas lights. Donn’s is going for the 60’s Christmas vibes, and it’s safe to say it’s met the theme.
“What’s up, man?” I grab his hand across the bar, leaning in briefly before I dab the next three guys walking in behind him—Vince, Gerry, and my boy, Brian.
Brian gets his own greeting. I haven’t seen him since he left for the internship we had lined up in Seattle. I heard it led him to his dream job, which couldn’t make me happier for him.
“What’s up, Bri?” I say excitedly as he leans over the bar and brings me in for a full brotherly hug.
“Jake, you look great, man. How’s everything going?” He steps back and pats my shoulder. “You were a little bit of a mess last time I saw you. I’m glad to see you smiling.” He almost laughs lightheartedly, clearly pleased I didn’t jump off the bridge I was once on the edge of. The one I feel myself returning to.
“I’m good, brother,” I lie.
“Jakey Cakes?” Nate interjects. “He’s always smilin’ now,” he sings.
