Of course, something would ruin this: the build of brightness, the growing comfort of having joy in her life, the steadily growing ease of waking up happy.
Sudden, sharp—a hot, acidic shock of guilt and shame hits.
Because of course, too, it would be her who ruined it: her, forgetting the anniversary of her parents’ death, in the blur of summer, in the blur of pretending she deserved things she’d only break.
Traffic blares around her, burn of tears, as Lili taps through her phone—squeezing her eyes shut, the thud of her heart as she accidentally sees the picture again—fast through her contacts: Jackie, Amina, James—no, no, no—and she goes into her recent calls.
“Lili,” he answers, a familiar low register, with sounds of the office, the warmth of his voice holding her name. “How are you?”
“I—” A sob breaks in her throat. The street is loud around her, indifferent.
His tone immediately changes. “What’s wrong?”
“I—I didn’t—I... I messed up, and I don’t—”
“Where are you?”
“Can I—” She bites back tears, staring up at the sky. “Can I see you?”
“Yes, butwhere are you?” The urgency in his voice pushes back at the irregular, increasing thud of her heart, like a panic attack about to take hold.
“Downtown,” she croaks out. “Sixth, in the—the Village.”
“I’ll be home in fifteen,” Aleksandr says. She can hear movement, the changing scope of sounds on his end: a door closing, footsteps. “Can you meet me there?”
Lili nods, before realizing he can’t see her. “Yes,” she whispers. “Yes.”
As she walks to Tribeca, she tries to hold herself together.It’s okay,she tells herself, but it seems like the worst kind of joke, the most despicable form of insult: to pretend that any of this—any of her—is okay.
Instead, as she somehow turns onto Walker, the only remotely okay thing—a sick wash of relief—is that it’s here, again: the familiar comfort of the floor falling out from under her; the reliable confirmation that there isn’t steady ground underneath her, but only water—dark water, inhospitable depths, pain so much bigger than her.
The elevator slides open, the openness of light and space.
“Lili.”
Already home, he’s waiting for her. She catches his expression of deep concern for a second before she’s kissing him, racing to overwhelm this panic before it ruptures.
He grasps her hair—good; she wants sharp hurt to burn her.
But Aleksandr’s hands are gentle, not rough, as he pulls away, and looks into her face.
“What happened?” he asks. His eyes search hers, serious.
“Nothing,” Lili insists, grasping the lapels of his suit. “Come on, just—let’s just—”
He holds her wrists. “Talk to me.”
“Stop—don’t—”
“Lili,please—what’s wrong?” he asks, trying to pull her into his chest, trying to calm her down. Fighting against his grip, Lili twists free, and he lets her. It makes poisonous disappointment snarl in her: she wants tohurt him, wants him to hurt her. She buries her face in her hands, unable to stand it.
“Don’t—don’t—Aleksandr, just fucking—hurt me—” Her voice breaks, rough like a scream trapped. “Just—justhurt me—fuck, I’m not asking for anything new—”
“Lili.”He grasps her shoulders, but she shrugs them off, knocking away his hands.
“What? This is what we do! Sex, that’s all—that’s—” Again, panic claws in her chest. She digs her nails into her palms. All she wants is clean pain: hurt that blots out the guilt, the shame.
“Not like this,” Aleksandr says, threading his hands through her hair. “Just talk to me—”
