Page 84 of 32 Days in May

“What?” An incredulous laugh rips through me. I sit up straight in the chair, dropping my feet to the floor. My calf muscles twitch. “Have you lost your mind? We agreed to date for the month of May and now you want to support me financially?”

His expression crumbles. For the first time ever, Marco looks pissed. Actually angry—his features are hard, the heavy, shadowed lines in his face cutting through all his prettiness. “Then what are we doing? Just torturing ourselves?”

“I don’t know, Marco,” I push back. “This was your idea. You wanted an end date.”

“That’s not fair, Nadia.”

“Why? Because I agreed? You also agreed. I didn’t know you were even thinking about keeping me—”

“Of course I am. I’m here with you, giving you as much of myself as I can. I said so in Italy, Nadia.”

“You didn’t say it directly. I-I wasn’t—I didn’t think you wanted a serious relationship.”

“Okay, fine. Let me say it right now. I know I’m inexperienced, but I want to try. Even if I fuck up entirely, please stop pushing me away, because I can feel what you’re doing. You’re getting ready to run. But I have to even if I fuck u—”

“I have lupus.” The words tumble out of my mouth so fast they all come out in a jumbled string. My voice bounces off the ceiling.

Marco stills. Everything about him comes to a complete stop. He holds my gaze, unblinking. “What?”

“I have an autoimmune disease. Lupus.” I drop my eyes to my feet, my comically jovial pink toenails. “I was diagnosed six months ago. It’s . . . not deadly, not at first. But I was really sick back then, and that’s when I lost my job. Because I—um, I couldn’t do it anymore, and so they fired me. And I was so depressed I . . .” I bite down so hard on my lip I can actually taste blood. “I tried to kill myself.” Then, I laugh.

He doesn’t say anything.

When I look up at Marco, he swallows hard. “Oh my God.”

“This . . .” I hold up the gallon bag. “Is my medicine. I’m supposed to take it every day. But it’s been hard the last week so I’m starting to feel really bad. And, um, I hurt my hand”— I hold up my bandaged palm—“at work yesterday and it’s not healing well. I may need to go to urgent care later. So, yeah. I can’t go to LA. Because I’m not well enough and I definitely, definitely shouldn’t put my body under more stress.”

“Stress?” he says. Marco closes his eyes for a moment, bringing his thumb and finger to pinch the soft skin between them, then he casts his gaze to the ceiling. “Sorry. This is a lot.”

“It is,” I agree. “That’s why I didn’t want to tell you.”

“Are you still . . .” He clears his throat, bringing his gaze, glassy and distant, back to mine. “Contemplating suicide?”

Humiliation burns in the back of my throat, like hot bile. “Not currently.”

“And your sister? She’s calling because she’s worried about you?”

“We got into a huge fight. She thinks I’m fucking my entire life up, every second of every day.”

“Because of me?”

“Because of everything, Marco.” I flash him a sad smile. I can’t hold back anymore; hot tears brim in my eyes. “Because I’m broke and I don’t really have a job and I don’t really have friends—except Soph and Allie, who almost have to like me, because they’re scared for me, too—and I don’t even really have you. She didn’t want me to be with you; she thinks you’re using me, that I’m pathetic for agreeing to this. And I can’t blame her for thinking that way because . . .” I laugh again as the tears fall, heavy and slow, pulling through the little red rashes beginning to form on my cheeks. “I can’t even actually have you. I had to lie in order to have you for a fraction of a month.”

He doesn’t move to comfort me, and I don’t blame him. Instead, Marco pushes his hands through his hair again and stares wide-eyed up at the skylight as a cloud passes by, stealing away the sunshine.

“Nadia,” he says finally. He still won’t look at me. “I can handle this.”

“Can you?” I ask in a whisper. “I can’t come to LA or New York or Rome or wherever your photography takes you. I can stay here, in Evergreen, and I can live a small, manageable life where I’m healthy enough. And that’s it, Marco.”

“But you did—”

“I did,” I cut him off sharply. “I did, and I’m suffering for it. My body hurts. I hurt.” I feel a strange and terrifying—familiar—sense of acceptance. I stand on steady feet, leaving behind my book and medicine. Then, I move around him toward the hallway. I need to lie down.

“I know I need to say something,” he calls after me. I stop walking and, with my feet quiet, it hits me how utterly still the world has gone around us. No birds chirping. No music from the radio. No noise floating in from the street. “I know I do. Just give me some time. A moment to . . .”

I turn back and Marco’s watching me, eyes fixed in a severe look—an unfamiliar look. He’s a stranger after all, isn’t he? We’re strangers. His full lips have completely disappeared into a straight white line. “You don’t have to do anything, we can just do this, as . . .” I pause to inhale as much air as I can. “We can just do this as we planned.”

He doesn’t meet my gaze. “Were you ever going to tell me the truth?”