“Jesus Christ, Tyler,” I mutter, exhaling as I tilt my head forward, pressing my hand across my forehead. I know I told him to try sneak across the hall, but I seem to have fallen into such a deep slumber that I totally forgot. I’m not used to being in my own room again and I’m certainly not used to having Tyler staying over. “Way to scare the hell out of me.”
Tyler’s standing by the side of my bed, but not too close, and as his sheer height towers over me his face is illuminated by the lamplight. It allows me to see the tightness in his jaw, the nervousness in his eyes and the lump in his throat. “I need to talk to you now,” he tells me quietly.
“Really? You need to talk to me now?” Holding my comforter tight against my chest, I reach for my phone on my bedside table with my free hand and check the time. It’s just after 4AM, so I groan and lean back against my pillows, rolling my eyes in irritation. That’s when I realize that Tyler’s still fully dressed, only now he’s pulled on a jacket. I get the feeling he’s not here to slip into bed alongside me, so I quickly sit forward again. “Tyler?”
Tyler chews on his lower lip rather anxiously as he rubs at the back of his neck. At the exact same time, he retreats away from me even further, moving toward the door. The light from the lamp on my bedside table doesn’t quite stretch that far, so there’s a shadow cast over his face that prevents me from seeing his expression as he says, “I need to get out of this city.”
At first, I don’t understand. His words don’t make sense and they come so out of nowhere that I don’t reply to begin with. I listen to the silence of the house instead, blinking at Tyler’s silhouette by the door. “What do you mean?” I finally bring myself to ask.
“I mean that I’m gonna leave for a while,” Tyler says.
My stomach twists, suddenly knotted. Now I’m wide awake and Tyler has my full attention. A shiver even surges down my spine as every inch of my body tells me that none of this is good. “Why?”
Tyler releases a slow, deep sigh. He walks back around to the side of my bed, back into the light, and his shadow flits across the walls. “There’s too much going on right now,” he admits, “and I need to figure things out.” Leaning back against my wall, he pauses for a second to string together his next few sentences, deeply thinking about the right words to say and the right things to tell me. The entire time, my body is growing stiff.
“You know, I don’t want to be anywhere near my dad. I can’t cope with it, and I don’t think I can handle your dad, either, because I might just end up beating the hell out of both of them.” Another pause. Now my body is starting to feel cold, even though I’m under the comforter. Worry crosses Tyler’s face and his voice drops to a whisper as he asks, “What if your dad’s right? What if I do end up like mine?”
“You’re nothing like your dad, Tyler.”
“But I am,” he argues, his jaw tightening. “My temper snaps just as fast as his used to, and that’s what scares the hell out of me. I want out of this city and as far away from him as I can get.”
“Come to Chicago with me,” I blurt immediately. It’s the first thought that hits me, and it’s not a bad idea. I’m leaving in the fall, packing up and heading halfway across the country to settle down in the Windy City. And I realize then that I haven’t once thought about what would happen in September when I left. I never considered the fact that Tyler and I would be separated by distance again, so suddenly the idea of Tyler coming with me to Illinois is the only thing I’m rooting for. Kind of like running away together. Kind of.
But my new plan for us both is quickly shot down, because Tyler simply says, “No.”
“Why?” I ask, both dismayed and confused. My moment of excitement comes to an end. So much for Chicago.
Tyler closes his eyes for a second and tilts his face down to my carpet, leaning against the wall. He still looks tired, and I’m starting to wonder if he’s even slept at all. The longer he takes to reply to me, the more nervous I grow, and it turns out I have every right to be anxious, because when he glances back up at me, his expression has contorted, twisting with hurt as he whispers, “Because I don’t really want to be near you either.”
I want to have misheard. I need to have misheard, because the moment the final word escapes his lips, Tyler’s lips, everything inside of me shifts. My stomach tightens even more than it already has and my voice catches in my throat, taken aback by his words. “What are you talking about?” I force myself to ask, my voice feeble.
“Maybe you were right before,” he says without hesitation, talking fast as he shakes his head. “Maybe we shouldn’t be together.”
“Where the hell is this coming from?” I demand, anger rushing through every single inch of my being as I push back my comforter and swing out of my bed, straightening up on my feet. I’m really praying that I’m dreaming right now. I have to be. Tyler would never say that.