Ring.
He’d left with Karin. I saw that. But given the look on her face, I didn’t know how long their conversation would be. Either way, he said he’d always be there for me.
I needed him.
He needed to tell me I wasn’t the morally bankrupt shrew my mother implied with a soft click of her tongue and an arched eyebrow.
“You’ve reached Gregory Fitzgerald …”
“Shit, come on,” I hissed at the phone when I was greeted with his voicemail. I pressed end, waited a second, and called again.
“Here ya go,” the cab driver said passively as he pulled up to a bar I’d never been to.
“Thank you so much.” I gave him far too much money and slammed the door shut, desperate to get Gregory live on the phone.
After hearing his voicemail greeting two more times, I leaned against the cool brick of the exterior of the bar, deciding to call one more time. All he had to do was answer, and assure me. It rang only once before a brief silence. I knew he’d picked up because I could hear the sounds of traffic.
“What?” he spit out. His tone was toxic.
I hesitated for a moment, convinced he wasn’t speaking to me, that maybe he’d answered the phone without checking the caller ID.
“Hello?” His tone hadn’t changed.
My voice took on an ungraceful tremor. “Hi. I … um …”
“I can’t do this right now,” he snapped as he ended the call.
I pulled the phone away as the timer blinked :15, mocking the time it took for Gregory to prove I was no different. That we were no different.
The last fifteen seconds I’d ever speak with him.
Savannah
I checked the time on the departures display. It was 9 a.m., which meant I still had three hours. I’d spent a small fortune to move my departure up a week, especially given it was a non-stop flight once we got to New York. Sticking around in the purgatory that had become Boston, though, wasn’t a healthy option.
My phone rang again, and I breathed a sigh of relief as I checked the caller ID. It was Nathan, who was hopefully on his way. Gregory had called half a dozen times this morning, and I’d sent him straight to voicemail. I knew he was probably calling to apologize. To tell me he was sorry. He didn’t really have anything to apologize for. Well, maybe both of us did. After all, he was in the car with his wife, undoubtedly arguing. About me. And that was the point really. She was his wife.
I wasn’t.
No matter how much I wanted it, no matter how much I might fantasize, no matter how much it might seem right, the fact was, he was married to someone else. And that was an insurmountable obstacle.
I answered the phone. “Hello?”
“Am I too late?” Nathan asked.
“No ... I’ve got an hour or so before I go through security.”
“Good ... I’m just looking for parking. Where are you?”
I looked around then gave him my location in the terminal.
After saying goodbye, I sank down on my heels, holding onto my flute bag with one hand and stifling a cry with the other.
I was relieved I’d had the good sense to throw jeans and a t-shirt into my flute bag before the performance last night. I’d intended to change into them before the after party, but I changed in the dirty bathroom of a dive bar at 3 a.m., cramming my green satin dress into the garbage can on my way out the door. It was Gregory’s favorite; I’d worn it when I saw my mother perform on my birthday in 2001. It was the first time I caught Gregory eyeing me in a way that tightened my belly and made my neck hot. Surveying my curves as I’d introduced him to my mother, his eyes barely left my body as he shook her hand.
This was it. This was how my perfect summer with Gregory was ending. Not just my summer. Our story. Over like this—me, alone in Logan on zero hours of sleep, waiting for my 16-hour flight back to Moscow. I hadn’t said goodbye when I should have. I hadn’t been clear with him about going back to Bolshoi, but he hadn’t asked, either.
Honesty.
I shook my head, lamenting over the muddled intentions of that word. Lofty promises and dreams on the horizon. We believed them, though. I believed him when he said he would do anything for me, because I’d meant it when I said it to him. As odd as it seems, I had no reason not to believe him. Gregory had always been honest with me, even in the beginning. Even when I was just his student. He’d always shown me a side of him he never let anyone else see. Who he really was. No matter what truths we’d bent over the years, we were always pure in our interactions with each other.
I can’t do this right now.
He couldn’t do the one thing I needed. In the moment when I held onto his honesty, his word, the tightest, he failed me. I knew he was in the car with his wife, but I didn’t need him to say anything to me other than It’s going to be okay or I’ll call you as soon as I can. Something other than the annoyed and angry dismissal I received. How people behave under intense stress shows a lot about who they are.
And he couldn’t be bothered.
I felt my body shudder, another suppressed sob trying to force its way out of my body.
Nathan’s voice. “Christ, Savannah. You look like shit.”
“I haven’t slept,” I said. I started to cry again.
Nathan sighed. “Ahh, shit.” He slumped down to the floor next to me and pulled me into his arms. And that was all it took to reduce me to a sniveling mess.
“Marcia told me you called her.”
I nodded. “Is she pissed at me for not coming home?”
I felt Nathan’s chin moving back and forth across the top of my head. “No. We were all concerned, though. You just kind of disappeared. Did you talk to him?”
“He wouldn’t talk to me … or couldn’t ...” My tears came harder as I grasped at the fabric of his shirt.
“Fuck,” he whispered.
“I’m so sorry, Nathan.” My voice was louder than I’d intended, given I was trying to speak over my tears.