They’d accepted Ethan into their family wholeheartedly, automatically setting out an extra plate at dinner and an extra bowl of cereal in the morning. The first time Ethan had shown up with his shoulder throbbing, nearly wrenched out of its socket, Sam’s father had wanted to call the police, but Ethan had begged him not to. It would have only made everything worse. That night, Sam’s parents had made up the guest room for him, instead of his usual sleeping bag on the floor of Sam’s room. He hadn’t gone home for three weeks.
He’d envied so much about Sam: his easy charisma, his creativity, his quick wit. He knew Sam had been jealous of him, too. They’d entered high school the same height, barely five and a half feet tall. The summer before their junior year, Ethan had sprouted up five inches, and then another four before they’d graduated. Sam wasn’t unattractive, and he was so damn charming that he’d never had trouble dating, but he’d always joke about how he had to talk women into liking him despite his appearance, not because of it. Once Ethan had grown into his looks, the amount of attention he got from girls just from standing around and scowling had been borderline unsettling.
But even so, Ethan felt like he was always trying to keep up with Sam. When they’d watched their first unpolished VHS “dailies,” Ethan had been shocked at how wooden he looked next to Sam. Sam was a natural from the beginning. He’d brought everyone to tears as Tevye in their high school production of Fiddler on the Roof; a half-WASP, half-Italian seventeen-year-old flawlessly channeling a middle-aged Jewish peasant. Meanwhile, Ethan had white-knuckled his way through his one song as Perchik, the handsome socialist revolutionary.
When Sam and Ethan were fourteen, Sam’s parents had thrown a party, and the two of them had made off with a six-pack without anyone noticing it was missing. They’d sat on it for a week like a pot of gold, waiting for the right moment, before each chugging three warm cans and meeting up with some of their other friends at the park. This is what it must feel like to be Sam, he’d realized. He felt lighter, his inhibitions stripped away, making everyone laugh, saying exactly the right things. That is, until his head started to spin and he’d puked in the bushes. But more so than any of the other important relationships in his life—Sam, Nora, and now Grey—it had been love at first sight.
Ethan sat on the edge of the bed, hands pressed against his temples. His breathing was ragged and his head ached. His eyes drifted to the minibar.
He was going to make it through this afternoon. He didn’t have a choice.
* * *
—
GREY ARRIVED BACK at the hotel sweaty and out of breath. The hours had slipped by before she knew it, and she’d hastily said her goodbyes and dashed out of the restaurant. She fired off a few apologetic texts to Ethan as she dodged cars, running across the street against the light, to no response. By the time she pushed the door of their room open, it was twenty-five minutes after they were supposed to leave.
“Fuck, I’m so sorry,” she wheezed, darting into the bathroom to splash water on her face and touch up her makeup. No response. She poked her head out of the doorway.
“Ethan?”
Their suite was empty.
She returned to the bathroom and checked her phone again. Nothing. She swiped it open and called him. A faint buzzing came from the other room, and she dropped her eyelash curler into the sink with a clatter.
When she darted into the bedroom, her stomach plummeted. Ethan’s phone was sitting on the nightstand. Her mind raced. Maybe he’d just run out to get something from the bodega and forgotten his phone. As ten minutes passed, then twenty, this seemed less and less likely. It was possible he’d decided to go to Queens without her—but unthinkable that he’d do it without even sending her a text first.
After two excruciating hours, she did the only thing she could think of. She called Nora.
Thankfully, Nora picked up on the third ring.
“Hello?”
“Hey, can you talk?” Grey’s voice sounded overly perky.
“Sure. One second.” Grey heard her excuse herself, then the muffled sounds of the street. “Is everything okay?”
“Yeah. No. I don’t know. I’m really sorry to bother you, I just didn’t know who else to call.” Grey closed her eyes and took a deep breath. Saying the words out loud would make it real. “It’s Ethan. He’s gone. He left his phone; I don’t know where he is.”
Nora was silent for so long that Grey had to check to make sure the call hadn’t disconnected. “Hello?”
“How long has it been?”
“I don’t know. At least two hours. I came back to the room and he wasn’t here.”
“And he was supposed to be? You had plans?”
Grey sat down on the edge of the bed and rested her forehead in her other hand.
“Yeah, we were going to go to Queens and see Sam’s parents.”
Another silence. Then Nora sighed heavily. “Has he done this with you before?”
“No. Never. Do you know where he is? Should I be worried?” Too late for that.
“You shouldn’t. But I don’t blame you if you are. Trust me, I’ve been in your place before. There’s nothing you can do right now.”
Grey took a deep breath. She didn’t want to ask. She had a feeling she already knew the answer.
“Where is he?”
“If I had to guess, probably in the back of some shitty bar.”
Grey was silent.
“I’m sorry, Grey. I wish I had something better to tell you. But I’m sure he’s okay. Or as okay as he ever is. He always comes back eventually.” It sounded like Nora was talking about a wayward housecat that’d escaped their yard.
“I just feel really…helpless.” Grey lay back on the bed, her legs dangling over the side. She covered her eyes with her arm. Nora tsked sympathetically.
“I knew that coming back to New York might be tough for him. Maybe I shouldn’t have pushed. That night at dinner…” She trailed off.
The silence hung heavy and significant between them.
“Did you…when you were together. Did you ever talk about him trying to get sober? Give him an ultimatum?” Grey’s voice was hollow. She felt exhausted.
Nora sighed again. “No. I mean, we fought about it all the time, but I never put my foot down. Maybe I should have. I’ve always believed that you can’t force anyone to change unless they want to. I hoped he would come to it on his own, but maybe I was just enabling him. Things didn’t get really bad until after Sam, and by that point I had to do what I could to protect myself, protect the girls. I couldn’t sit around and wait for him to get his shit together anymore. But I really wanted things to be different with you two. You’re so good together. He seemed…better. Like maybe he was ready.”
“Yeah.” Grey wished the conversation were over. She wanted to crawl into bed and sleep, even though it was barely dinnertime. When she woke up, Ethan would probably be back, and she could pretend everything was normal again. The knotted feeling in the pit of her stomach was no longer about the mystery of Ethan’s absence; it was about the conversation that would have to happen upon his return.
“Thank you, Nora. For everything. I’ll let you go now.”
“Anytime. I mean it.”
Though she had been anxious to hang up, once she did, she regretted it. Now there was nothing to focus on but the seemingly endless expanse of time before Ethan showed back up.
Grey thought about texting Kamilah, but she knew what she would say. That if she let this kind of thing slide even once, he would keep pushing it. She would be teaching him how to treat her. This was the moment to tell him to shape up or ship out.
But then, maybe she was being a little dramatic. Was it really such a big deal that he blew off their plans one time—the first time ever? She didn’t even know for sure where he was. He’d been pushed into coming here. He was overwhelmed. It made sense that he would need to let off steam alone for a while. She was just looking for another excuse to cut and run. No relationship was perfect. There was probably a reasonable explanation for everything.