“And then you can come and eat your salad,” Sean says.
I nod. Just because you’re trapped in a hotel room with a guy who is stalking your sister and killed his own brother, that’s no excuse for not eating your vegetables.
I gather my clothes, bring them into the bathroom. I watch myself in the mirror as I slip my shirt over my head, pull my pants up. I smile at myself in the mirror. I look terrified.
When I come back out, Sean is standing by the desk, the salad is laid out and next to it is a plastic fork on top of a paper napkin. The vitaminwater sits next to it. He’s taken the cap off for me.
“For you, my love,” he says. I walk over.
His phone starts vibrating. He reaches into his pocket and stops it. I stare at his hands. He grabs the back of the chair, pulls it out from under the desk. I sit. I stare down into the plastic bowl—limp lettuce, bloated red tomatoes, rubbery cucumber slices, corn, covered in a slick of sour-smelling vinegar. I stab the fork into a piece of tomato. A piece of corn is stuck to the side, like a small rotting tooth. I gag.
“You okay?” Sean says.
“Yeah,” I say. I put the tomato in my mouth, chew the cold flesh. Flesh. I gag again. I taste bile. Sean is standing over me, staring down. He puts his hand on my shoulder.
“I understand,” he says. “I couldn’t eat for almost a month after my brother died, but it will really make you feel better.” I nod. My thoughts are zipping around inside my brain, collecting speed as I remember different things he said, things he did that I’m now understanding in a new way.
“It’s hard,” I say.
“I know it is, baby.” Sean reaches out and strokes my hair. “I’m just so glad I can be here for you now. I’m just so glad I can be here.” He crouches down so his head is level with mine and he puts his hands on either side of my face, forcing me to face him. “You are in my heart now, Ellie.” He looks me in the eyes. “And that’s forever.” He leans in toward me, his lips parted, his breath hot against my face. And then, I can’t help it, I flinch, ever so slightly.
He leans back. “Oh God,” he says. He raises his hand to his mouth, his lips part. “That look you just gave me.” He stands and stumbles backward. “You know.”
“What?” I’m shaking my head. “What are you talking about?”
“You know,” he says.
His face is changing now, in slow motion, his mouth turning down, opening, closing, and opening. He’s blinking. His eyes are clouding. It’s too late. It’s too late.
“No, no, no, no, no, no, no,” he says. “Oh God, I’m so stupid. I should have known…you went into the bathroom to shower with all your clothes on, but when I came back, your clothes were all around the room. And you’d locked the door and…”
He walks slowly over to the closet, reaches up into the blankets and takes the bag down. He stares at the lock, his back to me. “…and these are not the letters I left the lock on.” He stares at me. I look down at the limp lettuce, at the bloated tomatoes. “Do you know how I know?” He waits for me to answer. I am silent. “Because I left the lock turned to Ellie.”
I can hear Sean’s footsteps, soft on the carpet. Approaching.
I should get up. I should run. But I am frozen in my seat.
I feel his hand on my shoulder. My stomach drops.
It’s too late. He turns me around in the chair, bends down, gathers me into his arms, squeezes me, tighter, tighter, and tighter. He pulls me off the chair until we’re crouched facing each other. It hurts how hard he’s holding me.
“Oh, Ellie,” he says over my shoulder. He sounds like he’s crying now. I think I can feel his body shaking. He strokes my hair, hard. “Do you love me, Ellie?”
I swallow. “Of course I do,” I force myself to say. My heart is pounding so hard I can feel it throughout my entire body.
He mashes our faces together in some sort of approximation of a kiss. His tears run down my cheeks.
“No, you don’t.” He leans back.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I say. “Of course I do.” But it sounds like a lie, even to me.
“It’s so unfair. So incredibly, terribly, horribly unfair. One mistake! I made one mistake in my entire life, and it ruins everything! I guess that’s the funny thing about a mistake like that, you can’t take it back. Even if you want to. You just can’t ever take it back. And here’s the worst part, it wasn’t even my mistake! Nina made me do it for her. I didn’t want to do it. She set it up so that I’d think I had to! I loved her and she knew it, and I know she loved me. Or at least she could have if she let herself. But then he wasn’t around and she still wouldn’t be with me!” His eyes are filling up again. “She tricked me!”
He clenches his jaw, a vein throbs near his temple.