He sighs, rakes his fingers through his hair. “Sarah Turner? Does that name make sense to you?”
I nod. “She wants his job.”
“They want to talk to you. There will be an investigation.” He gives me a meaningful look.
“There’s no need for one.” I avert my eyes. “I pursued him. I literally stalked him. Went to his house. I fell in love with him. It was all me.”
“He was right,” Caleb mutters.
“Who was right?” I ask, but I don’t really care about the answer. It’s all automatic. I feel the animation and emotions leaving my body. I actually feel lighter, thinner because of it, like a little tap would turn me to dust.
“He told me not to say anything, but I know you. You’re insanely stubborn so… Thomas was here last night.”
I whip my gaze back to him as my heart drums from beyond its grave. “Thomas?”
“You were out cold. He told me to tell you it isn’t your fault. I wasn’t supposed to tell you that the message came from him though.”
“He…He said that? That’s what he said?”
“Yes. Among other things.”
“What things?”
Sighing, he turns his face, and for the first time, I notice the left side of his jaw is swollen. “He punched me. Told me it was because of what I did.”
My eyes widen and a pounding starts in my head again. Caleb puts a calming hand on my shoulder. “Relax. You’re gonna make yourself worse.”
“And he just left after that?”
“Yes.” He stares at me with pity. “He wasn’t going to stick around anyway.”
Caleb doesn’t say it but I can read his expression. What were you thinking? Sleeping with a married professor?
“Of course, yeah. I know that.” I shake my head as tears fall down in a thick stream. “Why would he?” I almost killed his family, I want to add, but my voice shuts down, along with every other function of my body. I become useless and limp as Thomas’ words swirl around in my head.
My family is dying because you love me.
How could I have done this to him? How could my love be so toxic? Selfish and greedy. A fucking demon.
It isn’t your fault. I don’t believe Thomas. How can it not be my fault? I went there when he specifically asked me not to. Maybe, he was just being kind to me while I was unconscious, and that kills me even more.
I thought I did everything right this time. I thought my love wouldn’t eat me from the inside out. I thought it wouldn’t hurt anyone.
Turns out, my love is cannibalistic. Turns out, I don’t deserve to love anyone, much less have that love reciprocated.
The Bard
Four Months Later…
He looks at me with bright blue eyes. His dark hair falls to his forehead and drool hangs from his lips. Yeah, I might need to get that later. But for now, he’s happy to be a free agent. He’s on all fours, grinning at me, or rather the purple blanket I’m holding in my hands.
“Come on, buddy. You want this?” I wave the small blanket at him and his grin gets wider. “Then come get it. Come on.”
I egg him on and he shrieks, and crawls over as fast as his knees and dimpled palms will allow. I laugh at his enthusiasm and haul him in my arms when he reaches me. His shrieks and mirth get louder as I lift him up.
He’s lighter than air but I know he’s put on weight. His red cheeks have become fuller and healthier. He is happy and oblivious. He doesn’t know that mere months ago he almost died, that the button from his favorite purple elephant almost killed him. And I wouldn’t want it any other way. I don’t want anything tarnishing his pure innocence.
Nicky gurgles when I put him down on the floor and give him his blanket. Muttering to himself, he snatches it from my hands and begins to rub his face on the soft fur. Then he proceeds to blow raspberry kisses on it, and I chuckle. A strained, almost choking sound. Something about his playful actions, about the fact that he can do this… that he gets a chance to do this, lodges something sharp in my throat.
I look up when I hear Hadley come into the room. She’s freshly showered, her hair up in a neat bun, and her smile in place. Like Nicky, she has grown healthier too.
“Do you want to eat now?” I ask. “We can think about unpacking a few things later.”
The boxes are stacked up by the wall of the living room. A lifetime of possessions, a life contained inside the four cardboard walls somehow fails to do justice to what we’ve all been through.
This is our new home now. We’ve been living in Jake’s empty apartment in the city for the past few months. But it was time for a change, to move forward. So we got a new place in Brooklyn.
Hadley gives me a shy smile. “Okay.”
I leave Nicky to play on the floor, and pad over to the kitchen and start taking out containers from the bag. I sense Hadley coming closer. She stops at the island, still standing. I look up at her and find her watching me. I swallow and almost drop the container, my hands going weak. It’s still surreal that she is here, that my son is alive, that we are a family, again.
I focus on the food, dishing the perfect portions of the kung pao chicken out.
“Thomas?”
I halt my movements, the fork dangling in the air. There’s something about her voice that gives me goosebumps. My entire body goes into defense mode and the attack hasn’t even come yet. It’s the subtle steel, the soft authority in her words. It’s a tone she has rarely used with me. We never had any use for it. Even during the early days when we’d only just met, we never clashed. Now I realize that was because she gave in to all my demands.
“Yes.”
She rubs her arms—a gesture so like her that my chest hurts—but her eyes are determined. “I want a divorce.”
A beat passes. Two. Someone laughs on the street. A car whooshes by. A woman shrieks followed by more laughter. My eyes go to Nicky. He’s still playing with the blanket, crawling with it tucked close to his chest. A chest that’s moving up and down, as he breathes. My own chest begins to heave, one shuddering breath after another at the sight of my son alive and breathing. Focusing back on Hadley, I admit that I’ve been wondering when she’d say those words, when she’d be strong enough, mentally and physically, not to need me anymore.
Not need me to get her meds, feed her, hold her while the nightmares make her cry—the only time I have the courage to touch her—and silently pray my own tears away because she needs me to be strong.
“I see.” I rub my fingers over my mouth, oddly stunned that the moment is here.
She smiles then. Slowly, she leans over, puts her hand on my shoulders and tells me to sit. I do, like I’m a child, incapable of thinking for myself or doing even the simplest things.
Hadley takes a seat and we sit at the island across from each other. “This feels nice,” she says. “It feels like old times.”
I clear my throat. “Yeah.”
“Look at the size of this thing. It reminds me of the tiny island you had in college.”
“It does.”
“You don’t remember it, do you?”
“I—”
“You don’t have to agree with me on everything, Thomas. I won’t…I won’t blow up or anything.”