What If

Miles steps forward. “Okay, that’s enough, man.” He stands next to me now, poised to move between us. “You’re drunk, and you’re going to say something you regret. I think you both need to sleep off the events of the evening and talk when you’re thinking clearly.” Miles turns his eyes to me. “Before either of you do or say something you can’t take back.”


I hook my arm through Miles’s, letting my hand rest on his elbow. Griffin flinches at the sight, and I pray for the floor to swallow me up so I don’t have to look in his eyes anymore and see what I’ve done to him, what I’m still doing, all in the name of pushing him away where he’ll be happier…eventually.

“There’s nothing to sleep on,” I say, angling to face Miles, but my eyes still on Griffin. “A clean break, right?” I shrug, a failed attempt at making this casual when it’s anything but. “We walk away with no hard feelings. That was the deal.”

“I thought we changed the rules.” Underneath the anger, his voice pleads.

“I changed them back,” I say, moving closer to Miles, squeezing his arm in mine.

“Maggie,” Miles starts. “Don’t do this.”

“It’s already done,” I say, not fighting the tears.

“Are we ready for our slumber party?” Paige strides out of the bathroom but grinds to a halt when she sees the three of us in front of the door. “I’m gonna take a stab at answering my own question and say no.”

Miles nods to Paige and motions for her to join us. “Take her home,” he says, unlatching my arm from his. “I’ll be there soon.”

Paige lays a hand on my shoulder and asks, “Are you sure?” I nod, letting her lead me past Griffin to the door. But I can’t keep from meeting his eyes one more time.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I really am sorry. But it’s better like this.”

Better for him, I tell myself. It would only be selfish to keep this going.

Then I let Paige push through the door and take me to her car. She doesn’t interrupt my quiet sobs as we drive through the empty streets back toward campus. She simply lets me cry, her free hand holding mine, no sound but my intermittent sniffles and vents filling the car with what must be heat. But I never warm up, my insides holding on to their chill.

When we get back to my apartment, I am hollow—no tears, no warmth. Paige piles blankets on top of me on the couch, then runs to her place for her giant pillows, the ones that will serve as bed cushions for her and Miles tonight.

But something propels me to move with zombie-like slowness to my bedroom. I stand at the foot of the bed, scanning the wall that spells out exactly who I am—reminding me of who I’ll never be. Photographs and captions mock where they should comfort. I spin to face my bed, see the photo of Griffin lying in his on my nightstand—the perfect night and the photo I took just for me. Not to remember his name or a drink order. The picture is simply him.

I take a few hesitant steps to my desk where my Polaroid sits, pick it up and look through the eye piece, first at the photo of Griffin, next at my bulletin-board wall. Then I slam the camera down on the desk’s faux-wood surface. Again. And again. I’m not sure what will give first, the desk or the camera, and when glass cracks and chips and spills out from where the lens should be, I know the desk has won.

Paige runs back in, a response, I’m sure, to the sickening crunch of plastic parts succumbing to my last-ditch effort at control. My back is to her, but I feel her eyes on me, know she stands in silence in the frame of my bedroom door, waiting for me to speak. I crumple into a heap on the foot of my bed, my eyes stinging from the need to cry, but the tears will no longer come.

“Oh, honey,” she says. “Your camera.”

She means what’s left of it, which is nothing retrievable. I made sure of that.

“No. It’s a stupid reminder of my stupid dependency on everything other than myself.”

Paige sits next to me now, her arm around my shoulders.

“This is you depending on yourself.”

She motions to my wall filled with photographs and notes.

I laugh, a bitter sound. “I look like I’m either a serial killer or the cop trying to solve the crime.”

She giggles, nudging me with her shoulder. “You just made a joke. You should try it more often, laughing at all of life’s Fuck yous. It’s like your own Fuck you right back.”

I bump her shoulder. “I’m okay. But I needed a tension breaker. It’s too late for me to scream without waking the neighbors, so the camera had to die.” I let my eyes fall on the destruction sprinkled across my carpet. “Fuck,” I lament. “My camera.”

“We’ll clean it up tomorrow.” She rises from the bed, her arm still around me, and I stand with her and let her lead me back to the living room, depositing me on the couch before she gets comfortable on the floor.

“Are you sure about all this?” she asks, curling up on the pillows and turning on the TV.

“No,” I admit, knowing she’s talking about more than the camera. “But it’s what’s easiest for both of us. We’ll get over each other, and we won’t have to worry about what kind of mess I’ll get into next. If it’s too much for me to handle, he doesn’t deserve to bear that responsibility as well.”

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