“Since when?” Being lost felt like a waste of time and the e-mails he was getting back about his project were disheartening, but it was all okay with Selina next to him. The idea of her not being there was suddenly unbearable.
“Since we left the caves. Babe’s friend can rent me a room in Salt Lake. It’s near some bus lines so I can get to work once I find something, and it’s not far from the community college campus. It’s not much, but it’s everything I need right now. And my professor thought me working in the gallery was possible. His friend needs someone on a part-time basis. With a waitressing job, I could make it work. Maybe even to save up a little money. Get my independence back.”
The word independence registered in his mind but not before his heart fell out of his body and landed at his feet with as much force as he imagined went over the falls in front of them at peak season.
His mind climbed around and over that word, trying to figure out why she would choose to live in a rented room, ride the bus, and work two jobs when she could be driving around the west with him, skiing at some of the best resorts in the world. “I’ll pay for your ski lessons,” he offered. “It’ll be fun.”
She leaned forward to rest her arms on the railing, then looked over her shoulder at him. “It’s not the ski lessons or the hotels or the meals. Or the fun. I don’t think you’re having fun.”
“I’m having fun with you.” He folded his arms on the railing, too, their skin barely touching. He needed to touch her, to know she was still next to him, at least for this moment.
“I guess.” She shook her head, her blond hair bouncing around her face. The hair that had caught his attention only a couple of days ago. The hair he might never see again.
“No,” she corrected herself. “I see that you are. But you’ve never stopped checking your phones, and it’s not like you’re not scrolling Facebook. You’re waiting for an e-mail saying you can be let back in to the project that you sold. And if that e-mail comes through, well, I’m sure you’ll do as you promised and get me to whatever city I want to be in, but you’ll drop this man-of-leisure act in a heartbeat and every minute more you have to spend fulfilling your promise to me will be time you resent.”
“That’s not . . .” He was going to say it wasn’t true, but it was. And he wasn’t a liar. “I won’t get an e-mail inviting me to work on the project.” His heart was already on the ground and admitting the truth felt like his heart was now being kicked over the rocks. By feet shod in cleats. “I applied for a job at the company that bought Terry. Curtis sent my application back to me with an e-mail that said, You’re making a fool of yourself.” He clenched his fists in frustration. “I don’t know what else to do besides keep driving around and skiing. I’m done with the project of my life.”
He felt hollow and full of holes. Anything that got poured into him was going to drain right out. A sieve. A waste.
“Your choices aren’t just get back on the project or be a man of leisure.” Her brows were crossed in confusion, wrinkles covering her forehead. “You can do something else.”
“Something else like you’re doing? Finding a waitressing job and going back to community college?” His anger burned through the holes littering his body as he said the words, and it didn’t feel good. Nothing about this conversation felt good.
It all felt wrong. As if he was being dumped when they weren’t even dating. Only it wasn’t like the other times he’d been dumped. Once, in college, he’d felt like a child being denied a toy. And then when he was working on his project, a woman had dumped him because she never saw him. She must have been right, too, because he didn’t remember missing her.
But Marc wanted to have fun with Selina. He wanted to explore with her and get to know her better, see those moments when she was relaxed and when her face puckered into the strangely hot irritation that made her lips purse.
They weren’t a couple, and all she was asking for was their original agreement, but he still felt as though he was being rejected because he was at odds with himself. As though there were some defect in him that made him unworthy.
It’s not because you’re lost. It’s because you’re not trying to find yourself.
All the code running through his mind suddenly finished processing and his brain flashed with a result. She’d said something about him that was both true and something he didn’t like, and he’d responded by throwing accusations at her.
Not a way to plead his case.
He was silent for moment, letting the noise of the falls wash over him and the icy winter water cool the ashes his anger had left behind.