“No.”
He kept cooking like I hadn't just bitten his head off. That easy patience made me want to push harder, see what it would take tocrack that zen bullshit. Find his breaking point since I couldn't seem to find mine.
“Eggs are almost ready,” he said, sliding them onto a plate with practiced ease.
I took my coffee to the deck, needing air. The morning was crisp, that clean mountain smell that used to calm me down. Instead, my chest was tight, like someone was sitting on it. Everything was too much—too bright, too sharp, too fucking present. Like someone had cranked all the settings in my brain to maximum and broken the dial.
Through the window, I watched Dusty plate food with the same careful attention he gave everything. His hands were steady, sure. Everything about him screamed competence while I could barely hold a coffee cup without my fingers twitching.
My phone sat dead on the kitchen counter where Dusty had suggested I leave it. Yesterday that had seemed smart. Today it felt like being buried alive. No connection to the outside world, no escape route, no distractions from the noise in my head that just kept getting louder.
“Thought maybe we could try some breathing exercises after breakfast,” Dusty said, stepping onto the deck with two plates, steam rising from the eggs.
“I'm breathing fine.”
“Your shoulders are touching your ears.”
I forced them down, which lasted maybe thirty seconds before they crept back up. The eggs smelled good but my stomach was full of broken glass. “I need to move around.”
“Okay. Want to explore the property? There's a nice trail that loops through the woods.”
“Fine. Whatever gets me out of this place.”
The cabin felt like a cage, all those windows looking in instead of out, walls too close together, air too thin. I dumped the eggs inthe trash when Dusty wasn't looking and followed him into the trees.
The trail was narrow, dirt packed hard by years of use. I followed Dusty in his jeans and t-shirt, his hair knotted up on top of his head, with a stupid mini-backpack slung around one shoulder. Dried leaves crunched under my feet, oak and cedar, brittle from the Texas heat, and something about the sound helped, gave my brain a rhythm to follow instead of spinning in circles. My legs remembered what it was like to have purpose, even if it was just putting one foot in front of the other.
For maybe ten minutes, the physical motion kept the edge off. Then my brain kicked back in—worry spiraling about my career, about what sports reporters were saying, about whether I was having some kind of breakdown that normal people just powered through without running off to cabins in the woods.
“Vincent mentioned there's a bigger stream about a mile up,” Dusty said, stepping around a prickly pear cactus, its flat pads dotted with tiny spines that gleamed in the morning light.
“Great.” The word came out sharper than I meant.
“You're pissed at me.”
“I'm not pissed at you.” Except I was, and I didn't even know why. Maybe because he looked so fucking calm while my skin didn't fit right. “I'm pissed at this whole situation.”
“What situation?”
“Being here. Needing help. Having to talk about my feelings like some therapy patient instead of just dealing with shit like an adult.”
“You are dealing with it.”
“No, I'm hiding from it. There's a difference.”
The trail curved uphill through scrub oak and cedar, limestone jutting up through the thin soil. My breathing got heavier. Not from exertion—I was in better shape than most people half myage—but from everything else. The way Dusty kept glancing at me like I might explode. The way every sound felt amplified. The way I couldn't stop thinking about those pills with my name on them sitting in a Denver pharmacy and how much quieter everything would be if I had them.
“I asked you to help me get through a couple of rough days,” I said, needing to fill the silence. “Not psychoanalyze my entire existence.”
“I'm not—”
“Yes, you are. Every question, every concerned look. Like I'm some wounded bird you found on the side of the road.”
Dusty stopped walking. Live oaks spread their branches overhead, leaves rustling in the breeze. The air smelled like cedar and dust and something earthy I couldn't name. “Is that what you think this is?”
“Isn't it?” I turned to face him, spoiling for a fight. My hands were clenched at my sides and I could feel my heartbeat in my throat. “You get to be the healer, I get to be the broken athlete. Satisfying for your savior complex.”
His jaw tightened, first crack in that calm facade. “That's not fair.”
