Ispent the better part of two hours convinced I’d die of embarrassment if someone caught me sitting at their doorstep, but it turns out, embarrassment is the least of how I feel from Joe’s silent treatment.
I keep flicking my phone screen as if any second now I’ll see his name pop up. It doesn’t. I even tried calling again. Voicemail. I hung up before his greeting finished because the sound of his voice made me want to scream.
I wait; what else am I supposed to do? My stomach keeps trying to crawl up my throat, and the more I try to slow my breathing, the faster it gets.
Headlights sweep the street, and I tense, mixed with a slap of relief when I see their Jeep turning the corner.Finally.
I jump to my feet and nearly lose balance. For a split second, hope flares but then I see who’s driving when the car pulls in.
It’s Liam.
It’s fucking Liam.
He slams the car door so hard the entire frame shudders, and I flinch. He stalks up the driveway with the energy of someone who’s about to punch through concrete and doesn’t pay attention to my existence whatsoever. What else is new?
I call out, “Hey.” But the sound comes out tiny compared to the energy he emits.
He doesn’t even look at me.Not one glance.
He unlocks the front door, pushes it open, and strides into the house, leaving the door gaping like an invitation or a threat. I guess I’ll find out and take the bait. My legs are on autopilot, and I follow him inside, moving as quietly as I can, catching sight of Liam’s silhouette in the living room, shoulders hunched, fists balled so tight his arms tremble as he drops his keys on the counter with a sharp clatter and stands there breathing heavily.
“Liam?”My voice barely makes it past my lips. It’s a whisper bathing in heaviness.
He doesn’t turn or even flinch.
I stand, unable to move, waiting for him to acknowledge me as he walks across the room to the backyard like a fierce storm and grabs some gloves.He rips the cover off the heavy bag hanging from the tree and starts pounding it with animal force. Hard. Brutal. Like he’s trying to erase something from his bones. Each punch sounds like flesh against meat, like rage turned physical.It fills the surrounding space with violence, and worse than the sound is the silence that follows every hit.
That awful, stretching silence.
I’m frozen in place in the doorway, not knowing if I should move closer or disappear altogether. He goes at it for a full minute, my heart matching the hits and my throat constricting before he finally speaks.
“Why are you here?” His voice is hoarse, cracked open, and it shatters me out of a daze of concerns I have growing inside me.
“I was—waiting for Joe.” The words sound so small, so hollow in the air, and suddenly I hate them.
He lets out a bitter, humorless laugh. “You sure about that?”
My pulse skips. My hands won’t stop shaking and a tingly feeling creeps up my face, fear.
“Did he—did Joe say something? Is he mad at me? Because I—” I can’t finish. “I just want to talk to him. That’s all.”
Liam doesn’t answer. He keeps going.
Hit. Hit. Hit.
His body coiled tight like a weapon unsheathed.
Something’s wrong. More wrong than usual.
I take a step closer, needing to see his face, needing to witness whatever’s unraveling in his eyes.
And when I finally catch them, I know.
He’s not angry. He’s wrecked, as if he barely holds it together.
“If you see him—” I take another step closer. The thought that he could hurt me crosses my mind, but I don’t care. With tight composure, he looks like he’s about to snap and, in an instant, he stops punching the bag, rips the gloves off, and turns his back on me. “You’re not seeing him anytime soon, neither am I.”
“What? Why would you say that?” I say with panic. I’ve held it together, but now I’m unraveling.
