Page 168 of My Unfinished Heart

I heave in a breath because I’m not choked up anymore. I’m fucking crying. I’m crying for the first time I can ever remember. But it doesn’t feel like a release. It’s all just pain.

It’s pain in the pit of my heart, and it hurts like a motherfucker.

“Hey, no…I'll talk to him—I’ll call him right now⁠—”

I sniff loudly and wipe at my face. “Please don’t.” I reign it in. It was a weak moment, but it was only a moment. “Let it go. Just leave him alone. I think we've done enough damage, don’t you?”

“We? What did I do?”

“You slit your fucking wrists, Connor. He found you dead in a bathtub full of blood.”

The line goes silent. I think he’s hung up, but then I hear his rapid breathing.

“I’m sorry,” I say quickly. Shit. What the fuck is wrong with me? “I’m so sorry." I don’t know what else to say.

Several seconds pass before he says anything. “What did he say to you?”

“I’ll be home in the morning. Let’s talk about it then. I’m just gonna get some sleep, and then I’ll head back, all right?”

“Archer, just tell me. I won’t break. I promise.”

I don’t believe that. If nothing else, Connor is still so breakable. “He wants to start over. We have to let him. We both owe him that.”

“No.”

“Connor—“

“No. No,” he says, angry.

“Listen to me⁠—”

“NO!”

And then he does hang up.

There’s no point staying awake. He’ll wake me up when he gets to the hotel anyway.

I text him the hotel information and my room number.

Please come here first.

He’s buzzing when he gets to the hotel. He tells me he had three Monster energy drinks on the drive. His caffeine-induced mania is a lot for my sluggish mind to take in. He stands at the foot of the bed, talking at me with his hands.

“Here’s the plan. In the morning, I’ll go over there. I’ll talk him into seeing you again. He’ll listen to me. He always listens to me. Then I’ll come back here, and you can go over there. Unless you think it would be better if we saw him together. Would that be better? I was going back and forth about it, and I don’t know. What do you think? I think he might need to see us both at the same time. Not like an intervention, but kind of, I guess. Does it sound too much like an intervention, because if it does, then I should just go over there first. I can lay the groundw⁠—”

“Stop. Jesus. Shut up. Here,” I toss him my pill bottle from the nightstand. “Take one and calm the fuck down.”

“What is this?” he asks, picking the bottle up off the floor after it hits him on the shoulder. “Klonopin? Is this what you take? Why didn’t I know that? Does it work?”

“I was sleeping, wasn’t I?”

“Were you?”

I put my arm over my eyes and lie back on my pillow. I hear the bottle opening, the rattle of the pills and the lid going back on. Thank God.

He sits down much too close to my head. And I say too close because his voice is still so loud. “I just don’t understand what happened between now and when I saw him. It’s only been a couple days. He was fine. I mean—a little sad, not really talking much, but I figured that was because of you and what a tool you were when you ran into him at the rehab.”

I let that one go.