Page 125 of Secret Paths

Too honest.

I stand, but I stay by the chair. “I respect that you do not want this. I do. But I cannot keep acting as though you are only a secret I get to visit when no one is looking.”

Her face changes.

Not anger now.

Something worse.

“I never said only.”

“No,” I say quietly. “You just keep choosing it.”

The words land hard.

I wish I could take them back, but I won't because they are true.

Mandy shifts the shopping bag from her lap.

“I should go.”

Every part of me wants to say no.

Stay. Sit down. Have tea. Tell me what you are afraid of and let me hold it for five minutes without trying to solve it.

But I have just told her I need to stop being a secret. Asking her to stay would make a liar of me.

“All right.”

She goes upstairs to dress.

I stay in the living room and listen to the floorboards creak above me. The television is still paused. The house feels painfully ordinary around me, which seems unfair when everything inside me is not.

When she comes back down, she is wearing her own clothes. My jumper is folded over her arm.

She holds it out.

I take it.

Neither of us says anything about that.

At the front door, she puts on her coat. I open the door before either of us can stand there too long.

Mist has settled over the lane, softening the hedges and stone walls.

“I am not punishing you,” I say.

“I know.”

“I just need to protect myself a bit.”

Her mouth trembles once before she presses it firm.

“Good,” she says.

It is a terrible word for that face.

She steps outside.