Page 124 of See You Next Tuesday

“I don’t know!” Gabe smacked the table. “It fucked me up so badly when they didn’t ask me to run the campaign the first time, and then to have them come back on their knees, so desperate for me to do the only job I’ve ever dreamed of doing—I had to take it. I had to.”

“But don’t you think that’s exactly the problem?” Anya leaned toward him. “That we aren’t like Kira and Simone? That we consider ourselves before each other?”

“Wait.” Gabe looked at her in complete shock. “Are you saying you don’t think we should be together?”

“I don’t know.” Anya felt terrified. “Maybe?”

“Anya, how can you say that? This was just a campaign, it was just work—”

“Not to me!” Anya protested. “It was the culmination of everything I’ve ever wanted to do with my life, of what my mom wanted for me. I can’t believe that you don’t get that.”

“I do, I do get that.” Gabe slid his chair toward hers. “I had no idea how hard it was going to be, working on opposing campaigns—”

“Hard for you?” Anya asked skeptically. “Really?”

“Are you kidding? You guys had each other. I had no one to talk to, I was completely alone. My job was this miserable, endless slog, and you were off having the time of your life with Hugo—”

“Hugo?” Anya almost laughed. “Why are you bringing up Hugo?”

“I don’t know.” Gabe’s nostrils flared. “Is he relevant to this conversation?”

“Not unless you know something I don’t. And what do you mean, you had no one to talk to? We talked all the time!”

“Not about work,” Gabe countered. “I could never tell you how awful it was for me, because we had more money, and we were winning. And then, even when you had more money and you were winning, I still had to be the bigger person and swallow however I was feeling about it because you were always standing on the moral high ground.”

“You run ads like that and then talk to me about the moral high ground? You were the one slinging mud!”

“Do you have any idea how hard I tried to keep those ads off the air?” Gabe raised his voice. “I fought for months, I pulled every move I could think of, I put the campaign and my job on the line—but none of that matters to you, because you have these impossible standards that no one can ever live up to. Those ads only went live because the senator himself overruled me.”

“That’s worse! Don’t you see how that’s worse?” Anya was so upset she was shaking. “That you would put us through all this for a man who would do that?”

“That man is the only candidate who has a shot at winning!” Gabe said. “God, Anya. You gave me shit for all these years that I just want to be liked, that I do whatever anyone else wants me to do. I guess what you really meant is I should do whatever you want.”

“And what you want is to work for a man like Wheeler? Really?” Anya shook her head. “I’m not asking you to have my values, Gabe. I’m asking you to live up to yours.”

The look on Gabe’s face when she said that was so awful, so hurt, Anya didn’t know whether to wish she could take it back or feel relieved she’d finally said it out loud.

“You think we have different values?” he asked. “You don’t think I want the same things as you?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I have a hard time justifying how you could take that job if we did.”

He stared at her in disbelief. “So you’re going to throw this away because I worked for one campaign? I don’t mean more to you than that?”

His voice faltered a little at the end. She thought of him sitting in the ambulance with his mother, looking broken, like a lost boy.

“You mean everything to me.” Anya closed her eyes and let the tears spill down her face. “I just don’t know how many more times I can let you hurt me.”

“So that’s what this is.”

Anya opened her eyes. “What do you mean?”

He shook his head. “You’re afraid. You went through hell after your mom passed, and you’re going through hell now, and instead of letting me be there for you, you’re blaming me and running away because you’re too afraid of the hell you might one day go through if you don’t leave me first. Right?”

“That’s not true,” Anya whispered, but Gabe wasn’t buying it.

“Anya, I know you,” he pled. “I know you better than I’ve ever known anyone, and I love you more than I’ve ever loved anyone. When I promised I would never leave you, I meant it. So you don’t have to do this, okay? You can just— You can stay with me, and we can figure it out. Please, Anya. Please, just stay.”

He was crying too now, and it was horrible—it was so much worse than when he yelled.