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My mother decides to stay for that night’s family therapy session, and the reception desk assures us they’ll get her a ride home, so Rob and I return to the car alone. We reach the highway, and he rests his hand on my thigh.

“It’ll be good to have you back home,” he says.

Oh, God. I’m not sure how I’m just realizing this now, but tonight will be our first night alone since we got back together. And there are things he’ll expect. I’ve slept with him a thousand times, but the idea of doing it tonight sickens me.

I stare out the window. No place is more beautiful than Colorado in August, but right now all I can see is what’s bleak—the grass that’s parched and the dry ground and the ugly highway. Everything looks dead to me, looks like nothing, and that’s what I feel inside.

I’ve just chosen a lifetime of things I don’t want—NPR and fancy dinners and boring sex—because I’m convinced this life is the safest course.

I squeeze my eyes shut to stop thinking, but I only hear Brendan and Sean in my head, and they’re both saying the same thing. They’re telling me I’m giving up everything I love because I think it will keep me free—from pain, from worry, from the sick parts of myself. But freedom is meaningless if you gain it by giving away what matters.

I’ve been confusing comfort with happiness, apathy with freedom. Just like my parents, I’m missing my real life every single day by choosing things that are empty, by choosing to pretend.

I don’t want to give up dinner outside, or music. I don’t want to give up sex in a hammock, or on a picnic blanket. Or late nights with someone who will stay awake with me when my whole life is turning to shit, who knows everything ugly inside of me and wants me in spite of it. What am I getting in exchange for all of those things I’ve pushed away? Less pain, maybe. Fewer demons to fight and resist.

Sean is right. I’m as big a coward as anyone in my family.

He turns the radio on. Bluegrass music again. I reach out and turn it off so I can say brave words at last, really meaning them this time.

“I’m sorry, Rob,” I tell him, “but this isn’t going to work.”

76

Brendan

Present

“How long you plan to keep doing this?” Beck asks, sliding me a beer.

We’ve been friends for a long time, but that doesn’t mean I feel like answering his questions, even if he does let me drink for free. I wrap my hand around the bottle, looking at it as if it holds answers. “Doing what?”

“Sitting in here alone and pissed off, drinking to forget about Erin.”

“What makes you think this has anything to do with Erin?”

He raises a brow. “Do I really look that stupid to you?”

It’s been three days since she walked away from me at the hospital. Three days since I realized getting serious with Gabi wasn’t the biggest mistake of my life, refusing to get serious with Erin was.

“It doesn’t matter. It’s over. She’s marrying someone else.”

Beck hesitates, like he wants to argue, and finally decides against it. “Then you’ve got to move on, man. I’m tired of watching you sulk and go home alone.”

I look around. There are girls here, girls I’d have taken home once upon a time. I don’t have much interest in being that guy again, but who am I otherwise? I’m this, the guy who didn’t pull his head out of his ass until it was too late. The guy too damn miserable to care about anything right now, even the business he once wanted so badly.

“Something’s got to change, bro,” says Beck.

Yeah, I guess it does. Realizing that I’m capable of commitment, of the risk involved, must be broader than just Erin. If I can feel that way about one girl, I can probably feel that way about someone else eventually. And in the meantime, I should do what I can. For the next few months, getting over the fact that Rob and Erin are married is going to be so fucking hard. I’m going to need something more than what I’ve got at the moment to survive.

I look around the room. No one appeals to me. Doesn’t mean I shouldn’t at least try.

77

Erin

Present

I sit outside Brendan’s place. His car is here, which is a relief, but also terrifying. I know what he said to me at the hospital, but he was so against commitment, and for so long, that it’s hard for me to imagine he’s really changed his mind.