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His tongue darts out to tap his lip. “I don’t have plans. But don’t rush back on my account.”

We are being too tentative with each other now, and I miss the old Hayes, the one who would bombastically demand my free time as if it were his due. We should never have slept together, and you’d think with as many times as I’ve had this thought over the past week, I wouldn’t still be letting myself fantasize about him at every turn.

We exit the elevator, and he’s stopped by someone he knows just as my mother calls again.

I turn away from Hayes, walking toward the tall palms that divide the lobby from the downstairs bar. When a parent calls twice in a row, you probably ought to answer...even if it’s my mother in question.

“It’s about time,” she says by way of greeting. “I met with Dr. Shriner this morning, and she told us you’re moving home for good. I can’t believe you’re going along with this nonsense. Shriner has no right to keep Charlotte there. None at all. She’s bluffing.”

I close my eyes, trying to rein in all the other words I want to say: Dad never would have abandoned his duty the way you have. He’d never have put me in this position. “Mom, it’s not about whether or not she can. It’s about the fact that she doesn’t think you’re up to the job.”

“Because I won’t go to AA!” she yells. “Which I don’t need!”

I no longer know what to believe. It’s hard for me to truly imagine my mother is an alcoholic, the way you see them in movies and cop shows. But it’s getting increasingly easy to believe she’s not the best person to care for a fragile child.

A bell rings signaling the start of the keynote session, and suddenly a herd of people is moving behind me toward the ballroom doors. I need to end this call.

“Look, I don’t care if you need it or not,” I snap. “But the fact that you won’t listen to Shriner at all means she’s definitely right about one thing: I have to move home because you are not willing to do what’s best for Charlotte.”

I hang up and turn to look for Hayes...only to find him standing right behind me looking stunned. And stung.

“What the hell is going on?” he asks.

This is not the way I want to be telling him. And not now, when he’s about to go into a conference for an entire day and we can’t really talk.

“I...I’m, uh, going home next month. To Kansas. My sister’s doctor is requiring it.”

He stiffens. “For how long?”

I glance away. “I don’t know. I guess until she graduates. I don’t see my mom stepping up and there’s no other option.” My teeth grind as I say it, making the words sound more defiant than forced.

He pushes a hand through his hair, his jaw clenched tight. “And you never managed to tell me this?” he asks, his voice rough. “I see you every day, and you never managed to tell me you’re moving?”

I want to claim it never came up, but it did. He’s brought it up repeatedly, and I thought I could simply ignore the problem until it solved itself. “It’s not like we were going to be hanging out together in a month anyway.” I sound like a child, trying to defend the indefensible.

His nostrils flare and his eyes are darker than they’ve ever been, all pupil. I’ve never seen him so angry before.

“That,” he says, turning to walk away, “is absolute bullshit.”

* * *

As I walk the streets of San Francisco, a sick feeling settles in my belly.

Would Fisherman’s Wharf—loud and crowded and slightly tackier than I expected—excite me if the conversation with Hayes didn’t just happen? Perhaps not, but it wouldn’t feel like this, as if I can’t see anything clearly, as if my stomach is folding in on itself and I can’t quite take a full breath. I should have told him. He knows almost everything else about me, and I concealed this from him intentionally, for reasons even I can’t fully acknowledge.

What upsets me most about all this is simply that he knows. Because it means I can’t keep pretending—to him or myself—that I’m able to stay.

My feet are throbbing and my shins ache once I get back to the hotel. I shower and collapse into the soft chair on the balcony in my robe to wait for Hayes. There’s a naïve part of me that hopes he’ll simply be over the whole thing so we don’t have to discuss it.

When I hear him enter the living room, I call out. He comes to the sliding door, eyes flickering over my robe and wet hair.

I don’t know where we stand. My lips open, on the cusp of offering a reluctant apology, when he speaks instead.

“How was it?” he asks.

Relief rushes through me. Maybe we can keep pretending. Maybe we can go to dinner and things will feel normal again. “Good, but I’ve still got a lot more to see. I hope you weren’t planning to make me do any actual work tomorrow morning.”

“I generally try to assume you won’t be doing any work whatsoever,” he replies coolly. “That way, my expectations are met.”