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Part of me wants him to jump in like he did that night, block my way, grab me hard enough to hurt and tell me he’s in charge now. But he just throws himself on a lounge chair and closes his eyes. Finally, I climb out and stand at the foot of the chair, staring at him.
“I can hear you dripping,” he says finally, without opening his eyes. I don’t answer.
I like his body all stretched out, in a black tee that molds to his pecs and jeans tight enough to remind me that I never got to feel his thighs around my head. But today it makes me feel shitty instead of good. I crouch down, studying him.
“Why are you sulking?” I ask. I’m sulking because thirty thousand anonymous strangers are trying to ruin my life. But I don’t know what his problem is.
“Because I’m depressed.”
I sit on the lounger next to his, letting the sun dry off my back. We’re alone except for the sound of leathery tropical leaves rubbing against each other in the wind.
“Don’t be depressed,” I say. It sounds weird, but I can’t think of a different way to tell him what I want.
Finally, his eyes crack open and he looks at me. “Don’t sleep in a closet.”
I look at my hands, clasped between my knees. “I get it. Sorry.”
“I’m the one who came here to apologize.” He meets my eyes, but I look away.
“I don’t want you to apologize.”
“I told you I’d protect you when we came back, and I couldn’t do it.” He pauses. “You didn’t have to yell at me, though. I was trying.”
I sit on my hands so I can’t touch him. “Please don’t try.”
He’s silent until I look at him again. His eyes are burning with all kinds of things—frustration, confusion, need. “Victor,” he says. Just that. My name.
I run my hand through my wet, tangled hair. It's getting damaged from all the chlorine and salt water. “I’m fine. You can go home and protect your mom.”
I guess that wasn’t the right thing to say, because his face just collapses and he turns his head away, toward the pockmarked concrete wall of the hotel.
“I don’t think I really help anyone; I just brute-force my way through life, telling myself I’m doing the right thing.” His chest rises and falls rapidly. If we were still in the countryside, I’d take his hand and make him feel my heart beat until he calmed down, like he did for me.
“I’m not going to sit here and argue with you.” I stand up. My head is throbbing. Picking up my clothes, I take my sunglasses, the ones I stole from him, and slide them onto his face. “Don’t get sunburned.”
As I walk away, I imagine for a minute that it was a real goodbye, that I can’t turn around and see him right there because he’s on a plane to Seattle. I try to really believe it. Running my tongue over the tang of chlorine on my lips, I pretend it’s the taste of his last kiss, the one he sneaks in because he can’t stop himself. I wonder what my final words to him were, whether they were mean or funny or stupid. What he said back.
Jesus Christ, I’m falling apart.
Pulling on my shirt and shorts, I go out and smoke on the front steps of the hotel. I’m supposed to be quitting; I told Ethan I would. But I can’t drop more than one addiction at a time.
After ninety minutes, I work up the courage to leave the hotel property and wander down the street in a direction I’ve never been before. It’s the hottest day of our trip so far, every stone surface baking and shimmering, and the air smells of herbed fish and cotechino sausage as the whole neighborhood dusts off their grills.
I stop outside a small grocery with crates of figs and lemons on the sidewalk. It’s packed, and I’m scared to go inside.
I don’t have very many ideas, so I have no way of knowing if this one is good or not. But I want to find out, so I pull up my hood and duck through the door.
Grabbing a basket, I open the notes app on my phone with my other hand. It’s a messy list full of typos because I type too fast and never read it back.
-animals
-oranges
-mariners b-ball
-gelato
-that chocolate that starts with a g
-licking around the head
-complaining
It goes on and on. I’ve been making it for a long time. There’s a lot of food; the man likes to eat.
It’s the shape of you, as best I can make it. I had to be good at forgetting, to protect myself, and now I can’t remember anything. I put it here, so that when you’re gone I can rebuild you again every time I forget.
I’ve almost deleted the list a couple of times, because it doesn’t seem like the kind of thing you do for someone you hate. But today, I’m glad I kept it.
