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“I passed Walt on the way in. He said he was grabbing a bite. Want to join him?”
She averts her eyes, sliding her hands into her back pockets. She has to be exhausted. She drove from Ohio to Illinois. I’m still pissed she didn’t call me, but now’s not the time for that conversation. She’s struggling to deal and on very little sleep.
“Somewhere else, maybe?” She frowns.
“I know just the place.”
The deep-dish-pizza joint is open twenty-four hours. It’s between a pawn shop and a salon in not the best part of town, but fairly close to the hospital. I have a hunch she doesn’t want to venture too far away.
Our pie arrives, packed with meat and cheese, and on Viv’s half, per her request, “lots of olives.” I remember the olive I ate from her martini the night I showed her the rose garden. The night she changed my life by agreeing to come home with me.
We eat in silence. I wolf down two slices by the time she’s eaten half of one. Today’s been hectic. I had three meetings to cancel and one I had to show up for before I could fly out.
“Here you are again,” she mumbles to her plate. “My knight in shining armor.”
“Flattery. My ego loves that.” I make a gesture indicating for her to compliment me more, but her smile is brittle.
“Hey.” Serious now, I bend my head and try to meet her downturned gaze. She looks up, pain in the depths of her eyes. “He’s all right. I talked to him. He’s going to be okay.”
Her voice is watery when she asks, “For how long this time?”
I want to tell her for good. I want to reassure her and make promises. But the life of an addict is a slippery slope. Recovery is a day-to-day consideration. At any moment anything could happen. So I tell her the truest thing I know.
“I don’t know, but whatever happens we’ll deal with it.” I reach over the table and take her hand in mine. She starts to cry. “What can I do?”
“That’s just it.” She uses the scratchy-as-cardboard napkins to swipe tears from her beautiful face. Even with a red nose and puffy eyes and tangles in her normally bouncy hair she’s beautiful. “You do everything for me. For us. You can’t be stopped.”
I can’t be. I let out a chuckle. “I care about you. What do you expect?”
I love her. I don’t say that. Her misery seems less about Walt and tiredness and more about something else. When she tugs her hand into her lap and sits back in her chair, the alarm siren in my head wails. My mind goes berserk imagining one bad-news scenario after another.
“I can’t do this anymore, Nate.” She sniffs, straightens her back. Shoring up. “I’ve been fooling myself believing you and I were building a life together.”
“We are building a life together.” My heart throbs. Aches. She can’t do this.
“Not any longer.”
I think of the painting of the dragon at the art institute and for the first time picture myself as the beast and not the knight. It’s me who’s being stabbed to death. Me who’s losing the battle. And by battle, I mean her.
“You know as well as I do Walt’s fight isn’t over,” she says. “If I don’t push you away, you’ll go down alongside us.”
“I’m a big boy. That’s my choice,” I say, as firmly as I can.
“No. It’s not.” Her head shakes and more tears run down her cheeks. “I don’t want you to stay. It’s not worth it.”
“I’m in love with you. It’s worth it.” I hadn’t imagined making that proclamation as a Hail Mary, but here we are. She doesn’t respond the way I hope. Her face falls and her eyes broadcast a combination of hurt and sympathy. Committed to my foolishness, I prompt, “And you love me.”
I didn’t mean for it to sound like a question, but it came out like one. And then, right there in a twenty-four-hour pizza place, she plunges the sword into my chest to the hilt.
“I don’t know how to be in love. That’s not your fault. I never meant to hurt you.”
“Bullshit,” I growl, growing angrier by the millisecond. “You’re scared. You’re not thinking clearly.”
“I’m not scared. I’m terrified,” she admits, with another angry swipe of the napkin across her face. “I’m thinking plenty clear. I’ve seen what romantic love does to a couple. You believe it saves the world. The Owens have been your shining example. You are able to believe, and that’s a miracle.” Her smile is faint before her expression hardens once again. “I live in a different world. One where love hurts and bad things happen, regardless of what you do to safeguard against them.”
“Dammit, Vivian,” I say, pissed off and every bit as terrified as she is. I’m losing her. In real time. “Don’t do this.”
“Look around.” She throws her arms wide. “It’s done! Why do you think I didn’t call to ask for your help? You’ve cashed in your last get out of jail free card for me. I don’t want your help. And I don’t want you.”
