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“I could give two fucks what they want. You want me to leave, Eli?”
I don’t say anything. Just let my unspoken words hang between us.
Of course I don’t want you to leave. I want you to stay. I just need time. Can you give me that? I need to think this through rationally. Maybe with some time apart from you, I can come to terms with what this really is.
And yet, I utter none of it. All of that just stays lodged in my brain and my mouth refuses to spit it out. My body is revolting against me. First my hands and now my mouth. What’s next? My legs, my neck, my arms?
“Ah, fuck. Yeah, I gotcha,” Luke mumbles and then stands up, looming over me. “It’s because I hurt him, huh? You still pining over him or something? Is that why you snuck off this morning, to go see him?”
“No. Absolutely not. I left so you could sleep. And I’m not a fool. That man is a cancer.”
“But you still let him eat away at you, dictating your life, your choices.”
“I do not,” I spit, even though I’m shrinking on the inside. Because he’s right, and I don’t know what to do about it. I live in so much fear from past choices that I’m nearly paralyzed by them.
“You won’t choose me because of him. Because of what he did to you.”
I exhale shakily and throw my hands up in the air. “What do you want from me, Luke? Huh?”
“Simple. I wantyou.”
Those words make my chest constrict so tightly that I can’t breathe. I can’t fucking breathe.
“Well,” I say on an exhale, “You can’t have me. You just can’t.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know!” I shout as I stare at his flushed face. “I don’t fucking know,” I say more softly.
Luke blinks slowly, his chest rising and falling evenly, and I want to lean into him and have him hold me. I want to immediately apologize, to tell him I’ve changed my mind. But I don’t do any of it. I can’t. I’m frozen. My body has completely locked down. I just stand facing him, my hands clenched into fists, my cheeks hot.
“Anything I can do to change your mind, Eli?” He asks gently.
We stare at each other. One heartbeat. Two. Three.
I don’t fucking answer. I just stare at him.
He stares at me.
We. Fucking. Stare.
And then Luke moves toward the bedroom, his hands clenching and unclenching near his sides.
“What are you doing?” I ask, following him, my voice tight and clipped.
“Packing.”
“Why?”
“I can read between the lines.”
“What lines? There are no lines. We can leave together and stay somewhere else. Why don’t I get us separate rooms at the hotel down the street?”
Luke eyes me like I’ve lost my mind, like I’ve just sprouted two new eyes. And he’s justified in this. I don’t really want to be separated from him, but I know that I probably should be, so I can fucking think about what this all is. Whenever he’s in my space, I am just consumed by him and my mind doesn’t work properly.
“Nah, Eli. It’s best if I stay somewhere else tonight. Without you.”
My heart thunders in my chest, and I feel a little lightheaded. “What? Why?”
