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My voice wavering, I say, “You made me fall in love with you!”
Kaan wipes a hand down his face and growls, “You have no fucking idea what’s been going on.”
“Tell me then. Help me understand.”
His brow creases and I can feel the guilt weighing on him, but it’s guilt that he has taken ownership for, guilt that isn’t truly his to live with. Guilt is as much an addiction as drugs or alcohol and it’s this guilt that’s going to destroy him.
“I can’t.”
“You can’t blame yourself for what happened.” Kaan needs to understand that what happened to Blair isn’t his fault. “The truth is that you can’t help people that don’t want to be helped. Sometimes you have to walk away.”
“Walk away? I may as well have!” His anger boils over now. “I let her down. I abandoned her.”
“But you didn’t.”
“How the fuck did I not? Blair needed help and I knew it… we all knew it, and no one did a fucking thing. We just let this happen.”
“An addict needs to help themselves; they need to want to get better. You learned this with your dad.”
“How can you say that? Should I have just let her die? Not tried to help her?”
“She chose to do this, Kaan. Not you. Not anyone else. Blair chose this.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about and frankly none of this is any of your fucking business.” His eyes darken and I know I’ve pushed him too far; his body is shaking like he’s having some kind of seizure in anger. “I should have been there for my dad and I should have been there for Blair as well.”
“You know what breaks my heart the most? It’s the fact that you listen to those evil fucking voices inside your head more than you do to the people who care about you.”
“Do you want me to say I’m sorry for leaving, for trying to help Blair?”
I can feel my chest start to tighten, the ringing in my ears is deafening and the walls on the elevator are closing in on me. “That’s just it, Kaan! You don’t have to be sorry. What you need to do is realise that none of this was your fault.”
“Everybody knows the truth.”
“The truth is all a lie. You and Blair weren’t a couple. You were never a couple. Even you said it you only screwed her a few times. That’s all it was. Brynn and I fabricated the whole fucking thing for publicity! And because of our lies you’re going to carry this guilt around your entire life? You’re just going to self-destruct because of a lie?”
We’re both angry now, but this is not the place to try and repair the damage between us. I lift my hand and trace my fingers along the side of his face. “I’m sorry, Kaan. I know you don’t want to listen to me, but you need to… to find some kind of peace with what happened, with yourself.”
Without warning Kaan twists his body towards mine and kisses me. His hands tangle in my hair, devouring me with his lips and tongue. His movements are jagged, frantic, pulling me closer until our bodies are flush. His hands now move urgently, demandingly over my body as his lips continue to imprison mine. This isn’t a kiss of passion, or even affection. Rather, this was a kiss of punishment and betrayal. This was Judas’ kiss. Things can and will never be the same between us again.
I break the kiss with such force that Kaan tumbles backward against the elevator wall. He eyes flash angrily for a brief second before being smothered by raw pain. Resignation is clear on his face. His mouth pulls into a half-smile. “You were right about one thing though, Nutmeg. We aren’t supposed to be together.”
“Why are you being like this?”
“Take a little of your own advice and walk away from people that don’t want to be helped.” Kaan hits the button on the panel and the elevator jerks back into life. The doors finally open to a conference room full of people. Kaan steps out of the elevator without looking back. “I don’t think there’s anything else to say. Goodbye, Nutmeg.”
As Kaan’s parting words echo in my mind, my heart is heavy with sorrow and confusion. I try to process what just happened, but the elevator doors snap me back to reality.
It’s really over.
With each floor the elevator descends, my anxiety increases. I’m falling into an abyss, with no safety net to catch me. When the doors finally open, I trudge back to my desk, like I’m walking through quicksand.
The black screen in front of me is a stark reminder of what’s to come. It’s just a matter of time before Brynn calls me into her office and delivers the news.
Every time my phone rings, my heart jumps into my throat, but it’s never Brynn. I wonder if she’s forgotten about ne, but that seems unlikely.
Finally, after what feels like an eternity, the phone on my desk rings. I pick it up and hear Brynn’s voice on the other end, brisk and business-like. “Can you come to my office, please?”
I take a deep breath and stand up, trying to compose myself as I make my way to her office. The walk down the hallway is the longest of my life, and when I finally arrive, Brynn is seated behind her desk, looking stern and serious.
