I’m sick of the pain, and if I never cry again, it will be too soon.
I just want to be over Ethan. Now. I don’t want to be wondering how his holidays were. If he fought with his dad. How drunk he got.
If he thought about me.
I don’t want any of it.
I want to be mine again and not his.
The way forward is to purge and cleanse. Push every positive thought about him out of my system. It’s the only way I’m going to survive seeing him again. I refuse to pine for Ethan Holt for the next two years. No freaking way.
I close my eyes and try to focus. I picture him as I listen to the song, over and over again, and I let the lyrics harden my paper-thin layers.
I’m going to become a rock.
Ruby drops me off at our place before heading to the store for supplies.
I look around my apartment. Everything’s the same yet seems totally different. That’s the door that opened to him, as he stood there wide-eyed with panic. That’s the wall I pressed him against as I told him I loved him. The same place where he said he wished he didn’t love me. Right over there is where he undressed me and kissed me until I was breathless. On the floor was where we …
I shake my head to clear it.
When I step into my room, my stomach coils.
My bed.
It’s stripped back to the bare mattress.
The morning he broke up with me, I’d ripped the sheets off and taken them to the laundry room. Then I’d turned the machine to “hot” and doused everything in far too much detergent.
I remake the bed with fresh sheets. I breathe deeply as I tuck and smooth, and palm over the areas where we made love like I can wipe them clean of memories.
When I’m done, it’s perfect. Pristine.
I look at it for long minutes as phantom lips suckle my neck. Ghost hands trail across my thighs.
Screw this.
I shower. Wash my hair. Finish with water so cold it shocks me into distraction.
When Ruby gets home, we fall into a pattern of easy familiarity. We reheat frozen dinners, drink wine, watch TV, laugh.
We don’t talk about him.
When eleven p.m. rolls around, we yawn and say good-night.
Ruby goes into her room.
I sleep on the couch.
The classroom is noisy, filled with chatter about who did what during the break. I’ve missed my friends, and I can’t deny their hugs are welcome.
Aiyah and Miranda are holding hands. Like Ethan and I, they got together last year. Unlike Ethan and I, their love survived the holiday. Jack is telling jokes, and I smile as Connor and Lucas crack up. Heck, I’ve even missed Zoe and Phoebe and their shrill conversations.
They all seem happy to see me, too.
None of them know about the breakup. How could they?
I guess they’ll figure it out soon enough, but I’m not going to be the one to tell them.
The second Ethan enters, I know it. A bone-deep vibration shudders up my spine and sets every hair on edge.
People say his name. Ask how he is. He answers, his voice low and quiet.
I don’t want to look at him, but my body turns of its own accord, and there he is, towering over most of the people around him, even as his shoulders sag.
Excitement tries to fire in my veins, but I suppress it.
Unwanted fantasies about kissing him crawl through my brain. It all seems so unlikely now that I almost laugh out loud.
He glances over at me, and that’s when all the air goes out of the room. His mouth sets into a hard line, and he looks away several times before returning. It’s like he wants to look anywhere but at me, but is incapable.
I know how he feels.
This what I’ve been preparing for.
I breathe steadily and make myself over. Smooth down the rumbling waves of emotion. Make myself a rock.
I stare at him without apology and let him see my indifference. Dare him to challenge it.
For a moment, he frowns, like he expected something else. Hurt, maybe. Or longing.
If he expected to find me a blubbering, emotional mess, he must be sorely disappointed.
His expression is one of indescribable sadness, before his familiar barriers slide into place and it’s almost as if nothing happened between us.
We’re two perfect characterizations, flawless in our denial.
No one can tell how bitterly unleashed I am on the inside. Not even him.
Especially not him.
A line from As You Like It comes to me: All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players. Standing here, staring at Ethan, that concept has never been more true. The Grove is now our stage, and these are our new roles.
Separate.
Loveless.
Unaffected.
I take a deep breath.
Curtain up.
ELEVEN
OPEN BOOK
Present Day
New York City, New York
The Apartment of Cassandra Taylor
My head is on his chest, my arm draped over his waist. I’m gripping his shirt like it can keep me here in this place. Where everything that happened between us hovers on the edge of my consciousness like white noise. Not forgotten but dimmer.
After our hallway confrontation, he brought me in here. Laid me down. Reassured me we’ll be all right.
Now he has his arms around me and is stroking my arm.
I can’t quite believe he’s in my bed, the scene of so many angst-driven fantasies about him. We’re both fully clothed and completely silent, yet this is the most intimate I’ve been with a man since … well, since him.
He takes my hand and places it on his chest, then presses it down against the pulse of blood and silent promises. I can feel him willing me to trust him.