Lately, I wish I didn’t have one. That way it could never be broken.
“I’m . . .” Awful. Horrible. Devastated. Alone. “Okay.” I take a deep breath, holding it in before I slowly let it out. Trying to cleanse my mind, my heart, my soul.
It doesn’t help. The ugly, crippling blackness creeps back in, wraps itself around my mind, my heart, my soul. I’m . . . angry.
No one wants to hear that, though. Not anymore. I should be getting over it by now. That’s what my sister wants, and my mother.
Easy for them to say. They weren’t the ones who’d been so thoroughly lied to.
“Just okay? Last we talked, you were very down.” Sheila keeps her expression completely neutral. Something she’s extremely good at. How I wish I had her poker face.
More like I was depressed. I’ve moved past that. I’ve focused on my anger about what happened and it’s fueled me. Pushed me forward, encouraged me to do what I want for a change, even be a little defiant.
And I haven’t been defiant since I was twelve.
“I got sick of crying.” I shrug. I’ve shed enough tears to last fifty lifetimes.
Sheila smiles. “You’re acting rather unusual.”
“How do you mean?”
“I want to say rebellious, but I don’t know if that’s the right word.” She taps her finger against her lips, contemplating me. I sit in the chair, my arms crossed, my expression stony. I can feel how still I am as I watch her, wait for her to continue. I’m thinking rebellious is the perfect word. “Stubborn? Nonchalant? Like what Ethan did to you was no big deal.”
She brings him up. Of course. My heart freaking skips a beat every time I hear his name. Tingles sweep over me. The whole romance-novel thing happens all over again and I despise it. Even though I also miss him.
It’s infuriating, missing someone you’re angry with. The conflicting emotions seem to be in a constant battle.
“It was a huge deal,” I say quietly, unwrapping my arms so I can clutch my cold hands together.
“Have you spoken to him? Face-to-face?”
I shake my head. I received a text a week ago. That was the first and last one. Seeing his name appear on my phone screen made my heart leap into my throat. I didn’t know how to react, how to respond. What could I say to him?
Please talk to me.
In the end, I didn’t. I didn’t reply. How can I? He lied to me. Lied. Over and over again, all while pretending he had my best interests at heart. More like he was concerned with his own interests.
Afterward, once I calmed down and could think clearly, I realized so many things. Like I’m a fool. An idiot. I fell for him and he knew all along that he was tricking me. Playing me.
I remember watching the old Superman movie with Dad when I was a kid. Before all the bad stuff, when we used to spend time together and he didn’t look at me like I was tainted. Damaged. As we watched the movie he loved as a child, I couldn’t help but think Lois was a total idiot for not realizing Clark Kent was really Superman.
I’ve become Lois Lane. Ethan is my Clark Kent. Will was my Superman.
Frowning, I blink hard and return my gaze to Sheila.
“Has he tried to contact you at all?”
The text from Ethan came after my last weekly appointment with Sheila, so she doesn’t know about it. “He texted me.”
“Did you respond?”
I shake my head again. Don’t say a word. I remember the sound of his voice instead. Warm and deep and steady and true, my name falling from his lips. I can hear him now.
Katie.
No one else calls me that—I don’t allow them to. After everything happened, Katie was dead and gone. When I returned home I became Katherine. Until Ethan came along and started calling me Katie again and I found I didn’t mind it. Now I understand why he called me that from the start.
To Will, Katie is my name.
It hurts so much to think of him, to imagine his handsome face. The way his eyes would crinkle at the corners when he smiled. The words he said, the promises he made. How he would touch me, almost reverently, as if I were fragile and could possibly break.
He was right. I feel like I might shatter at any moment.
“How about Lisa Swanson? Has she reached out to you again?” Sheila asks gently.
“Yes. She really wants me to participate in another interview. A sort of counterpoint to Aar—” My voice hitches and I can’t . . . I can’t say his name. Having that problem to this very day says a lot I’m sure. “To his first interview from prison.”
“His only interview,” Sheila interjects.
“Right.” I take another deep breath and release it slowly. “He’s never spoken to the media until now.”
“Are you curious to hear what he has to say?”
“No. Not really.” A tiny part of me is curious, but mostly I’m repulsed that he’d think now is the appropriate time to talk. Is it because of my earlier interview with Lisa? It has to be.
What does Ethan think about this? I shouldn’t care, but I’m still having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that Ethan is in fact the son of Aaron Monroe. Spending time with Ethan, I never caught even a glimpse of violence or hatred within him. He wasn’t mean. He was always kind, always sweet and respectful.
The brief, harrowing time I spent with Will, and during our contact afterward, when we would write and call and text each other, he was always sweet to me then, too. Though with an almost resentful edge, as if he needed the contact with me yet hated it all the same.