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Chapter Text

“Love is so short, forgetting is so long.” -Pablo Neruda

         Her face was Lip Smackers watermelon and freckles leftover from Slip n’ Slides that summer. Her eyes were the wide, pale blue of a nursery. He was tall and ruggedly handsome, his fuzzy brown beard perfectly trimmed and slathered in a beard oil that would stick to her face.

         “Are you for real?” she whispered. 

         “What do you mean?” he chuckled, tucking a strand of her sunset-colored hair behind her ear.

         “I don’t know, I just feel like maybe I made you up.” He probably thinks that’s childish, she thought to herself, damn it, I shouldn’t have said that.

         His eyes smiled, but his mouth stayed in its horitzontal line. He was laying on his side, head resting on his once-strong arm. 

         His sheets were slate gray Egyptian cotton, regularly changed by his maid or his mom. She laid her head on his graying chest hair. 

Two Months Earlier

       New Jersey was enchanting in the fall. He'd sworn up and down that this apple orchard would be the best she'd ever seen. "We'll do cringey couple things," he kissed her, "like hold hands and hide from judging eyes." 

       They got looks everywhere they went, between her slight frame, round face, and cartoonish eyes, she barely looked sixteen, despite her twenty years. Sun damage, smoking, and drinking had made him look a decade older than his thirty years.

        "You get better with age, like French cheese," she smirked.

         "Or a good scotch. You're going to try the hard cider here, it's the best. It's got this aftertaste--"

         "I'm not twenty-one 'til next month," she said. "I'll try absolutely everything else though."

          He snorted.

          "What?" she asked.

          "This is why my friends think you're immature."

          "My age?" Her heart pounded spastically. Immature? And he's told his friends about me? They already don't like me?

          He shrugged and led her down a deserted row of apple trees, each one dripping in Red Deliciousness. 

          The sky was a perfect blue, nearly neon in its brightness. Every time her hand brushed his, the sky came into focus. He was the lens she’d been waiting for, he showed her how to truly see things.

        “It’s the same color as your eyes,” she said dreamily.

        “Those skinny clouds, those look like you,” he laughed.

        She self-consciously rubbed her bicep.

        “Don’t worry,” he squeezed her waist, “you’ll grow up.” 

Oh, your sweet disposition and my wide-eyed gaze

We're singing in the car, getting lost upstate

Autumn leaves falling down like pieces into place

And I can picture it after all these days

             He was wearing his blue puffer coat, medium-washed jeans that were almost the same color as the jacket, and his gray knit beanie. She jumped onto his back, throwing her arms around his neck. He laughed and hooked his arms under her legs to keep her steady. She kissed his cheek, he said nothing. She pressed her face against the top of his head, his close-cropped hair tickling her porcelain face. He let her fall to her feet as he spun around, grabbing her face and slamming his lips into hers. His large hands cupped her round, freckled cheeks and deepened the kiss. Her fingers ran over the slivers of gray that ran through his sideburns. He left no time between kisses, no time for her to breathe as he devoured every millimeter of her lips.

'Causе there we arе again on that little town street

You almost ran the red 'cause you were lookin' over at me

Wind in my hair, I was there

I remember it all too well

        They walked a little farther down the path, him reaching out to yank unripe fruit off the branches so they could fall to the ground.

        "They'll just spoil," she said. "What a waste."

        "I like to watch them fall," he said. He tore another apple off its branch and it hurled it into the nearby lake. The lake reflected the greens and yellows of the trees, its surface the mellow green of corroded copper. She ran her hand over the cattails, needing to feel the texture to assure herself she wasn’t dreaming. They sat on the small, rocky beach and he pulled out his iPhone.

        “This would sound better on a record player,” he said. “But this’ll do.”

        "If you made a playlist about today," she said, "what would you call it?"

        “An upstate escape.” He raised his eyebrows and smirked that cursed, that damn smirk, bewitching and indifferent at the same time.

        “I bet you’ve never heard this song.” He turned up the volume.

        The singer’s voice came in a warbly, drowning tone. She shook her head.

        “It’s from before your time,” he wiggled his eyebrows, “but allow me to enlighten you.” The music grew louder. “The Velvet Underground,” he said, placing his hand on the denim-clad thigh. “You’re gonna learn all their songs.”

        She listened intently to his song, wanting to show how much she was caring about his music. After the last notes faded, she tentatively plugged the headphones into her phone. Her fingers were sweaty, there was so much pressure to pick the right song. If she picked wrong, he'd never take her music taste seriously again.

        She popped the earbud into his ear. Immediately he leaned in and kissed her, kissed her til she was dizzy.

        “I want to show you this song--”

        He cut her off with another kiss. His earbud clinked to the ground.

And I know it's long gone and

That magic's not here no more

And I might be okay, but I'm not fine at all

Oh, oh, oh

And I know it's long gone and

There was nothing else I could do

And I forget about you long enough

To forget why I needed to

Like and Comment if I should do the rest of the song :)

Chapter Text

      And I know it's long gone and

There was nothing else I could do

And I forget about you long enough

To forget why I needed to

  She’d been to Brooklyn before, of course, but she’d never appreciated it until he brought her there. She felt stupid when he came to her house, she felt childish that she still lived with her parents and fought her little brother for the remote. She nearly fainted when he invited her to his house. She’d dated an older man before, when she was nineteen and the dude was thirty-two. He’d never invited her over to his place though. But now, her thirty-year-old boyfriend had casually invited her over to get Thai takeout and watch Donnie Darko , which she’d never seen.

        “I’m gonna give you an education,” he threw his arm around her shoulder. “Show you all the great movies.”

        She nuzzled her face into his neck. “You’re the best,” she smiled against his skin. “My friends are doing a movie night this weekend, you should come.”

        He snorted.

        “What?” she asked. “Don’t you wanna meet my friends.”

        “What am I gonna do with a bunch of teenagers?”

        She wanted to point out she and her friends were mostly twenty, but that probably was beside the point. He meant he didn’t want to babysit, her friends were beneath him.

        “Besides,” he said. “My weekend is packed. My friends I haven’t seen in like five years are coming to town to celebrate my shoe launch.”

        “Shoe launch?”

        “It’s whatever,” he shrugged, “my organic shoes are finally starting to sell.”

        “Babe!” She kissed his cheek. “That’s so exciting! I had no idea!”

        “Yeah, well, you never asked.”

        “My bad,” she murmured. “I didn’t even know you’d started producing them. Last you told me, it was still just an idea.”

        “I pitched it to my dad and he took care of all the boring business side of it. But, I’m sure you don’t wanna hear about that,” he said. “I’m having my friends over here for dinner on Saturday night.”

        Movie night. She’d really wanted to hang out with her friends, but it sounded lame that she’d rather eat Sour AirHeads and watch New Moon in her friends’ basement than go to her boyfriend’s business celebration.

        “What are you guys doing for dinner? My mom, well Mom and Grandma taught me, this amazing lasagna--”

        “Woah, sweetheart, what are you saying?”

        Oh my God, he didn’t invite me. This is humiliating . “I shouldn’t have assumed, God, how weird of me.” She laughed nervously. 

        “I didn’t invite you because it’d be boring for you,” he said. “You don’t wanna sit there and have to listen to us drone on about politics and investment returns.”

        “You don’t want me to meet them?”

        “What? No, I didn’t say that. I said you don’t want to meet them,” he said.

        “But I do want to meet them.”

        “If I let you meet them, will you shut the hell up and kiss me?”

        “Are you embarrassed of me?”

        He dragged his hand over his buzz cut. “Honestly, how do you come up with this stuff? I applaud your imagination, honestly, you should write one of those stupid love triangle book things.” He slammed the window shut aggressively, making her jump. “I’m. Not. Embarrassed. For Christ’s sake, I took you to my family for Thanksgiving. You met my goddamn sister. Was that not enough for you? Do you need to invade every area of my life?”

        “I’m sorry,” she studied the Sharpie doodles on her Converse, “I didn’t mean to upset you.”

        “Well, you did. Did you even care about meeting my family?”

        “Of course I did!”

        “You never even thanked me. How was I supposed to know it meant anything to you? I can’t read your mind.”

        “I’m really sorry.”

        He sighed, heaving himself onto the couch beside her. His thumb and forefinger traced the curve of her ear, sending a warm jolt through her body. “I’ll get over it,” he said. He kissed her closed eyelids, her nose, the hollow of her throat, and finally, her eager lips.

        “I’ll do better,” she promised. “I’ll be better.”

        In the six days since their fight, he’d barely answered her calls. They’d hung out once, and he’d seem distracted the whole time. Finally, it was Saturday morning and he called her. “It’ll be just like a sommelier thing,” he said. “Stinky French cheese and hipsters, I think you’d hate it. But you’re welcome to come, if you want.”

        “Wait, seriously?” She’d spent the last six days being as un-needy as possible, hiding any negative emotions. She didn’t throw any of her “tantrums” and listened intently to everything he said. She gave him her complete attention and adoration. 

        At thirty, he’d dated countless girls. He was used to women far more emotionally mature than she was. 

        I’ll prove that I’m sophisticated, that I’m mature enough to run with your friend group.

        She’d spent hours on Pinterest researching outfits. She read article after article on “How to Look Elegant” and “How to Dress More Maturely.” She poured over Seventeen magazine and Teen Vogue before realizing that was the exact wrong place to look. She looked through her Mom’s Cosmo , but shut it after getting overwhelmed by advice and tips that made her cheeks flush.

        The idea of being around people a decade older than her, who all worked grown-up jobs, toured vineyards, went to beer gardens, had studied at prestigious universities, and had all known each other for longer than she’d been alive--she was terrified.

        She snuck down the hall to her parents’ room, the door squeaking as she opened it. She went to her mom’s antique vanity and dug through the drawers until she found it: the red lipstick her mom had worn to go as Audrey Hepburn for Halloween. It would be a bold look, very Old Hollywood glam. Hipsters loved vintage, right?

        She’d seen Audrey Hepburn and loads of college-aged and professional women wear monochromatic outfits. She’d been planning on wearing her favorite outfit, gray skinny jeans, a green Hollister sweater, and her go-to Converse, but once she put that outfit on, she felt ridiculous. The green sweater mixed with her red hair and lipstick made her feel like a Christmas cookie.

        She pulled on her tightest black skinny jeans and a black turtleneck. She invaded her Mom’s closet for her black Stilettos, and after putting them on (and falling about twenty times), she realized they cut into her feet. Worth the blisters , she thought, admiring her chic outfit in the mirror. She could be the kind of girl who wore all black and left lipstick stains on wine glasses; the kind of cool girl who never got mad at her boyfriend.

        The First Crack in the Glass

        The cab driver dropped her off in front of his building. The greasy man had been staring at her in the rearview mirror through the whole drive, and she was anxious to get away from him. When he pulled up to the curb, she jumped out and scampered up to the buzzer and rang him three times. 

        “What?” His voice was gruff over the intercom.

        “It’s me,” she said.

        “God, you didn’t tell me you were coming.”
        “Can you please just let me in?” She said, daring to look over her shoulder at the cab driver who was idling in front of the building. Beads of sweat began forming under her turtleneck.

        He buzzed her in, and when she got up to his door, he opened it with a frown.

        The apartment was filthy: empty green juice bottles on every surface, boxers crumpled on the ground, and his beard clippings coating the bathroom floor. 

        “I told you not to come til later,” he said.

        “You asked me to come at four,” she said. “It’s four.”

        “I meant like, around four.” He slumped on the couch, brushing away a handful of orange crumbs. “My friends are animals,” he said. “I had them over for cocktails last night, and look how they left it. My precious baby,” he ran a hand over his imported Italian leather sofa.

        If they were over for cocktails, why does it look like it’s all your garbage? 

        “I can’t entertain you,” he said, “and cook dinner and clean up. I was hoping you wouldn’t come ‘til later.”

        “I can help!” She grabbed a half-filled take out bag from the side table and began tossing garbage into it. 

        “I can’t ask you to do that,” he said. “I’d feel awful.”

        “You go get ready,” she said. “I’ll clean up out here.”

        He kissed her nose, wrapping his arms around her waist. “Thank you,” he said. “That would be a huge load off of me. Then we can cook together. It’ll be romantic and sh*t.”

        She stood up on her tiptoes to kiss him and he gave her a quick peck.

        “Can you vacuum too?” He asked as he walked into his bedroom.

        She picked up the garbage, wiped down all the surfaces, and vacuumed the carpet. Next, she straightened up the kitchen and cleared off the dining room table. He was still in his bedroom, talking loudly on the phone. It was probably one of his friends or maybe his lawyer going over some business details.

        I’m going to make his life so much easier. He’ll be ecstatic that he invited me over .

        She cleaned the bathroom next, which made her almost throw up. She swept and mopped the floor, cleaned the toilet, and took a Clorox wipe to everything. Next she dug around in his closet and found a clean hand towel, so she put that up in the bathroom. His hand soap was empty, as was every bottle in his shower. 

        I’m such a good girlfriend , she thought as she jogged down the steps and hailed a cab. She would’ve just gone to CVS or something, but he would’ve lost his mind if she’d bought anything not organic or locally sourced. She waited in line to get into Trader Joe’s, but that was taking forever and she didn’t have the time. She wandered down the block and finally found a Mom and Pop candle shop. They also sold farm-to-bottle soaps and lotions, so she bought a couple hand soaps and even a body wash.

        Once she was back in the apartment, she closed the door behind her and his bedroom door finally opened. 

        “What’s up?” he said, giving her a confused look. 

        “You were out of hand soap,” she said. “I ran out to grab some.”

        “Oh,” he said. “Cool, thanks.”

        “Sorry, was that weird of me?”

        He shrugged one shoulder. “Wish you would’ve asked me. What did you even get?”

        “It’s organic,” she blurted out, then toned down her voice. “From that cute standalone shop by the Trader Joe’s.”

        “Damn it,” he said, grabbing one of the bottles from her hand. “This company is bullsh*t. They don’t pay their workers well and they totally exploit immigrants.”

        “Oh my God,” she said. “I’m sorry, I had no idea.”

        “Of course you didn’t,” he scoffed. “You don’t even research brands before you buy from them. Has it ever crossed your mind that other people exist besides you?”

        “I-I--”

        “Whatever,” he said. “Did you take the chicken out of the freezer?”

        “The what?”

        “The chicken,” he emphasized each word, “did you take it out to defrost?”

        “You never told me to do that,” she said.

        “You never listen to me!” The vein in his forehead was throbbing, his face turning red as he yelled. “It’s like I’m talking to a brick wall!”

        “You never told me about the chicken.”

        “Are you calling me a liar?”

        “No, of course not--”

        “It’s like having a puppy underfoot, barking and peeing on everything. First the soap and now the chicken? Are you trying to ruin dinner on purpose?”

        “No!”

        “You’re acting like it! Are you sabotaging me? Are you jealous that my business is going amazing and you didn’t even get accepted at Princeton?”

        She felt a weight on her chest, a hot, uncomfortable feeling that caused tears to poke at the corners of her eyes. “I was just trying to help,” she said in a small voice.

        “Just don’t ruin anything else before they get here,” he said. “I’m gonna have to run out and grab some take out.”

        “I can come with you,” she offered.

        “I think it’s better if I just do it myself. Besides, I have to pick up some vintage Cabernet I laid aside at the liquor store, and they carded you last time.”

        He left, slamming the door behind him. She curled up on the couch, careful not to let her makeup anywhere near the white leather of his couch. She felt like she was in time out, left home while the grown-up went to do grown-up stuff. 

Chapter Text

  He was magnificent, charisma rolling off of him like waves and crashing into everyone in the room. His six friends—she'd struggled to keep their names straight—all threw their heads back in laughter. He was a shining king, holding court for his adoring subjects. 

        He leaned back in his chair, waving around his empty wine glass. She sat at the end of the table, his body blocking most of her view of the other guests. Her wine glass sat untouched, filled to the brim with wine so dark it looked almost black. 

         “Why aren’t you drinking?” A man across the table asked her. He wore a floral bomber jacket and had six earrings in each ear. 

          It was the first time anyone had acknowledged her presence in hours. They’d all greeted her when they first arrived, but when they started talking about old memories and people she didn’t know, she was left behind. 

         “I’m not twenty-one yet,” she said nervously. She looked at her boyfriend trying to gauge if she’d given the right answer.

         “Oh God,” said a woman with an undercut and a gorgeous jumpsuit. “Dude, you’re robbing the cradle again!” 

         Again? I guess he’s never told me much about his ex-girlfriends. He said they were all crazy. Besides, a ten year age gap isn’t that bad. 

        She gripped the stem of her full wine, feeling the impossible length from that dinner until her birthday the next month. 

        Her boyfriend shrugged. “What can I say? I get hotter every year. That reminds me, this girl slid into my DM’s…” he started telling a story about some girl flirting with him. It hurt her to sit there, feeling so young and unimportant. 

         He wouldn’t even look at her. He hadn’t even spared her a glance the whole night. 

         She reached for his hand, her freckled fingers finding his guitar-calloused knuckles. He slipped his hand out from underneath hers, placing her hand on the table away from his, giving her hand a quick pat, and then using his newly-free hand to grab her full wine glass. He drained the glass quickly, still avoiding looking at her. 

         He dropped my hand. What did I do wrong? Am I being annoying? Is he embarassed of me? 

        His friends stayed until 11, 12, 1 and finally the last one trickled out at 2 o’clock in the morning. She drifted around the apartment like a ghost, unnoticed and uninteresting. She started gathering people’s plates and cups, hoping it would encourage the guests to leave. It didn’t. They took their sweet time. 
       She began washing the dishes, knowing how particular he was about his boneware plates he’d supposedly gotten from a monk in Sri Lanka. 
       He was fully hammered, well past the giggly flirty kind of drunk. He was at the mean stage of drunkenness, throwing plates into the sink without even looking at her.

Once everyone else was finally gone, she stayed in the kitchen. He wandered around the house, either to put off talking to her or helping with the dishes or both. She’d been washing the dishes for twenty minutes and he hadn’t even acknowledged her. 

       She kept her head down, letting her auburn hair fall into her eyes to cover the tears that were forming.
      When he finally dragged himself into the kitchen, he reeked of whisky neat. He had collected the rest of the dishes and wine glasses and ash trays his friends had used. He piled them up beside the sink, doubling her load. Of course he didn't have a dishwasher, he said that he didn't trust them. He threw a fork into the sink. He jammed his hand under the faucet, blocking the water flow from the dish she had been cleaning.  “Why are you so pissed off?” he groaned. He flicked the water off of his hand and droplets splashed against her face.

       She took a shaky breath. Her hands were too wet to wipe her face. “I’m not pissed off, who said I was pissed off?” Creak creak creak, metal dragging against dishware. She wanted to puncture a hole straight through.

       “Cuz you’re acting pissed off. It's ridiculous. These are my friends. And they were super f*cking nice to you, too.”

       She watched the water bounce off an overturned bowl and spray against the metallic edge of the sink. “Well, I liked your friends. I never said I didn’t like your friends.”

       “Why were you being—“

       “I didn’t like the way you acted around them,” she cut him off. She couldn’t take it anymore.
       

His voice raised another volume notch. “You were being so weird and quiet the entire time.”

       “I was not being weird.”

       “Yes you were!” He slammed the dish towel against the counter.

        “Because you wouldn’t even look at me!”

        “Oh come on.”

        “You could ask me at least one thing the entire night!”

        “Bullsh*t. That’s such bullsh*t,” he scoffed.

        “You dropped my f*cking hand! What am I supposed to do with that?” She hated the way her voice sounded, whiny and shrill.

        “I didn't even f*cking noticie! What are you even talking about? 'I dropped your hand'!?”

       “I don’t know any of these people, they’re all strangers." The anger rose face and she could feel heat pulsating from it. "They’re all older than me!"

"But like," he interrupted, "what are you even talking about?"

"You’re the only person I know, I feel so out of place," she continued, "the only one who can make me feel comfortable.

"You're making this about you," he groaned.

"But you won't even look at me!"

       “I’m catching up with friends,” he said in a patronizing tone. “You’re literally saying I dropped your hand, like what?!” He snorted, eyes flickering toward the recessed lighting. “I don’t even remember the moment that you’re talking about. How can you be like attacking me for a moment that I don’t even like f*cking know…. I was doing it subconsciously. I was catching up with people.”

      “Don’t!” She pushed her hair out of her face. “You’re making me feel f*cking stupid!”

       “Holy sh*t,” he shook his head. “I don’t think I’m making you feel that way. I think you’re making yourself feel that way.” He added yet another bowl to her pile. “Literally a moment that I don’t even f*cking remember that you’re f*cking, like, holding me hostage over. It’s insane! It’s f*cking crazy. These are people I haven’t seen in like ten years. And you,” his voice was filled with annoyance, “you just sat there the entire fucking time." His hands gripped the stove top. He was as far away from her as he could be in the remodeled but tiny Brooklyn kitchen. The size of the kitchen had never mattered to him, it wasn't like he cooked. "It. Was. Fun. I actually had a f*cking blast.” No thanks to you, his tone implied. He poured himself another glass of wine before picking up the bottle and drinking straight from the neck. He wiped his mouth with his flannel sleeve. “Now,” he huffed, “now this is the night. Now,” he vibrated with anger, “we’re doing this!” He elbowed her slightly out of the way and placed his wine glass on the plate she’d just finished cleaning, letting the trickle of purple re-dirty the plate. “This is awesome,” he spat. “So f*cking awesome.”

      She scraped at the plate more aggressively, metal scratching against sustainably-sourced bone china. “You just treated me differently," her voice was embarrassingly tinged with tears. She wanted him to understand. She wanted him to just look at her. Anything but his angry stomping around the kitchen. 
      “What do you mean," he asked, "treated you differently?”

      “You didn’t even look at me once!” She exploded. She snapped the faucet off and let the plates crash into the sink. She whirled around, shoulders shaking with anger, forcing him to look at her.

"What are you even talking about!?" he raised his voice above her's. “I was catching up with my friends—“ he began.

      “You’re not listening to me!” She got up in his face now, knowing that if she didn’t look at him, he’d never look at her. He’d been avoiding her all night. 
      “No, no, no, no trust me,” she laughed mirthlessly. “They were enthralled by you, of course, of course."
      “I’m so…” he shook his head. “You’re making the whole night about you--"

      “--No, you’re the perfect friend. You didn’t even look at me--” she said.

      “--Holy sh*t. I can’t, I can’t. It’s f*cking selfish. It’s literally like—“

      “Oh. so I’m selfish now?" She asked. "I'm selfish now--” 
      “Yes!" He shot back. "You’re acting selfish. Right now, that’s exactly what’s happening."
      She couldn’t hold her tears in anymore. She looked down, hair falling over her eyes, sobs rebelling up her throat. She felt pathetic. 

      “Don’t f*cking look at me like that,” he groaned. “That’s so f*cked up.”

      She turned around because she knew if she looked at him for one more second she’d start bawling. She leaned over the sink, cool metal pressing against shaking hands. 
      He took a few deep breaths. His footsteps drew close to her. “Hey, hey, hey,” he cooed, voice now soothing, “hey, hey.” He grabbed her around the waist pulling her into him. He rested his chin on top of her head. “I don’t wanna fight. I don’t wanna fight. 
      She sniffles, rubbing at her eyes with her palms. 
       “Come on,” he said softly, “I’m sorry.” He kissed the top of her head. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He wrapped his arms around her small neck, encasing her in a warm headlock. “I’m sorry.”

       A giggle escaped her mouth. He kissed the top of her head. 
        “I’m sorry I dropped your hand,” he said, flipping her around and pulling her hands off her face. “Come on, come on,” he urged.

       “No,” she squeaked, “I’m embarrassed.” 
      “Come on,” he kissed her forehead, “I’m sorry.” He pulled her close, kissed her temple. She leaned her chin on his shoulder. He stroked her hair as she nuzzled into his shoulder. The sharp hairs of his beard were like cactus prickles against her scalp.

This is the real him, she thought. What I've been waiting all night for.

Chapter Text

The yellow glow from the microwave light created a buttery yellow halo around her head. One of his hands was around her waist, the other holding her hand. He’d flung open the refrigerator, and it washed them both in glacier blue light.

They’d finally stopped fighting. It was almost four in the morning now. She still felt embarrassed, but he held her with more softness than she deserved. She knew she’d acted crazy, he’d told her that plainly. But he was so forgiving and understanding, he wouldn’t bring it up again. He pressed his lips to her freckled forehead.

“Come to bed,” he whispered.

“I can’t,” she said. “My folks will be expecting me to come home.”

“Say the subway broke. Or a meteor hit earth.”

She giggled and pressed her face into his collar. “No, no, I need to get home.”

“It’s four in the morning, they’re already worried, what’s a few more hours?”

“No,” she shook her head. “They'll be worried. I need to leave.”

He wrapped both his hands around her waist and pulled her close, kissing her until she forgot what she’d been saying. “You’re twenty, you’re an adult. You shouldn’t have to run home to mommy and daddy.”

If I stay here, what is he gonna expect? Would I sleep in his bed with him? Would we just kiss? Do more than kiss? Oh my God, I haven’t shaved. I’m going to feel so stupid, especially with him, he’s been with countless girls. I’m just going to fumble around like an idiot nun.

She kissed him extra long, hoping that was enough to convey that she desired him. “Please drive me home?” she asked, a knot forming in her gut.

“It’s too late now, the sun will come up soon. Besides, I’m still a little buzzed. Just get a couple hours of sleep and I’ll take you home after breakfast.”

Is he going to think I’m acting immature again? I really don’t feel comfortable staying, I’m not ready. “I’ll Uber home. Or take the subway.”

He snorted. “Good one. That doesn’t make any sense. If it makes you feel better, I’ll sleep on the couch.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “Really?”

“If you really wanna kick me outta my own bed just for some antiquated Puritanical Christian moral standards, sure.”

I should definitely leave. But, it is late… and I don’t want him to get mad at me. 

“Tell your parents you stayed with Anika or one of my other friends. They can’t get mad at a girl’s sleepover.” His rough hand slipped under her black turtleneck and ignited the skin of her hip. His fingertips grazed the small of her back, sending electrical volts up her spine. Her legs weren't quite as steady as they had been a moment before.

“Nobody has to know,” he said. “Our little secret. Promise me you’ll stay?”

The oath stuck in her mouth, so she nodded.

He kissed her. “I love you.”

She startled. “You do?” That night when his friends arrived, he had introduced her as "his girl." Not girlfriend, not partner. He'd always said he wasn't into labels or stupid nuclear family hetero-normative relationships. Yes, of course he loved her. She felt it deep inside. He loved her like she loved him.

“I love you,” he kissed her cheek. “I love you,” he kissed her nose. “I love you,” he said, kissing her neck with fresh intensity. “You’re my angel, I’d pray to you every night.”

Fireworks exploded in her stomach. She cupped his face in her hands. “I love you too. I love you so much.”

He lifted her up so she could wrap her legs around his waist. He held onto her waist with one hand and shut the refrigerator door with the other. He held her firmly against him as he stumbled toward his bedroom door. 

She felt dizzy. Everything felt too bright, too close, too warm. She was about to say something, anything, but he shut the door behind them with his foot. They were in his bedroom now, completely alone except for the moon gleaming through the curtains.

He had a plush, king-sized bed with luxurious sheets and a navy goose down comforter. He laid her down on the bed, her head meeting memory foam pillows. He crawled on top of her, his hands eager as he undid his plaid flannel shirt and threw it onto the floor. He kissed her so quickly, so passionately, she didn’t have time to speak or think. Her mind started to slip through her ears and float up into the smog-covered stars.

“I love you so much,” he said, playing with the hemline of her black turtleneck.

“I thought you were gonna sleep on the couch." She tried to make herself sound playful but the words were tight.

“Just one more minute,” he kissed her neck six times, then her collarbone. “One more minute and you can tell me to get lost, if you want.” His hand wrapped around her knee and he hitched up her leg, bringing it around his waist. 

Her black turtleneck ended up on the floor in a wrinkled lump, next to a pile of to-go containers he had hidden from the guests.

—-----------------------------

The morning was cold and sweaty, like a locker room floor. 

I can’t believe that happened.

It was already noon, and she had ten missed calls from her parents. She hadn’t even remembered to text them last night.

He pulled her close to him. “Good morning, beautiful.”

       She touched his chiseled jaw. He looked like a Greek god in the afternoon light.  “Are you for real?” she whispered. 

         “What do you mean?” he chuckled, tucking her hair behind her ear and pressing a longing kiss on her neck.

         “I don’t know, I just feel like maybe I made you up.” He probably thinks that’s childish, she thought to herself, damn it, I shouldn’t have said that.

         His eyes smiled, but his mouth stayed in its usual horizontal line. He was laying on his side, head resting on his once-strong arm. 

         His sheets were slate gray Egyptian cotton, regularly changed by his maid or his mom. She laid her head on his graying chest hair. 

“You’re my girl, all mine,” he said.

She buried her nose into his shoulder. “I love you.”

She waited a few seconds, but he didn’t say it back. She looked up. He was already on his phone, scrolling through Uber eats. “Are you hungry?” He grinned. “We worked up quite an appetite."

"Yeah--"

"You’ll need to leave by two though," he interrupted. "My dad is coming over to go over the marketing plan for my shoe launch."

“Oh. For sure. Yeah.” She felt suddenly aware of her nakedness, her moon-pale skin was a flashing neon sign of how unsure of herself she was. “I said I loved you.”

“I heard you, sweet girl.” He hooked his knuckled under her chin and tipped it toward his face. “Do you want pancakes?”

Chapter Text

That was the first full night they'd spent together, but it wasn't technically the first time they had had sex.

They started dating at that awkward time right before the holiday season. In a normal relationship, you would have a few months to build up a foundation before you have to go and meet the parents. He was so laid back and aloof that when he asked her to join his family for Thanksgiving, she almost fell out of her chair. "My sister lives upstate," he said. "She has this cottage, you'd love it ."

"I'd love to go," she beamed. My parents will be heartbroken I'm not spending Thanksgiving with them.

He kissed her and everything else faded to a dull hum.

They'll get over it, she thought. One day when we're married, my parents will look back at this and understand.

Not that he would ever use the M word. He had spent hours waxing poetic about how marriage was an ancient trap used to subjugate women. He was a feminist, an egalitarian, an enlightened, modern man. He was Brooklyn. She had only known him a couple weeks when he told her how he truly felt. "We're twin flames," he had told her. "Burning bright blue . Souls connecting means so much more than some piece of paper."

Her parents had been the awful, sad brand of quiet when she told them she would be having Thanksgiving with her new boyfriend. Her mom gave a weak smile and said, "Whatever makes you happy, honey." Mom gave her her birthday present early: a vibrant red scarf her mother had spent months crocheting. It was the softest, thickest yarn and it smelled like chocolate chip cookies and her mom's lavender lotion . 

"Thank you so much, Mommy," she said. "It's perfect."

The fateful Thursday came. It was her time to prove she belonged with him, to impress his family and make him feel proud to be with her. Ever since he invited her to Thanksgiving , she had spent every waking minute planning what she would wear, how she would act, what she would say. She combed through Pinterest and even watched and rewatched one of the movies he had mentioned Annie Hall. He loved all things Woody Allen. She didn't see the appeal but took notes of Annie's fashion. Boxy, masculine silhouettes, earthy and neutral tones. Everything in her own closet was hopelessly Forever 21. She found her dad's old tan pea coat in his closet and paired it with a n orange and gray argyle sweater she had thrifted. Sustainable, environmentally friendly, second-hand--my new boyfriend will definitely approve. She pulled on her favorite pair of jeans and the black ankle boots she had gotten last Christmas.  

She was halfway out the front door when her mom stopped her. Mom wrapped the bright red scarf once, twice around her and kissed her forehead. "We'll miss you, Bug."

I want to stay. I'm afraid to go. Please ground me or something so I can't go. I'm in way over my head.

But she said none of that. She just hugged her mom and left.

She took the subway from the Upper West Side to Brooklyn. The image of her parents sitting alone at the dining room table with an empty chair flashed through her mind.  She kept checking her reflection in the greasy subway window. Her face was too round, her eyes too wide--no matter how much makeup she put on, she still looked like a teenager.

She couldn't believe her boyfriend wanted to bring a mess like her to meet his parents. He'd probably brought sophisticated career women to meet them, women with signature perfume scents and on track to become partners at their law firms. How embarrassing would it be when she had to admit she was taking a gap year and working at a frozen yogurt shop?

He wasn't waiting at the station when she got off the subway. When she took a cab to his apartment building, he wasn't even waiting outside for her. She'd never dated someone with their own apartment before. Her last boyfriend, who had been thirty-two, had lived in a townhouse with his roommates. Lingering at the call box, she wondered if everyone could tell why she was there. Do I look like a booty call? Some girl so far out of their depth in the coolest part of Brooklyn?

She found his last name and pressed the buzzer. 10 seconds. 20. Nothing. She started to text him, but what if he was on his way to the door? She didn't want to seem impatient or clingy. She waited another minute and started another text, then backspaced and deleted it all. She pressed the buzzer.

"God, chill," his voice crackled over the speaker, "I'm here, I'm here. Just give me a second."

Her shoulders slumped. It buzzed and the door unlocked. She took the steps slowly, feeling the wet wool blanket of shame over her. He had sounded so annoyed. He was probably up there regretting ever coming on to her at that party two weeks ago. What had he even seen in her? Clearly she couldn't even ring a doorbell without coming off as childish.

She had to knock on the door. When he finally opened it, he was talking on the phone. He didn't even spare her a glance but held up a figure to gesture: hold on.

"Yeah, no" he said into the phone, "that's not gonna work. Tell them we need at least ten percent."

She smiled nervously, not that he was looking at her, and lingered on the doormat.

He pressed the phone to his chest. "Get in," he demanded, "you're letting all the cold air in."

"Right, sorry," she said, stepping on to the welcome mat and closing the door behind her.

He was already in the kitchen. "That's absolute bullsh*t and you can quote me on that."

She took her time wiping her shoes and pretended to be really interested in examining the key hook. After ten minutes, she started to take her shoes off.

"Woah," he said, suddenly reappearing, "making yourself comfortable are you?" He sounded annoyed but he was smiling.

She opened her mouth the respond but he had already put the phone back to his ear. "Come on," he mouthed to her. He walked out the door and she scuttled after him. She followed him down to the parking garage where his vintage 1980 black Cadillac was gleaming under the fluorescent lights. He loved that car, he talked about it like it was his one true love.

He got in and slammed the door. She hurried into the passenger side. He peeled out of the garage, tires squeaking, still yelling into the phone.

She kept herself busy on the hour drive by staring at the window. She didn't want to seem like she was eavesdropping, but she didn't want to be rude and go on her phone in case he hung up suddenly. She wanted to be available whenever he was ready.

Finally, he hung up. He was staring at her, smiling to himself.

"What?" she asked, her grin spread across her entire face.

"Just you," he shrugged. "God, I love looking at you."

Her face caught fire.

"How did your call go?" she asked.

He immediately began ranting and she knew she had asked the right thing. By the end of it, he was telling the funniest story and she was laughing so much she could hardly breathe.

"I swear to God," he laughed, "and you won't believe it--"

"What?" She could have listened to him forever.

"And it was my foot!"

She burst into another spout of laughing so abruptly a snort involuntarily escaped. That just made both of them laugh even harder.

He reached over and grabbed her hand. Everything felt so right.

He was looking at her for so long that he nearly ran the red light.

The "cottage" was nothing like she had been picturing. This was no Hansel and Gretel one-room cottage. The driveway stretched all the way from the road, through their front lot that was large enough to be a park, and up to the three-story house. The house was an original 19th century Colonial made of provincial red brick and trimmed with the original brown shutters. It looked like something Nate's family would have had in Gossip Girl. There were four cars in the driveway--each one worth a full four years of tuition at Princeton.  

The fall air was crisp and cold. The autumn leaves had fallen down like pieces into place.

The door was a mosaic of mauve and terracotta and burnt orange stained glass, a checkerboard pattern that kept her from being able to see inside. Would his parents be right behind the door? Would everyone be in the kitchen? Had they watched them get out of the car?

She walked through the door with him. They brought the cold air in with them. The house was cozy and perfect, something straight out of a mid-century modern dream. The walls were the warm gold of a toasted marshmallow. Right inside the entryway, there was a pale blue alcove filled with the kinds of books a professor would own. A dark cherry wood staircase disappeared up to the second floor.

Something about it felt like home, somehow.

"Sweetheart!" a woman's voice, likely his mother's, called from the kitchen. "Come in here, we're about to take the pies out!"

He disappeared without looking back at her. "Come in whenever you're done gawking."

She didn't care. She wanted to stare at this tangerine clock, these sage green shelves forever. She unwound her scarf from her neck and hung it on the banister.

"Babe!" he called. She followed him.

The kitchen was just as darling as the rest of the house with sage green cabinets and butcher block counters. The appliances didn't mesh with the aesthetic, they were gigantic, high-end stainless steel, the kind that would be in a five star restaurant.

"Hi, come on in," his mother said. She wrapped her in a hug.

This will be fine. I had nothing to worry about.

His mother hugged him next and kissed his cheek.

"I'm Anya," his mother said. "We're so excited to meet you."

His dad came over and clapped him on the back. "Glad you could make it, kid."

"Well," his sister smiled, "if it isn't the trouble-maker himself." She looked just like her brother with the same dark hair, square jawline, dark eyes, and sweet disposition.

After an hour, all of the girl's apprehensions had melted away. His family was so welcoming and made her feel like she had known them for years.

When his mom pulled out the family photo album, the girl and her boyfriend looked through it together.

It was so strange seeing her boyfriend back when he was so little, just a kid with glasses in a twin-sized bed. She loved looking through these pictures and could've stayed there forever.

The girl wanted to reach out and grab his hand, but the way he had his arms crossed over his chest made her feel like that would be too much.

"He was the best pitcher in his little league!" His dad laughed, taking a sip of his scotch.

His cheeks flushed bright red as his mom told the story of when he was four and on the tee-ball team and had wet his pants while waiting in the outfield.

" You were so embarrassed," h is sister teased , "running around, waving your arms, screaming how you needed to potty."

"Shut up!" He laughed.

"Oh, and there was that one time--" his mother paused, looking at him. "No, it's not important."

"Oh, no," the g irl laughed, "I wanna hear!"

"No, no, no," the boyfriend shook his head at his mother, "I know exactly what you're thinking and absolutely no."

" Alright ," his mom held up her hands, "I won't say a word."

Everyone's faces were flushed, their eyes watery from laughter. The girl had been sitting, trying to blend in with the designer couch and remain silent, but now she needed to know.

"Come on," the girl smiled.

"I'm sure it's not even as interesting as you think," the boyfriend said.

"He had just turned seventeen--" his sister began.

"NOPE!" the boyfriend said, shooting to his feet. He grabbed the girl's hand and hauled her to her feet. "We're exhausted after the drive. I think we'll take a nap before supper." He led her up the stairs, down a narrow hall, and into what had to be his childhood bedroom. The walls were a loud blue, his comforter tomato red, and his furniture was all white--it was an in-your-face American flag of decor. He sat down on his twin sized bed and patted the place beside him. She sat, bouncing on the mattress. He kissed her forehead and then her lips. "You look hot," he murmured. "Really hot." He grabbed either side of her hips and tugged her into his lap, making her giggle.

He began biting her earlobe and her breath caught in her throat.

" Your family's downstairs ," she whispered.

" I need you, right now."

" They'll hear."

The sound of his family's laughter echoed through the hallway. These walls definitely were not soundproof.

"I' ll be quiet ," he grinned. "Nobody has to know."

Chapter Text

TRIGGER WARNING: *sexual assault, sexual coercion, sexual content*

"Nobody needs to know," he had grinned. 

She stood up, eager to put some distance between herself and that bed. It wasn't that she wasn't attracted to him, she definitely was. Who on earth wanted to get it on with your partner's family within earshot? How in the actual hell could he even be thinking of that with his parents just downstairs?

"It's just not hot," she said, "knowing that your parents can hear."

He did an exaggerated frown. "You don't think I'm hot?" He tugged on her arm trying to pull her back on his lap.

Shoot, I'm ruining everything. She pressed her hands on either side of his face and gave him a quick peck on the lips. "Of course you're hot, the hottest," she forced a smile. "I'll make it up to you later, I promise." As soon as the words left her mouth, she wished she hadn't. What the hell did that even mean? His eyes lit up, and she knew she had promised more than she would probably want to deliver.

She finally managed to convince him to go down to dinner. It should have been amazing, she should have been soaking up this special time of meeting his family. Thanksgiving was supposed to be warm and comforting. His sister was so friendly and made her feel right at home. His mother kept telling embarrassing stories about her son, which eased the tension in the girl's stomach. The dad was cracking predictable dad jokes. Everything should have been great. All she could keep thinking about was his hand that wasn't holding hers but instead planted on her thigh. He kept giving her thigh little squeezes, like promises of what was to come. It was impossible to think or make intelligent conversation when the pressure of "making it up to him" hung over her head.

Finally, after dinner, she was alone with him in his room. They were watching this generic police procedural show, NCIS or CSI or some other acronym. In the show, a man and a woman start tearing each other's clothes off, the whole shebang. She asked him to turn the tv off. He laughed.

"Turn it off, please?" she said in as casual a tone as she could muster. She didn't want to seem like a wet blanket.

But of course he left it on. He came over to her and started kissing her. Something felt wrong. They were in a room alone, together. It was dark. His parents were asleep a few feet away from them. He had left the sex scene running on the tv. She was wearing a cotton pajama romper that had loose, flowy shorts that almost touched her knees. It was navy with white stars.

Because he kissed me and put his hands on my hips, which was fine. Then he put his hands on my knees, and that was fine. He slid his hands around the back of my thighs and slid his hands up under the hem of my shorts. His hands went straight up my shorts, over my underwear, and brushed against my bra clasp. I wished I was dead. I wanted to do something. I wanted him to know I didn't like it, that it wasn't okay. Didn't he know that I was worth more than this? Was it my fault? I should know better. This is just what my parents had always told me, that if I was in a room alone with a boy this is exactly what he would do. How could I have expected anything different?

If I had been wearing more structured clothes, if I was wearing more, if I was wearing full length pants...If I was doing more, doing more, doing more, then it wouldn't have happened. When his hands were all the way inside of her romper, she felt her soul shoot out of her skin and up to the ceiling and stare down at her. She was looking at herself, but she didn't even recognize her. That girl was hollow. There was nothing behind her eyes. She was frozen.

She wanted to melt into the floor and down the drain and into the ocean and never be seen again.

She backed up. She got his hands off of her. She laughed, playfully swatted him away. She didn't want to seem like a frigid bitch. "I'm so tired," she said. Please let me go, please, please, please.

Disappointment was written all over his face. The sex scene was still playing on the screen behind them. 

"We can make out," she offered.

He snorted. "I'm thirty. I don't make out."

"I just don't want our first time to be in your childhood bed. Or while your parents can hear." She did want him, just not right at this exact second.

"Our first time?" he chuckled. "I think you mean your first time, babe."

He might as well have kneed her in the stomach. Of course. His tone filled in whatever deniability his words had left open. He was a super experienced sex master and she was some sniveling little virgin. He was thirty and she was still a teenager, and damn it if she wasn't proving him exactly right. Grown-up women embraced their sexuality. They didn't sweat over whether their partner's family knew they were having sex or not.

She kissed him in a way she hoped would show him how attracted she was to him. She slung her arms over his shoulders. "We can do other stuff." Why did I say that? What will he want? More than anything, she just wanted to wipe that look of disappointment off of his face.

She went to the hall bathroom. She washed her face, her hands, her arms, then her face again. She wanted to get into the shower fully clothed and scrub every inch of her skin and outfit, anything he had touched. But it was one in the morning and that definitely would have woken up the rest of the house. She used her make up wipes to scour every inch of her legs, hips, stomach, ribs---desperately scrubbing until her skin was red. There was no dirt or even residue on the wipes but she knew she was still dirty.

I swore I wouldn't do this again, that I would never feel this way again. I would never be that stupid highschooler again, crying over my skin being stolen and used.

He was supposed to be her boyfriend, the one who cared about her. He wasn't some random creepy who was just trying to get her into bed. He was meant to treat her better than that. Didn't he hold her in higher regard than this?

It was three years later but I was back in the exact same f*cking situation that had debilitated me in high school and sent me spiraling down the darkest path I'd ever been on. He's going to go and tell his friends and it's going to be high school all over again and I'll never escape and this is the rest of my life. Everywhere I go, everyone will know that I am a slut. Maybe that's because I'm the common denominator. That's who I am. What if I am the problem. When one boy assaulted me, I could write it off as statistically likely. But two men? How stupid was I? How many more times would this happen? Would it ever stop?

All of a sudden she was sixteen again--back in high school, back in braces, back in her first year of getting her period. She was a late bloomer, still in training bras and Fruit of the Loom value pack bikini briefs. Everyone else seemed so grown up in comparison. She wore eyeliner and tight shirts and tried to seem older but it didn't work. Everyone assumed she was still in middle school.

To be continued....

Chapter Text

She was a senior in high school. The only concerts she'd ever been to had been Hannah Montana and the Wiggles. Now, there she was at a real, gritty concert.
The band—a post-punk blur with a name spat into a microphone—played a venue that teenagers had willed back into existence, twice un-condemned just by refusing to let it die. The air was sweat and vape, thick and sting-sweet, ironed flat by heat. Bodies pressed wall-to-wall, plaid and mesh and streaked eyeliner, everyone fighting for a view of the battered splintered stage. She was shorter than almost anyone there, pressed between her best friend's pointy elbow and a stranger's sticky arm, the floor trembling under her like a body with its heartbeat turned up too high.
She had spent hours on her eyeliner. The whole train ride, she worried it was too much. Now, surrounded by high schoolers in every possible mood (bored, high, bristling with energy, tipsy off sips of someone else's flask), she was invisible. Supposedly, she looked older than half of them (her friend said so, loud in the bathroom mirror at the station), but she didn’t believe it. Shoulders hunched, hands stuffed in the pockets of her thrifted bomber, head ducked to her chest, she clung to her ticket stub like a floatation device. The other hand kept worming through her hair, again and again, a nervous habit she couldn’t lose.
The opening acts blurred, one after another, rushed and forgettable, racing through their songs like the police might show up if they didn’t finish in time. She counted the minutes. She moved only when the bass hit hard enough to shake it out of her. She tried not to make eye contact with anyone, not even her friend.
But then the headliner strode out and the entire place gasped out a single breath. The guitarist, Jack, was pure magnetism. He wasn’t what she thought he'd be. Older, late thirties maybe (not that she could tell), all wire and bone, face sharp as broken glass, left hand crawling with black ink that bled across his knuckles when he played. Jeans so vintage she could almost see the years on them, t-shirt so thin it was hardly a shirt, just the idea of one. His voice: gravel, rain on asphalt, a scrape. They started with a song that made zero sense but all the girls screamed the words, like if they stopped the world might stop with them.
She wanted to look away, but Jack scanned the crowd, row after row, like he was searching for someone. When his eyes landed on hers for a half-second, a blip of a moment—it felt like being dunked in ice water. She looked down so fast she thought she might black out. He wouldn’t remember her. Why would he ever pick her out of this swarm? Still, she couldn’t stop glancing back.
Third song, his gaze found her again. This time, he didn’t move on. He focused, zeroed in, staring right past the front row and all the chaos. She half-waved, then immediately hated herself. Who did she think she was, acting like they had a connection? She’d listened to exactly two albums, stalked the Instagram, never even commented. She was nothing. A body in a crowd. But now it felt like the lights were all pointing right at her.
Everything after blurred at the edges, fever-bright. She watched Jack, watched herself watching him, hyper-aware of every movement, every sweat-damp arm or brush of another person’s hair. By the encore, her ticket stub was shredded into confetti in her fist, her own hair sticking out in a wild halo from the heat and humid air.
Her friends wanted out. “Let’s beat the rush, get to the train before the concert ends,” they begged.
She felt glued to the spot. “Five more minutes,” she said, not explaining why, not even sure what she wanted. The lights snapped on, harsh and white after the purple haze. The crowd surged backwards, a single living thing, and she was swept along with it, dazed, floating.

And then a tap at her shoulder. She flinched. It was a guy in a faded SECURITY t-shirt, face too young for the job, half-smiling like he knew a secret. “Hey, you wanna meet the band? Jack said to bring you. Saw you in the pit.”
Her heart flipped upside down. She spat out something to her friends (bathroom, emergency, sorry) and followed, barely daring to breathe, through a battered door at the side of the stage.

Backstage looked nothing like she’d imagined. No velvet couches, no glitter, none of the cool chaos she’d seen in movies. Just crumpled chairs, amps with their guts showing, a mini-fridge leaking condensation, a folding table covered in chip bags and half-drunk waters. Jack was already there. He was talking to a girl who belonged in a magazine (legs for days, chipped nail polish, everything effortless), but as soon as she walked in, Jack looked right at her.

“Hey,” Jack said, like he already knew who she was. The other girl slouched away, like she’d seen this before and had made peace with it. “Didn’t think you’d come back. You looked about ready to bolt.” He waved at a chair. “Sit. You want a beer?”

It took a second to find her voice. “I’m nineteen,” she blurted. As soon as she said it, she wanted to vanish.

Jack laughed, harsh and thick. “I’m not a cop. Besides, you look older.” He popped the tab off a can and pushed it at her. “Just don’t narc.”

She took the beer, all condensation and slippery in her hands, and sat. Her fingers left streaks on her jeans. “You were really good tonight,” she managed.

“You think?” His grin was knives, a little bit mocking and a little bit hungry. “I saw you. You knew every damn word. Half these kids only shout at the loud parts.” He leaned in, shrinking the space between them. “You’re not like them, are you?”

She could feel herself blushing. “I dunno,” she managed. “I just… really like your music.”

He nodded, lips curling up at one side. “What’s your name?”

She told him. He repeated it, tasting it, like he needed to make sure he got it right. “Nice. Kinda sounds like a song.” He flicked his phone out, thumbs moving. “You ever been to a club before?”

She shook her head.

“You wanna come with us? There’s a spot in Midtown, real exclusive. Not for kids, but you...you could pull it off.” His eyes ran up and down her, not in a gross way, more like he was sizing her up for an acting.

Every cell in her body screamed NO, but out loud she said, “Sure, I guess.” Her chest tightened, panic and thrill running loops.

He told her to wait while he got the others. She sat, beer untouched, working out lies she could text her parents if she even made it that far. There was no reality where she actually got away with this, but she couldn’t back out now. Not with Jack watching her, over and over, like he’d forget her if he stopped for even a second.

They left as a unit, Jack catching her wrist in his hand, easy but unbreakable. “Come on,” he said. She followed.

Crammed into a cab: two bandmates in the back, pawing at each other; the drummer up front mumbling to the driver; Jack and Her squished together, denim and bruised leather. He talked nonstop, sometimes to her, sometimes to himself, sometimes just to the window. He didn’t seem to care if she answered, as long as she was listening.

“You got anyone waiting up for you?” he asked, voice low.

“My parents think I’m sleeping over at a friend’s place,” she lied.

He laughed. “You’re trouble,” he said.

The club was nothing like she imagined. Neon everywhere, glass and thumping floors, a bouncer who could break her in half without blinking. Jack barely paused, just gave a nod, and the bouncer let them through, giving Her a once-over, like trying to guess her birth year. Inside: too loud for words, lights switching colors so fast it was like getting your brain rewired. The crowd here was older, sharper, experienced in the art of debauchery.

Jack pressed a fake ID into her hand. “Just in case,” he yelled. “Act like you belong.” He ordered two vodka shots, slammed his, made her drink hers.

“You’re different,” he said. This time it sounded real. “Most girls your age, they don’t get it. They want a selfie and that’s it. You see through the crap.”

She smiled anyway. He ordered her another drink. The vodka blurred the sharp edges, turning her limbs fuzzy and light.

They talked, or tried to. He asked about her life, music, dreams, plans for the future. He teased, pushed, poked fun at her but not in a way that made her want to run. She laughed. She hadn’t laughed like this in months. Somewhere between the third and fourth drink, his hand landed on her leg. Then her waist. She didn’t move it. She didn’t want to move it.

The night went sideways, in flashes: the way Jack bent close to speak just to her, the way his hand gripped her back, the way he never let her out of his sight. She kept thinking “this isn’t real” and then reminding herself not to ruin it. This was what stories were made of.

After midnight, Jack said he needed air. He pulled her toward the back, through a wall of smokers into a graffiti alley that stank of beer and city and rain. “You okay?” he asked, and for half a second he seemed like he cared, or maybe that was just her hoping.

“Yeah,” she said. “You?”

He laughed. “I’m definitely okay. I like being with you. You’re….” He hesitated, hunting for the word. “You’re not scared of me.”

She wanted to say she was. But maybe she wasn’t scared of him. She was scared of herself, of saying yes, of wanting this, of what she’d already agreed to.

Jack kissed her. Softer than she expected. She kissed him back, tasting every awful, beautiful thing: beer and cigarettes and danger.

He tucked her hair behind her ear. “Let’s get out of here,” he said. She nodded.

Back through the club, past the bouncer’s blank stare, out into the black city air. She barely noticed the ride, until the car slid to a stop in front of a blank apartment building. Jack said, “You trust me?”

“Should I?”

He laughed. “Probably not. But you do, right?”

She didn’t answer.

He got the door for her. “After you.”

She stepped in, feeling the whole world tilt off its axis. This was her story now. Whatever happened next, it was because she chose it.

After the second round, Jack reached into his pocket and palmed something onto the table. Two blue pills, smaller than Tic Tacs.

"You trust me?" he asked, just loud enough to be heard over the music.

She hesitated. "What is it?"

"Just something to take the edge off. You'll like it. Promise."

They drank more. The vodka stripped her insides clean. The pill made everything beautiful, the music more musical, Jack more magnetic. Time disintegrated. At some point he led her onto the dance floor, which was more of a writhing human blender than a floor, and she let herself be folded into the motion, Jack's hands always somewhere on her body: her waist, her shoulder, the back of her neck. The longer they danced, the less she cared about anything but staying in orbit around him.

The world stuttered. She found herself pressed against a wall, Jack's lips at her jawline, his breath coming fast. She didn't remember how they got there. He kissed her, and she let him. She liked the way it felt: grown up, dangerous, important. He kissed her harder, his hands everywhere at once. She could barely feel her own body, but she felt his, all muscle and desperation.

At some point he broke away and dragged her to a door marked "STAFF ONLY." He didn't bother knocking, just slipped them both inside, a narrow hallway lined with crates of booze and mops. The light in here was brutal, exposing, but she couldn't stop shaking, couldn't stop wanting.

He pushed her gently against the wall. "You okay?" he asked, but it sounded like a dare.

"Yeah," she said, and she almost meant it.

He kissed her again, hungrier. His hands slid under her shirt. She let them. He pressed against her, hard and insistent, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, not sure who was holding who up. He said things, a litany of you're so beautiful and I need you and I've never met anyone like you, and the words mixed with the music and the drugs until she couldn't tell if they were real.

He fumbled with her jeans, clumsy in the small space, and she helped him, because she wanted to, because she didn't know how not to. The wall was cold and damp against her back. His hands were not gentle, but she didn't want gentle. She wanted obliteration
When it was over, he pulled away and zipped up, brushing her hair out of her face. "See?" he whispered, lips to her forehead. "You're perfect. Knew it from the second I saw you."

She couldn't tell if she was crying or just sweating. He kissed her again, softer this time, and took her hand.

They went back out to the club. Nobody noticed anything. The night spun on, bright and endless.

She told herself it was what she wanted. She told herself she was in control. But as Jack flagged down another round of drinks, and the music got louder, and her head started to swim with exhaustion, she realized she couldn't remember the last time she had said no to anything.

____________________________________________________________

She woke to the shriek of sunlight across her face, the kind of light that made it impossible to pretend you were anywhere but exactly where you were. The unfamiliar room was a minefield of sensory punishment: the sour reek of spilled beer and unwashed sheets, the sharp bite of her own morning breath, a mattress that sagged in the middle like it was trying to eat her alive. Band posters peeled from the walls, taped over torn paint and angry holes. Last night's clothes were bunched at the foot of the bed, half inside out, tagged with what might have been blood or maybe just a blot of lipstick.

She blinked hard, swallowing bile. Her mouth was dry as felt. Every inch of her body ached. For a moment she tried to piece together where she was and how she'd gotten there, but the memories came in cold, broken fragments: Jack's hands, Jack's breath, the hard wall of the club's back room, the drag of her jeans down her legs. She couldn't tell which parts were real and which were manufactured by her own wishful thinking, but the outcome was the same.

Jack was sprawled on the far side of the bed, snoring with his mouth open, hair mussed into horns. He looked smaller in sleep, almost her age. She studied the line of his shoulder, the tattooed script winding down his bicep. She had traced it with her fingers last night, or at least she thought she had. It seemed impossible now.

She sat up, pulling the sheet to her chest. The movement woke him. He made a noise, something between a grunt and a yawn, and turned to face her.

"Morning," he said, voice shredded. He reached for a pack of cigarettes on the bedside table, shook one out, and lit it. He didn't offer her one. "You hungry?"

She shook her head. Her stomach was an empty pit.

He shrugged and stubbed the cigarette out, already bored. "You can use the shower if you want. I don't have an extra towel though."

She nodded, but didn't move. The silence stretched. She couldn't stand it. "Last night," she started, then trailed off.

Jack gave her a sidelong look. "What about it?"

She struggled to dig for the words in her pounding head. "I just—I don't know. I wasn't really ready for all that."

He barked a laugh. "You seemed pretty ready to me."

She felt herself shrink into the mattress. "I mean, I didn't really know what was happening."

"Here we fucking go," he said, voice rising. "Don't pull that shit with me, okay? You wanted it as much as I did. Or is this the part where you try to get me canceled?"

She flinched. "No, that's not—"

He cut her off, sitting up, face blotchy and dark. "That's exactly what this is. Jesus Christ. You practically dragged me into the back room. Now you're playing the victim?"

She tried to speak, but the words wouldn't come. Her hands were shaking, knuckles white on the edge of the sheet.

Jack was out of bed now, pacing the tiny room, naked and unashamed. He looked so much older in the daylight, almost middle-aged. "You know what your problem is? You're just like all the others. You act like you're so grown up, so cool, and then you wake up in the morning and decide it was all a mistake." He gestured at her, furious. "I knew I shouldn't have trusted you. You're just looking for attention."

She bit down on her lip, tears welling up and spilling over before she could stop them. He noticed and sneered. "Oh, come on. Don't start crying now. I'm the one who's screwed here. You want to fuck up my life? Congratulations, you did it."

He started grabbing her clothes from the floor, hurling them at her one by one. "Get dressed. Go home. Just don't talk to me again."

She struggled into her underwear and jeans, fingers fumbling. Her shirt was inside out, and she couldn't make her hands work the buttons on her jacket. Everything was wrong-side-up, wrong-side-in. She wiped her face with the back of her hand, but more tears just kept coming. Jack watched her, stone-faced, arms crossed.

When she was finally dressed, she couldn't look at him. He opened the front door, wide enough for the whole building to hear, and stood aside. "There. Free to go," he spat. "And I better not fucking read about your bragging about sleeping with me on whatever sad-ass fangirl forum you're on."

She stepped past him, keeping her head down. The hallway was cold, echoing with the sound of her own ragged breathing. She didn't remember how she'd gotten here last night, didn't know if she could find her way home now, but she kept walking anyway. Down the stairs, out the front door, into the slap of sunlight and city noise.

She made it halfway down the block before she broke, slumping against a payphone, sobbing until her throat hurt. People passed by, glancing and looking away. She stayed there, frozen, until the sun slid behind a building and she was nothing but a shadow on the sidewalk.

_______________________________

*Back to the present day*

She woke this time to quiet. The kind of quiet that only existed in apartments five stories up, where the sounds of life were filtered through brick and glass, muted into a distant comfort. She was alone in the bed, but the sheets were still warm on the other side, His pillow cratered where he'd slept. Sun poured in through the half-drawn curtains, bleaching the walls and the sheets and even her eyelids when she blinked.

For a split second her heart jackhammered—where was she, where was he, had she been abandoned again—but then her eyes adjusted and she remembered: it was morning, it was safe, and she wasn't seventeen anymore. She was grown, or something close to it, and she had survived.

The apartment was painted in gentle colors, bone white and gentle grays, but the red scarf she wore last night was draped over the chair, a slash of color that looked more alive than anything else in the room. She rolled onto her back, studying the ceiling, letting the warmth soak into her skin. The night had been late and long, full of talk and laughter, but there had been no sense of hurry, no threat of anything expected from her. Only comfort, only quiet.

She listened for Him, but the only sound was the city humming through the windows and the faint ticking of the old radiator. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and padded to the bathroom, washed her face, ran her fingers through her hair. In the mirror her eyes looked tired, but not haunted. She thought about the girl she used to be, wondered if that girl would even recognize this version of herself.

When she came back to the bedroom, the front door clicked open. Him entered, arms full: paper bag, two coffee cups, brown cardboard carriers stacked and swaying. He saw her and smiled like he'd been waiting his whole life for the sight. "You're awake," he said, setting everything down on the dresser. "I was just about to come wake you. I got blueberry scones—they're your favorite, right?"

She nodded, the word stuck in her throat. He came over, handed her one of the coffees, careful not to spill.

"You remembered," she said, more to herself than to Him.

"Of course I did," He said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

They sat on the edge of the bed, the sunlight laying stripes across their legs. He pulled apart the paper bag and produced two scones, one for each of them. She broke hers open and the sugar crumbled in her lap, sticky and sweet.

For a few minutes they didn't talk, just ate and drank and watched the dust motes spark and drift in the air. The coffee was perfect, sweet and milky, just how she liked it. She looked over at Him, noticed how he let her eat the bigger half, how he wiped the crumbs off her fingers without a word.

"It's nice," she said quietly. "Just—this."

He smiled. "It's the best part of my day," he said, and she believed him.

They finished breakfast, and He stretched out beside her, pulling the covers up around them both. He rested his head against hers, breathing in her scent like it was the only thing keeping him alive.

For the first time in a long time, she felt the ache in her chest soften. The fear and shame and memory receded, just for a moment, into the background. She wasn't erased, wasn't perfected, but she was here and she was warm and she was allowed to be happy.

She let herself smile, small but real, and closed her eyes. The day could wait.

She woke again to the smell of coffee and the sound of Him rustling the newspaper, both so familiar they could have been woven into her DNA. The red scarf was still draped over the chair, but now it was joined by her cardigan, sleeves twisted, a perfect still life of their night together.

He was sitting cross-legged on the foot of the bed, the paper spread out in front of him, chin tucked, eyebrows pulled together in concentration. He looked up when she stretched, one arm high above her head, and gave her a lopsided grin. "You ready to help me out?" he said, shaking the paper.

"Depends," she said, voice gravelly with sleep. "Is it the crossword?"

"Of course," he said. "I waited for you."

She crawled to the foot of the bed and took her place beside him, their shoulders touching. The crossword was already half-filled, his blocky handwriting crowded into the boxes. He read the clues aloud, leaning into her when he didn't know the answer, or when he just wanted to feel her next to him.

"Six across: ‘Summertime treat, seven letters, starts with ‘p’," he said, tapping the paper.

She thought for a second. "Popsicle."

He filled it in, tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth. "You’re good at this," he said.

She shrugged. "It’s the only thing I’m good at before noon."

He grinned, eyes crinkling. "I can think of a few other things," he said, lowering his voice. She elbowed him in the ribs, but not hard.

They kept going, clue after clue, and when they disagreed on an answer they argued like it was the most important thing in the world. She swore that ‘algae’ had to be correct, he was certain it was ‘moss’. She Googled it, declared herself victorious, and he raised his hands in mock surrender. "You win again," he said.

"You let me win," she countered, but he shook his head.

"Never," he said, smiling soft. "You’re just smarter than me."

The coffee cups were balanced on the nightstand, one dangerously close to the edge, and the sheets were spattered with crumbs from the scones. The sun shifted across the room, throwing patterns onto their legs, their arms, the crossword puzzle itself. She didn’t mind the mess. It felt lived in, alive.

When the crossword was done, he set the paper aside and leaned back, pulling her down with him. She landed with her head on his chest, listening to the slow, steady thump of his heart.

"This is my favorite part," he said, voice muffled in her hair.

"What, the breakfast or the puzzle?" she asked.

He ran his fingers down her arm. "The part where it’s just us," he said. "No noise, no drama. Just… this."

She closed her eyes. "Yeah. Me too."

He wrapped his arms around her, and they lay like that, bodies tangled, breathing in sync. For the first time in ages she felt the muscles in her neck unclench, the last scraps of yesterday’s ghosts burning away in the morning sun.

She wondered if she should say something, if she should thank him for making her feel so safe, so wanted. But she didn’t need to. He already knew.

They drifted in and out of sleep, neither of them caring what time it was or if they ever got out of bed at all. At some point, she reached for her coffee, took a sip, and smiled at the taste.

She’d never liked mornings, but this one she never wanted to end.

Chapter Text

Well, maybe we got lost in translation
Maybe I asked for too much
But maybe this thing was a masterpiece 'til you tore it all up
Running scared, I was there
I remember it all too well
And you call me up again just to break me like a promise
So casually cruel in the name of being honest
I'm a crumpled up piece of paper lying here
'Cause I remember it all, all, all
They say all's well that ends well, but I'm in a new hell
Every time you double-cross my mind
You said if we had been closer in age, maybe it would have been fine
And that made me want to die
The idea you had of me, who was she?
A never-needy ever, lovely jewel whose shine reflects on you
Not weeping in a party bathroom, some actress asking me what happened
You, that's what happened, you
You who charmed my dad with self-effacing jokes
Sipping coffee like you're on a late night show
But then he watched me watch the front door all night, willing you to come
And he said, "It's supposed to be fun turning 21"

The city had cycled from icy, spiked air to the soft, early bruising of spring; the smell of melted snow lingering in the gutters, the sound of wind making everything metallic. She had learned the exact route between his brownstone and her favorite bakery, the best way to navigate the subway from his stop (smile at the guy who worked the turnstile, keep your head down at the platform, ignore the flailing chaos above and below). She had found new places to stash her toothbrush and tamed her hair into a style that required zero effort but always looked like she’d just left a photoshoot. She'd learned the rhythm of his moods and the weight of his silences. She had, for the first time in her life, allowed herself to believe in the permanence of something. Now it was almost May, and the city was sticky with the promise of summer. She wore an oversized white button-down, sleeves rolled and cuffed above her bony wrists, collar half-popped and the back hem covering the shorts she’d stolen from his dresser. Her hair was twisted back in a loose, off-duty-ballerina bun. She padded barefoot down the hallway, guided by the faint rumble of music from his walk-in closet. He was there, on the ottoman in the middle of it all, surrounded by racks of color-coded shirts and racks of shoes, as if he’d collapsed at the dead center of his own personal department store. He wore a white tee and an ash-gray hoodie that looked both cheap and unspeakably expensive, the kind with a tag you leave on so people know you paid for it. His head was low, hands bunched on his knees, hoodie hooded. The light in the closet was clinical, recessed LEDs making everything brighter than daylight but less honest than the sun.

She stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame. “You know, if you stare at your shoes long enough, they might just tell you which pair to wear,” she joked. He didn’t move. She watched the small muscles in the back of his neck flutter, like he was bracing for some invisible impact. For a second she wondered if he was hungover, or if the band had gotten some catastrophic review, or if maybe he was just having one of his days—the days when he hated everything, especially himself.

She crossed the plush carpet, the pile of it swallowing her feet, and slid her hands onto his shoulders from behind. His back was warm and solid, but under the cotton she felt every edge of his bones. She pressed her cheek into his hair and kissed the crown of his head, like she’d seen his mother do once in a photo. She waited for the usual: his arm up and around her, his palm on the small of her back, the slow pull of gravity drawing her onto his lap. Nothing happened. She shifted, tried again. “You okay?” she whispered, lips brushing the line of his scalp.

He jerked a little at the sound, like she’d startled him. He ran his hands through his hair, fingers shaking. “I can’t do this anymore,” he said, not much louder than a cough. At first she thought he meant the day—the existential dread of it, the press cycle, the emails, the relentless expectation. But then he turned, finally, and looked at her with eyes so red it was like he’d clawed them bloody from the inside.

She blinked. “What?” It was all she could manage. He winced, like the word hurt him.

“This. Us. I can’t do it anymore.” It hit her like being slapped awake from a dream. Her body moved before her mind caught up—she dropped to her knees in front of him, searching his face for any sign of the usual joke, the hidden glint that said he was winding her up. But there was nothing but bone-white dread.

“That’s it?” she said. “You’re just… quitting?” Her voice cracked on the last word, made it sound like a toddler’s tantrum.

He stared at the wall behind her, mouth working. “I’m sorry,” he said, and she realized how much she hated that phrase. It was the phrase of cowards. He said it again, “I’m sorry, I just can’t do this.”

She waited for the punchline. When none came, her chest started to cave in on itself. “So what am I supposed to do?” she asked. “Just walk out of here and pretend we never—?”

“I don’t know,” he said, and his hands were in his hair again, yanking at the roots. “I don’t know, okay? I just—something’s not right, it hasn’t been right for a while.”

She felt the rage well up. “Then why didn’t you say anything?” Her voice pitched up, sharp and loud. “You just let me think everything was fine, you let me think—” She stopped herself before it got embarrassing.

He still wouldn’t look at her. “I didn’t know how,” he said. “You’re so fucking good at everything, at pretending it’s all fine. I couldn’t keep up.”

She laughed, a dry, brittle thing that made her sound ten years older. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

He had the audacity to say nothing. “Just fucking talk to me,” she said, voice rising. “Fucking look at me!” She grabbed his chin and forced his eyes to hers. He stared back, dead and glassy, and she let go. She was shaking now, and the room felt two sizes too small.

He sighed. “Maybe if we’d been closer in age, or if—if something was different. I don’t know.” He rubbed his eyes, like maybe he could erase the last year with friction alone. “But we’re just too different, you know? We don’t fit. Not really.”

She backed away, stumbled over a pair of his sneakers, collapsed against the wall. She pulled her knees up and dug her nails into her shins until it hurt. He watched her, and for the first time in their whole time together, she thought he looked afraid of her. Not in a physical way—she wasn’t that strong—but like he was seeing, maybe for the first time, what he’d actually done. She buried her face in her arms.

“I thought you were this amazing, never-needy, always lovely jewel,” he said, voice barely audible. “But God, you’re just like way too much sometimes. Look, I know that's harsh but I'm just being honest."

She didn’t respond. There was nothing to say that wouldn’t make her sound pathetic. He stood, hands jammed in his pockets, and hovered for a moment like he might try to hug her, or at least say goodbye. Then he left, the sound of his footsteps receding into the bedroom and then the hallway beyond. She stayed on the floor, trying to remember how to breathe. The air was thick with his cologne and the memory of every night they’d spent in this closet, laughing at his terrible taste in t-shirts, making out on the ottoman, pretending they were the kind of people who could have a future together. It all seemed like a story she’d read somewhere, not her own life. He had dropped it so cruelly, so casually. She stared at the wall until the LED lights started to blur at the edges, until her head was pounding and her throat was raw.

She wanted to die, or maybe just disappear into the softness of the carpet, never to be seen again.

______________________________________________

She spent the next curled up in the fetal position in her childhood bed, wedged between the wall and the mountain of unwashed laundry at the end of her bed. She was wearing his blue plaid pajama pants, rolled twice at the ankles to keep them from swallowing her feet. The room was dark, the curtains closed. Her phone buzzed every few minutes, but she let it thrum itself to silence on the nightstand, screen face down. The only sound in the apartment was the radiator clicking and the sound of her own breathing, sometimes slow, sometimes so fast she thought she might actually hyperventilate. When the sobs came, they came hard: body-wracking, ugly things that left her raw and aching and half-convinced she’d never make another sound again. When the crying stopped, she lay flat on her back and tried to focus on the feel of the flannel at her hips, the faintest scent of him (detergent, sweat, that cologne he stole from a hotel in Milan). It made her hurt more, but she kept wearing them anyway.

He called seventeen times the first day. Nine the second. By the third morning, he had switched to texts, mostly one-liners or blurry photos of the city outside his window: “Remember this?” and “Hope you’re okay."

She read them all, but didn’t respond. She deleted none of them. She couldn’t bring herself to. The world kept going without her. She ignored the group chat, the DMs, the growing mountain of unread email. She skipped all her classes, not because she was afraid to show her face but because her body felt like it had been drained of everything but grief, and even dragging herself to the shower felt like an Olympic sport. Food tasted like nothing. Water hurt her teeth. On the third night, her mother knocked on the door. She didn’t want to let her in. But the knock came again, gentle but relentless, so she rolled over and grunted something that sounded like “go away” but was just a sigh. The door creaked open and the hallway light bled in around her mother’s silhouette. Her mom was in an old hoodie and yoga pants, hair scraped back into a ponytail, eyes rimmed with the kind of mascara that never really comes off. She sat on the edge of the bed, making no move to touch her, just folding her hands in her lap and watching her daughter with the same expression she’d used for years—tender but wary, like approaching a wild animal.

“You want to talk about it?” her mom asked after a while.

She shook her head. Her mom nodded, as if she’d expected it. “Want to watch something dumb on Netflix?”

She shook her head again. Her mom didn’t push. She looked around the room, surveying the damage: the piles of books and clothes, the empty ramen cups, the sticky-taped polaroid pictures on the wall above the bed. All of them were of the girl at some stage of childhood or adolescence—gap-toothed, braces, then eyes black-rimmed with kohl, then just her and the cat, then just her and the city skyline. No trace of him in any of them. Her mom smiled, tight-lipped.

“You know, when I was your age, I thought the world would end if a boy broke up with me,” she said, voice soft. “I remember sitting on the bathroom floor, listening to Elliott Smith and just—losing it. Like, for days.”

The girl managed a grunt that meant she was listening, barely. Her mom ran her fingers through the end of the comforter. “It goes away. It feels like it won’t, but it does. Or maybe it doesn’t, and you just get stronger.” She paused. “Or you get weirder and start talking to cats. I did that, too.” The girl let her eyes close. She remembered being six and having her mother’s arms around her, safe in a world that wasn’t so complicated. She missed that world so much it hurt.

Her mom stood, stretched her back, and smoothed the blanket at the foot of the bed. “You should try writing down your feelings,” she said. “It helped me. Just…get it all out, even if you never show it to anyone.” The girl nodded, just enough so her mother would notice. Her mom leaned in and kissed the top of her head, just a quick press of lips, then left without another word. The hallway went dark again. She pulled the blanket up to her chin and stared at the spot on the ceiling where the paint was peeling. She wondered what she would write, if she ever found the energy. Maybe just one line, over and over, until the page was full: I am so fucking tired. She let her mind drift, and for the first time in days, she slept.

________________________________________

Late that night, she dragged herself out of bed and back to her desk. The fairy lights she’d strung around the window buzzed a low, static whine, barely enough to see by. It was perfect—she wanted just enough light to keep her from bumping into the world, but not enough to see herself clearly. She unlocked the old Smith-Corona typewriter she’d rescued from a curb in Park Slope last summer. It was heavy, cherry red, with keys worn to a shine by decades of other people’s words. She liked the sound it made—hard, definite, nothing like the tap of a laptop keyboard. She fed a sheet of paper into the roller and sat there, staring at the blankness, fingers hovering over the home row. She typed a few lines. Then deleted them, line by line, the carriage making a sharp, judgmental sound with every slap. She tried again, this time just smashing out whatever came to her head:

IT HURTS IT HURTS IT HURTS.

She let the words run until the page was half-filled, until the repetition turned meaningless and the keys started sticking. She ripped the paper out and crumpled it, then started over. She wrote about the smell of his skin in the morning, about how she missed his voice in the kitchen, about the way she’d wanted to save him from himself, as if anyone could.

She wrote about the closet, the way the lights made her feel like a bug pinned to a board, the exact sound of his voice when he said “I can’t do this anymore.”

She typed until her fingers ached and the ribbon left black stains on her hands. Nothing came out right. She balled up the paper, tossed it in the corner, and started again. And again. And again, until her floor was a nest of failed attempts, a pile of confessions that all sounded pathetic when she read them back. She stared at the next blank page, and for a moment, it looked like a new universe, clean and unspoiled. She almost started to cry again, but stopped herself. There was no one left to see. She pressed the first key and let the machine take her away.

_________________________________________________________

The invite came in the form of a text, three hours before the event: “It's time to get you out of the house. Come to my art show, it will be so fun!” from a friend she barely saw anymore.

She almost ignored it, but then she remembered the advice—put yourself out there, you’ll feel better, you can’t just wallow forever. So she said yes, instantly regretted it, and spent the next hour tearing through her closet for something that didn’t scream I’m still crying over a boy. She settled on the black dress—the one with sleeves that draped but didn’t suffocate, hem just above the knee, the fabric with enough stretch to make her feel less breakable. She swiped on red lipstick, careful not to let her hand shake, then wiped it off and did it again until the line was perfect. She wore the silver hoops she’d bought with her first paycheck, and a pair of ankle boots that made her two inches taller and four times more confident. By the time she arrived at the gallery, the city was already a blur of headlights and taxi horns. The opening was held in a converted warehouse in Soho, all concrete and white walls, the kind of space that made you feel simultaneously important and invisible. There were already bodies everywhere, drifting from canvas to sculpture to the open bar at the back. She slipped in, handed her coat to a bored attendant, and did her best impression of a girl who belonged.

She found her friend by the hors d’oeuvres table, locked in animated conversation with a man in a black turtleneck. Her friend squealed and hugged her, introduced her to the turtleneck (who had a one-syllable name and smelled like gin), then was swept away by another group before she could even finish her champagne. She stood alone by the cheese platter, pretending to study the art on the walls, which all looked like variations on rectangles and existential crisis. She refilled her glass, let the bubbles numb her tongue.

She kept her back to the room, not because she was shy but because she needed to breathe. The heels started to hurt. Her scalp itched from too much dry shampoo. After an hour, she started to feel a little better. It was easy, being anonymous in a place like this. She could watch people—how they moved, what they wore, who they watched in turn. She made up stories for each of them, games to keep herself from thinking about anything real.

Then she saw him. He was across the room, by the largest canvas, hands folded behind his back, head tilted in concentration. He wore a gray suit with sneakers, the jacket open to reveal a plain white tee, collarbone sharp above the neckline. His hair was a little longer, but the way he stood—the curve of his spine, the angle of his jaw—she would have recognized him in a blackout. Her heart kicked.

She set her glass down, wiped her palms on the side of her dress. She tried to look casual as she made her way toward him, weaving through clusters of people, rehearsing what she would say: Hi, I didn’t expect to see you, do you want to get a drink, are you okay. He turned just as she was within reach. It wasn’t him. The resemblance was uncanny, but the eyes were all wrong, colder, more calculating.

The stranger saw her staring and gave her a smirk, like he knew exactly who she was, exactly what she’d just hoped for. She mumbled an apology, backed away, nearly knocked over a sculpture in the process. She retreated to the bathroom, locking the door behind her. She braced her hands on the cold porcelain and tried to breathe through the lump in her throat.

She checked her face in the mirror, saw the mascara smudged at the corners of her eyes, the lipstick bleeding into the cracks of her lips. She tried to laugh, but it came out as a sob. She fished a tissue from her bag, dabbed at the mess. She told herself she was being dramatic, pathetic, childish, but the tears kept coming anyway, quiet at first, then harder. There was a knock at the door. She ignored it.

The knock came again, then a soft voice: “Hey, you okay in there?” She didn’t answer.

The voice tried again. “I’ve got another bathroom emergency if you want to tag-team a meltdown.”

Against her better judgment, she opened the door. Standing on the other side was a woman with glossy black hair, blunt bangs, and eyeliner sharp enough to kill a man at ten paces. She held a cocktail in one hand and a clutch in the other, and when she saw the girl’s face, she smiled like they were old friends. “Been there,” she said, offering her a fresh tissue. “Art shows are brutal.”

The girl laughed, which made her want to cry again, but the woman just leaned against the sink and took a sip of her drink. “Boy trouble?” the woman asked, casual as if discussing the weather.

The girl nodded.

“Me too. Fucking disaster.” The woman winked. “But at least we look amazing, right?”

The girl looked at her reflection again. The eyes were still puffy, but the dress fit, the lipstick was salvageable. She straightened up a little, ran her fingers through her hair. The woman finished her drink, set the glass down, and offered her a conspiratorial smile.

“Come out with me. We’ll talk shit about everyone here. It’ll be healing.” She almost said no, almost retreated back into the stall, but something in the stranger’s tone made her want to say yes.

So she did. They walked back into the gallery, side by side. The woman introduced herself and began to narrate each painting, giving them all new titles: “Rectangular Depression #7,” “I'm a Trust Fund Nepo Baby” “Portrait of the Artist as a Pretentious Asshole.” The girl found herself laughing, really laughing, for the first time in weeks. When she looked across the room, the man in the gray suit was gone. The woman turned to her, voice low. “What happened?” she asked. The girl thought of him—the real him, the one who broke her, the one who would never again appear at the end of a crowded room, waiting for her.

She wanted to say it out loud, wanted to confess that she’d never really stopped waiting, that she was still haunted by the hope of seeing him again. She pictured his face so clearly it was like she could reach out and touch him. You, she thought. That’s what happened: you.

The woman clinked her empty glass against the girl’s. “Well, whatever happened," the woman said, "fuck him."

And for a second, the girl almost believed it was possible.

__________________________________

Her twenty-first birthday fell on a wet, gray Saturday, the kind that made Brooklyn feel like the bottom of a drained aquarium. Her parents threw a party at home, invited everyone who’d ever attended one of her birthdays—elementary school friends, the girl from ballet, a cousin who once convinced her to eat a cricket for five bucks. The living room was dressed in a rainbow “Happy Birthday” banner that arched across the wall in sun-faded letters, held up with painter’s tape and a stubborn refusal to buy a new one after all these years. There were balloons, most already sagging by the time the first guest arrived, and a table of snacks that ran the spectrum from gluten-free kale chips to neon orange cheese balls.

She wore a comfortable olive sweater and a striped skirt, the kind of outfit that seemed festive but still safe, armor against the onslaught of childhood memories and awkward hugs. Her mom insisted on a tiara, so she wore that too, perched crooked atop her head like a dare. The apartment filled fast. The noise swelled, a thrum of laughter and shouting and pop music bouncing off the windows. She wandered through it, plate in hand, trading small talk with people she hadn’t seen since high school. Everyone wanted to know what she was doing now, what her plans were, if she was dating anyone. She smiled, told them she was thinking about grad school, that she might start a podcast, that she was still single and loving it, haha.

Every time the doorbell rang, her stomach flipped. She’d told herself he wouldn’t come. He didn’t even know her address anymore, didn’t know any of her old friends. But she kept glancing at the door anyway, heart doing a weird double-beat each time a new guest squeezed in from the rain. Her mom brought out the cake at six. It was bakery-fancy, layered in pastel buttercream and decked with edible glitter, candles sunk deep into the frosting. The whole room sang, too loud and off-key, and her face went hot as she sat at the head of the table, the center of everyone’s attention.

“Make a wish!” someone called. She closed her eyes.

For a split second, she almost wished for something new—a clean slate, the ability to forget. But then the old wish bubbled up, stubborn and pure: she wished for him, for the impossible, for a knock at the door and the world to shift back to the way it had been.

She blew out the candles. There was a cheer, someone popped a party popper, and everyone clapped as her mom cut thick, uneven slices and handed them out on napkins. She took a bite, barely tasting it. The night rolled on. She opened gifts (journals, books, a novelty wine glass that could hold an entire bottle), took pictures with the guests, pretended not to notice the way her dad hovered at the edge of the room, watching her with an expression that was part pride and part worry.

After the last guest left, the apartment felt hollow, every sound echoing off the cake plates and empty glasses. She collected the wrappers, rinsed the dishes, and collapsed on the couch, tiara still in place. Her dad sat beside her, careful not to crowd her.

He nudged a gift bag toward her. “You missed one,” he said. She dug through the tissue paper. At the bottom was a slim black notebook, the kind with an elastic band and crisp, white pages. She flipped to the first one. Her dad had written a note:

Happy 21st, Kiddo. If you ever want to write it down, I’ll read every word.

She blinked, unsure whether to laugh or cry. She did neither. Instead, she hugged the notebook to her chest and stared at the dark window, at the city lights blinking beyond.

Her dad put an arm around her shoulder, squeezed once. “It’s supposed to be fun, you know. Turning twenty-one.”

She nodded, but didn’t answer.

Chapter Text

Time won't fly, it's like I'm paralyzed by it
I'd like to be my old self again, but I'm still trying to find it
After plaid shirt days and nights when you made me your own
Now you mail back my things, and I walk home alone

She laid in bed for days until she and the sheets and her body odor and the nothingness became one. If she didn’t shower, there was no one to notice. If she didn’t eat, her body would eventually insist, and she’d gnaw on stale saltines until her jaw hurt and the crumbs stuck to her chin.

The phone was somewhere under the covers. It vibrated every few hours, then not at all. Friends had stopped trying, which was probably for the best since all she ever did was screw things up anyway. There was nothing on the calendar, no classes, no birthday parties, no gallery nights. She thought she could hear her mother in the living room, shuffling papers or rinsing a mug.

Sometimes she cried, sometimes she didn’t. The ache in her chest was so constant that it stopped feeling like pain and just became background noise, a low-grade fever of loss.

On the third morning (or maybe the fifth, maybe the seventh), she got out of bed. It felt like an act of violence, the cold air slapping her bare legs, the hard floor burning her feet. She wandered into the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water. The glass was greasy with fingerprints, but she drank it all in one go, trying to drown the rising panic. She looked out the window at the street below. 

She went back to her room. The bed was an invitation, but she ignored it. Instead, she slid down to the floor, knees pulled to her chest, back pressed against the wicker dresser. She started to bite her nails, one by one, until the corners bled. Her face was hot and puffy. She pressed her palm to her cheek and felt the throb of her pulse, each beat hammering a single line in her head: I’d like to be my old self again, but I’m still trying to find it.

She remembered how easy it had been to be happy. Not always, not even often, but enough to fill up a few good days. She remembered the way she used to wake up early on Saturdays, when she still believed in the myth of weekends. She remembered lying in his bed, the heat of him at her back, the scratch of his chin on her shoulder as he mumbled something dumb and soft into the hollow of her neck.

Her mind was stuck on that dreamy January morning that felt like a thousand years ago. She had spent the night at his apartment and when she woke up, she was met by the warm intensity of his gaze. He was propped up on one elbow, his hand tracing slow circles on her lower back. He looked at her like she was something precious and rare.

“You’re still here,” he said, half-smiling.

“Yeah,” she said, not knowing what else to say.

He ran a finger down the curve of her spine. “Good. I thought maybe you’d bolt.”

She laughed, but the sound stuck in her throat. “Who could ever leave you?"

He made her coffee in the French press, then came back to bed and sat cross-legged while she drank it, careful not to spill on the sheets. They didn’t talk much, just shared the silence and watched the sun creep across the floor.

After a while, he reached over and unbuttoned the plaid shirt she had pulled on, his shirt, the one that smelled like cedar and cigarettes and whatever laundry soap he bought in bulk from the bodega. She was nervous, even though she’d already been naked in front of him, even though he had already seen her in every possible light. But he was slow about it, as if defusing an elaborate bomb. He kissed the inside of her wrist, the soft spot just above her hipbone, the hollow under her jaw. She let herself melt into the mattress.

He moved above her, his body heavy but careful, his mouth searching her skin for something lost. She closed her eyes and listened to his breathing. She thought about all the girls who had come before her, the stories he had told, the scars she had traced on his arms. She wondered if he liked her better, or if she was just a temporary fix for whatever it was that broke in him every few months.

She let herself feel everything—the scratch of stubble, the sweat pooling between their chests, the weight of his gaze as he watched her fall apart.

He whispered her name, over and over, like he was memorizing the sound of it. She felt a heat rising up her legs, blooming in her stomach, a pressure that made her bite her lip until she tasted blood. She squeezed her eyes shut, afraid of losing control, but he just kept holding her, kept moving, kept whispering until her body convulsed and she cried out, not caring if the neighbors heard. Every muscle inside her unraveled at once and she felt herself lost over the edge of something unattainably wonderful.

Afterwards, they lay there in the sticky heat, sheets tangled around their ankles. He kissed her temple, then her nose, then the tips of her fingers. She laughed, but this time it was real.

“You’re shaking,” he said, brushing a strand of hair from her face.

 “I’m fine." She struggled to find the words. "Just wasn’t expecting that.”

He kissed her. “Told you I was good at this.”

She rolled her eyes, but she couldn’t stop smiling. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

They drifted off like that, limbs intertwined, the sound of city traffic below a lullaby instead of a warning. She woke up once in the night, his arm heavy across her chest, his breath warm in her ear. She closed her eyes and let herself believe that this could last, that maybe she wasn’t just a placeholder, that maybe she was the right person at the right time.

The memory left her numb. She dug her nails into her palm until the pain snapped her back to the present. The room was silent, the bed empty, the air thick with the absence of him. She wiped her nose on the sleeve of her sweater and tried to stand, but her legs were useless. She slid down until she was lying flat on the floor, staring at the ceiling, waiting for the next memory to swallow her whole.

She wondered if he ever thought about her, if he remembered the way her body fit against his, the sound of her laughter, the taste of her skin after a night out. She wondered if he had already found someone else, if she had been replaced by a newer, shinier girl with better stories and less baggage. She wondered if he missed her at all.

________________________________________

There was a package on the stoop when she came back from work. She paused before the box, as if it might bite, and for a long minute just stared at her own name that was scrawled in a handwriting she’d recognize even in the dark.

She crouched to retrieve it, fingers trembling, then peeled the tape from the cardboard in rough, angry strips. Inside: a toothbrush (bristles still damp, like it had been used just before boxing), a single bobby pin, a crushed tube of lipstick, the paperback she’d left half-read on his nightstand. At the bottom, swaddled in a thrifted t-shirt she once wore as pajamas, her charger, her silver ring, the lucky penny she’d left on his dresser for him to find. The coin was cold, and she closed her hand around it until her palm hurt.

It was an erasure. A precise extraction of every atom she’d ever left in his world, all returned in one last gesture of efficiency.

She carried the box inside and let it fall on the dining table. She unpacked each item, arranging them in a row like evidence at a trial. She could smell his apartment on them—organic detergent, the faint burn of espresso, a trace of sweat and that goddamn designer cologne. She didn’t cry, not at first. She just stood over the things, watching them, waiting for them to blink or breathe.

She put the lipstick back in her bag, the charger in the outlet, the paperback on the edge of her bed. She set the bobby pin on her dresser, next to a cracked bottle of nail polish and a line of empty perfume vials. The ring she slid onto her finger, then took off, then slid on again. The coin she pressed between her palms, holding it tight until her hands went numb.

She sat down in the middle of the kitchen floor, legs stretched in front of her, spine pressed to the cold cabinet. She traced the circle of the coin with her thumb, over and over, until the imprint of it felt permanent. She wondered if this was what closure looked like—just a box of objects, a line drawn, a life partitioned into before and after.

She closed her eyes, resting her head on her knees. The house was silent except for the distant hum of traffic, the radiator’s faint ticking as it cooled. She didn’t move for a long time. When she finally stood, it was only to flick the light off, to walk into the bedroom, to fall onto her bed and let the darkness swallow her.

She thought maybe, if she wished hard enough, she could wake up tomorrow as someone else. Or maybe as the same girl she’d once been, the one who didn’t know how it would feel to lose something so entirely.

Chapter Text

But you keep my old scarf from that very first week 'Cause it reminds you of innocence, and it smells like me

You can't get rid of it 'cause you remember it

All too well, yeah

'Cause there we are again, when I loved you so Back before you lost the one real thing you've ever known It was rare, I was there, I remember it

All too well

Wind in my hair, you were there, you remember it all

Down the stairs, you were there, you remember it all

It was rare, I was there, I remember it

All too well

[From His POV] The Remembering - Years into the Future

He was starting to hate Brooklyn. Every wannabe artist/hipster had moved in with their chain coffee shops and uninspired Pinterest copycat outfits.

Everything in the restaurant was curated for the illusion of intimacy, even the way the glassware caught and split the Edison bulb light into halos and jagged sparkles. The bistro was an old-world box, its ceilings pressed down by a hundred years of burnt garlic and regret, but the new owners had slathered it with brass, mirrors, and a playlist engineered for first dates and midlife crises. The tables were packed so close that the fights and laughter of other couples bled into every conversation.

Across the table, Lily cleared her throat. “Babe, I asked what you wanted to do for your birthday? The big 4-2?”

He slid the phone into his pocket and tried to conjure his best approximation of charm. Lily smiled at him, her black hair piled on top of her head in a Y2K throwback look. She wore a dress with mesh sleeves and a silver chain at her throat.

God, he thought to himself, Lily wasn’t even alive for Y2K.

“I don’t know,” he said, “my birthday doesn’t need to be a big deal.”

“There’s a new club in Bushwick,” she said, her eyes lighting up, “they open at 2 A.M. and serve breakfast-flavored shots like maple candy vodka.”

He felt tired just hearing about staying up until 2 A.M. It was incredible how much energy twenty-year-olds like Lily had.

“How are we gonna get you in,” he laughed, “with your shitty fake I.D.?”

He reached for the menu, tracing a line from the roast duck down to the price, and met Lily’s gaze only when he felt her watching. “You look nervous,” he said, voice pitched to carry only between them. He was proud of how gentle he made it sound. She blinked, startled, then gave a careful laugh.

“Is it that obvious?” she said, tugging a strand of hair behind her ear. She wore a ring on her right hand, a chunky silver thing with a black stone set deep enough to swallow light. She rotated it, nervously, as if it could dial down her pulse.

He shrugged, folding the menu closed. “Not really. I’m just good at spotting these things.”

Lily smiled, relaxing, and he felt the chemistry change. He let her take the lead, as he always did. She filled the silence with talk about the city, how she hated the subway at rush hour, how she only ever got homesick when it rained. She told him about her mother’s kitchen, her father’s uncanny ability to ruin every vacation with a single misplaced comment, her little brother’s obsession with tennis. She told him about the time she dyed her hair blue and tried to run away to Connecticut; she got as far as the bus terminal before she lost her nerve and spent the day in the mall, eating soft pretzels and pretending not to cry.

He listened, or at least made the effort. He was good at mirroring—tilting his head at the right moment, shaping his mouth into a line that could read as sympathy or arousal, depending on the angle. He let the moments stretch, watched the way her hands never stopped moving, always searching for an anchor.

He loved her youthful energy, the sparkle in her eye, her unflinching optimism. That shiny quality tended to dull in women sometime around when they turned twenty-five. He had never dated a woman old enough to experience that first-hand.

At the arrival of the wine—a pinot, from somewhere expensive—he poured for her first, then for himself. “You ever have this before?” he asked, raising the glass, eyes intent on the color.

She sniffed, swirled, like she’d practiced. “Does sneaking some of my mom’s boxed wine count?”

He leaned forward, elbows on the table, the way he’d been told not to as a child. “Try it. Tell me what you taste.”

She sipped, let it sit on her tongue. “It’s… I don’t know. A little sour?”

He grinned. “That’s the most honest answer I’ve ever heard.”

She laughed again, less brittle now. “What’s it supposed to taste like?”

He searched for the word, then shook his head. “I never remember the right answer. I just like how it makes me feel.”

She looked at him, eyes narrowing with mischief. “And how does it make you feel?”

He had a ready line for this—something about clarity, or confidence—but tonight he hesitated, and in the space of that pause, something cracked in his chest, sharp and unplanned.

The last time he’d had wine like this was at the little ski lodge three hours north, with Her. Not Lily—never Lily, not even close. Her, with the red hair that always slipped from its knot, the laugh that grated at first then gnawed until it got inside you. The girl who matched his appetite for risk and ruined everything by actually loving him. He remembered the way she leaned out the balcony to catch snowflakes, the way she never waited for him to start the conversation, the way she could find the only flaw in any painting, poem, or person in ten seconds flat.

He remembered that night, specifically, because it was the first time he saw her cry. Not from pain or anger, but from a song on the radio, some old standard, the lyrics half in French. She’d been making fun of him for not knowing the words, and then she just—stopped. Tears, slow and silent, and she hadn’t bothered to hide them. He asked what was wrong, and she said, “Nothing, it’s beautiful,” and he thought he’d never seen anything uglier or truer.

The memory hit with the force of an airbag, blinding and chemical. He blinked, staring at the wine, trying to recall where he was, when he was, who he was supposed to be.

Lily’s hand waved in front of his face. “You okay?” she said. “You look like you’re about to pass out.”

He forced a smile. “Sorry. Lost in thought.”

She tipped her head, curious. “Good memories or bad?”

He weighed the truth, then decided to let her in just a little. “Bit of both,” he said. “I used to come here, years ago, with someone.”

“Oh.” She glanced down, then back up. “An ex?”

His mind raced with the images of Her laying on the floor of the chalet, her sunfire hair fanned around her face. He had leaned over her, kissing her upside down like some sort of Spiderman impersonation. They had twirled around together, dancing and laughing and making love in front of the fire. That was before She had made everything so complicated, so much more than it had to be. She could never just relax.

He noticed Lily staring at him. He took her cue, pivoted the conversation. “How’s school?” he asked. “Still torturing you with dead white guys?”

She rolled her eyes. “Today was all Renaissance, all morning. I had to stare at a fresco for two hours and write a ‘meditative analysis.’ My professor is obsessed with the concept of ‘palimpsest.’”

He nodded. “It means a manuscript that’s been scraped and reused. The old text is never really gone.”

She grinned, surprised. “You’re the first person I’ve met who actually knows that.”

He shrugged. “I dated this girl once, she knew a lot about art.”

Lily laughed, soft but edged. “Of course you did.”

He liked her then, really liked her, for how she absorbed his confession and volleyed it back without injury. He reached across the table and laid his hand over hers, warm and steady. “Let me show you something better than a fresco,” he said. “How do you feel about taking a drive upstate tomorrow?”

She looked at him like he’d offered her the keys to a new city. “Like a road trip?” she said.

He nodded. “My sister’s house, upstate. It’s nothing fancy, but the view is wild, and there’s a fireplace.”

She hesitated, just long enough for him to notice, then said, “I’d like that. I’d really like that.”

The check came. He signed without looking at the number, then led her past the crowded bar and out into the hush of the street. It was still early, but the sky had gone to blue velvet and the breeze threatened rain. He went to the valet, handed over his ticket, and as the attendant disappeared, he noticed Lily shivering.

He peeled his jacket off and draped it around her shoulders, then realized there was something still in the pocket. He reached in, fingers closing around a tangled knot of wool—the red scarf. Not hers, never Lily’s; it belonged to the memory that would not leave him alone. He’d meant to throw it out a dozen times, but every time he reached for it, he couldn’t let go.

He wrapped it once around his own neck, a barrier against the cold and the past, and tucked the ends under his collar. Then he offered Lily his arm. She took it, curling close, and for a moment he could believe in new beginnings.

Chapter Text

And I was never good at tellin' jokes, but the punch line goes
"I'll get older, but your lovers stay my age"
From when your Brooklyn broke my skin and bones
I'm a soldier who's returning half her weight
And did the twin flame bruise paint you blue?
Just between us, did the love affair maim you too?
'Cause in this city's barren cold
I still remember the first fall of snow
And how it glistened as it fell
I remember it all too well

Thirteen years vanished, sometimes so quickly she convinced herself she’d only blinked. Outside, the world was wintering, New York iced in glass and shadow, but inside her apartment the air was a precise 70 degrees and so perfectly modernly pristine it looked like it had been grown in a lab. She slipped the second silver hoop into her earlobe and admired the reflection in the floor-length mirror: not a line out of place, nothing left to chance. Her hair auburn hair was twisted up in a French twist, glossy and pinned and perfect. Beneath the hairline, her face held a new sharpness, the maturity that had aged her face like a fine wine.

The apartment was what realtors called “architectural,” a glass-and-concrete wedge perched high above the city. Every surface was intentional. Books lined the walls, but only in monochrome: black, white, bone, navy, a few in the punch of fire-engine red. The couch was a designer relic, more art than furniture. The kitchen’s chrome surfaces gleamed like dental tools. It was the kind of home she’d always dreamed of, back when she’d lived in postage-stamp apartments with radiators that sang all night and neighbors who screamed at each other in languages she never bothered to learn.

She took her time in the bedroom, running her hands over the slip of dark silk that draped her body before pulling on her fleece-lined tights and Dolce and Gabbana black turtleneck. She checked her phone: a dozen unread notifications, all for her, all urgent. She ignored them, at least for now, and let her gaze linger instead on the paperback on her vanity: a blue cover, edges fuzzy and worn from too many rereads. The image on the front was a red scarf, caught on the white branches of a birch, a single drop of color in a forest of frost.

All Too Well. Her book. Her name on the spine in blocky capitals, just below the scarf.

She left the apartment on foot, boots knifing through the slush, coat pulled tight at the waist. Her personal assistant Henri had tried to send her driver, but she had insisted on walking. She wove past the commuters, the dog walkers, the bundled children trundling off to their various evenings of ice skating and holiday cheer. The city had changed, every storefront a new permutation, every block rebuilt or gentrified, but the sidewalks remembered her. Remembered the naive girl who had moved out here all those years ago, determined to become an author and forge a life for herself.

The bookstore was four blocks down, a wedge-shaped cave that she’d loved for years, even before the world cared what she wrote. The windows were steamed over, inside a slow boil of bodies pressed together, coats unzipped and hair half-melted from the cold. She could see them all through the glass: the fans, the hopefuls, the ones who clutched her book to their chests like it was the answer to all the questions they had ever asked.

She paused outside, heart beating just a little too fast, and for a second she saw herself as a stranger would: the hair, the coat, the careful posture, the way her lips twisted into a smile just shy of a smirk. Then she pushed through the door, into the blast of heat and perfume and the sticky sweetness of baked goods from the cafe in the back.

It happened in a wave, as it always did: first the hush, then the staccato of whispers, then the sudden centrifugal pull of every eye in the place. She let herself be swallowed by it, grinning wide and open, greeting the faces she recognized from social media, from previous stops on the tour, from the blur of the past month. There were women of every age, every shape, some in crisp business wear, some in pajamas under winter coats, a few with their daughters, faces twin-lit with excitement and awe.

At the front of the store was a table stacked high with her books, covers facing out like a wall of blue water. The scarf was redder in this light, almost alive. Next to the stack stood her assistant Henri, a too-tall, too-serious man in a navy sweater and thin spectacles. He took her coat and purse with the quiet urgency of someone who had seen everything.

She signed the first hundred books in a blur: Her name, date, a quick flourish, sometimes a smiley face or a line from the jacket copy if the recipient looked especially on the edge of tears. She was good at the performance, had learned to pace the compliments and the gratitude, to touch each person’s hand for just the right amount of time before moving on. For every one who told her she’d changed their life, she responded as if it were the first time she’d ever heard it, and in a way, it felt like it always was.

It was the scarf that stopped her. One woman—middle-aged, maybe, but with the energy of someone much younger—wore it looped around her neck, a near-perfect match to the one on the cover. She grinned as she slid her book across the table.

“I knitted it,” the woman said, voice trembling with a rush of something she’d probably call joy but was closer to awe. “I saw your interview, the one where you talked about losing your real scarf, and—well. I couldn’t get it out of my head. So I made one. Hope that’s not weird.”

“It’s not weird,” she said, meaning it. “It’s beautiful.”

The woman’s eyes welled up, and for a split second she saw her mother, or maybe herself, or maybe every version of heartbreak she’d ever tried to exorcise on the page. She smiled, signed the book with a flourish, and let herself imagine, just for a second, that she was still capable of feeling moved by a stranger.

When the stack of books was gone, Henri tapped her on the shoulder. Time to take the stage. She followed him through the maze of bodies, pausing to wave, to squeeze a shoulder, to accept the occasional shy hug from someone who needed it more than she did.

The stage was barely a stage—just a platform set up by the window, with a single microphone and a blue backdrop printed with the store’s logo. She stepped up, heels clicking on the wood, and took a breath. The room went silent, like a church congregation.

She scanned the crowd, all of them holding up phones, ready to record. She thought about her own first reading, how she’d been so terrified she’d nearly vomited in the alley behind the venue. Now it was easy, almost too easy. She could do this in her sleep.

She opened the book, page already dog-eared, and began to read.

The voice that came out was the same one she’d used to tell bedtime stories to her little cousins, the same one she’d used on late-night voicemails to Him, back when that meant something. It was measured, a little bit theatrical, but honest. She read about the scarf, about the winter she’d lost it, about the boy who’d taken it from her and never given it back. She read about the way she’d imagined it changing hands, imagined it living another life, imagined him holding it up to his face and breathing in the ghost of her perfume. She read about loss, about the way memory stuck to objects long after people had let them go.

The room was quiet. She could see the tears in the front row, women with their hands pressed to their mouths, a few men blinking fast and looking away.

She kept reading. She let the sentences hang in the air, let them echo off the glass and the books and the collective need of everyone in the room. She read until her throat hurt, until her eyes blurred, until the words lost meaning and became just sound.

When she finished, the silence held. For a moment, no one clapped, no one moved. Then the applause came, rising in a wave, filling the space until she thought the windows might actually crack.

She closed the book. She smiled. She nodded at the crowd, at the scarf-wearing woman, at the rows of strangers who had paid good money to watch her bleed on the page.

She scanned the back of the store, through the haze of camera flashes and the blue light from the street. For a second—just a second—she thought she saw Him, standing by the window, hands in his pockets, head tilted at that same impossibly smug angle. But when she looked again, there was only the reflection of her own face, caught in the glass like something trapped between two worlds.

She stepped down from the stage, heels clicking, and let herself be pulled into the sea of hands and voices and hunger. She signed more books, posed for selfies, accepted gifts of flowers and chocolates and, once, a tiny bottle of perfume wrapped in tissue paper the color of fresh blood.

When it was over, she let her assistant lead her out the back, into the alley behind the store, where the air was sharp and unfiltered and real.

She breathed in, letting the cold scrape her lungs clean.

She wondered, not for the first time, if the scarf was still out there—if He had kept it, if it still smelled like her, if it had ever really mattered to him at all.

She wrapped her own coat tighter and started the long walk home.

Above her, the city pulsed with light, and for a moment she let herself believe that somewhere, someone was thinking about her too.

****

He watched her through the glass, hands buried deep in his coat pockets, breath fogging up in the dark air like cigarette smoke. The snow wasn’t falling so much as swirling, an endless carousel of white that stuck to the city but never melted, never gave in. The sidewalk was a shallow grave of gray slush and abandoned coffee cups, but the window was perfect, a square of golden light in the gloom.

She looked exactly the same and nothing like he remembered.

Her hair was fire and formality, pinned up so precisely it looked like it might shatter if he touched it. The silver hoops in her ears flashed every time she laughed, the earrings he had mailed back to her all those years ago. The coat she wore probably cost more than his car, but the way she wore it—loose, careless, like a costume at the end of a party—made her seem both ten years older and exactly eighteen.

He’d heard about the book. Of course he had. It was impossible not to. All the blogs, the morning shows, the fever of attention that followed her now like a tail. He bought a copy, first edition, online, had it shipped to the studio so he wouldn’t have to explain it to anyone at home. He read it in a single night, the pages so thin he left fingerprints on every one. He read it and recognized himself in the margins, in the spaces between sentences, in the way she described a man who couldn’t love her right but couldn’t let her go.

He’d planned to stay away tonight. He had. But then the band canceled practice, and the air in his apartment turned thick and sour, and all at once he was out in the cold, walking streets he hadn’t walked in years. His body remembered the route even if he didn’t want to.

He watched her sign books, watched her beam at each stranger like they were the only person in the world. He watched her hold a crying woman’s hands, watched her let herself be pulled into photo after photo, never flinching, never bored. He watched her onstage, reading to a hundred people, her voice clear and warm even through the glass.

He wondered if she knew he was there.

He shifted from foot to foot, the cold biting through his boots, and pulled his scarf tighter around his neck. It was an old scarf, stupidly red, soft with age and stained with a decade of winters. He never meant to keep it this long. Sometimes he’d think about mailing it back to her, a little inside joke, but then the thought always seemed too heavy, too cruel, so he’d keep it another season.

A car slid past, headlights turning the window into a mirror. For a second, all he could see was himself: hair going gray at the temples, face hollowed out by time, the ghost of a tattoo peeking from under his cuff. He looked tired, and maybe that was true. Or maybe it was just that he’d spent his whole life trying not to feel things, and now there was nothing left to hold it all in.

Inside, she finished the reading. The crowd clapped, some of them on their feet, and she smiled with her whole face, soaking it up like a plant in a sunbeam. She gathered her things, accepted a bouquet from a little girl in the front row, signed a few more books. She leaned over to say something to her assistant, then paused, glancing out at the window, straight at him.

He didn’t flinch. He let her look. He wondered what she saw: a man she’d once loved, or just another sad bastard standing in the snow, unable to let go of the past.

She turned away, and so did he.

He walked the block, scarf pulled up, breathing in the ghosts of memories. He thought about the way she used to laugh, the way her hair stuck to his mouth when they kissed. He thought about the things he’d never said, the apologies he owed, the part of her he still carried in the lining of his coat.

He thought about calling her, just once, but the thought hurt more than the cold.

He kept walking, kept his head down, and let the city swallow him whole.

In a city filled with people, he was completely and utterly alone. He knew the feeling all too well.

Just between us, did the love affair maim you all too well?
Just between us, do you remember it all too well?
Just between us, I remember it (Just between us) all too well
Wind in my hair, I was there, I was there (I was there)
Down the stairs, I was there, I was there
Sacred prayer, I was there, I was there
It was rare, you remember it all too well