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She sighed. “Have you been paying attention? I care about you, London. More than I’m supposed to, I know. So even with our… agreement… I don’t intend to stand aside and just watch this happen to you.”
I took a long, shaky breath. It was embarrassing, frankly, that I was reacting like this. I just… well. I wasn’t used to it.
And I’d never have expected Cameron Mercier to be the one I would get it from.
“Thank you,” I said, softly, just barely a breath. “I… it means a lot. But I don’t think I can, anyway.”
Cameron paused. “Why not?” she said, her voice stern, or—trying to. I knew her well enough by now. I knew that subtle shift in her pitch, her cadence. That subtle, quiet pleading. It broke my heart.
“Because I… it’s…” I sighed, hard, frustrated, running my hand through my hair as Earl jumped up onto my lap. Absently, I pet him, just happy for something to do with my free hand. “Cameron, I am sorry. I don’t want to do it either. But I really have to leave this city.”
Cameron let out a short, sad little breath, and there was aching quiet down the line before she spoke in a small voice, a sad smile permeating it. “Rain finally did you in, did it?”
“Mm… I think maybe I could have learned to like it.”
She laughed, short and bitter. “Dammit. Saying something that romantic, now?”
Putting the word romance to it suddenly felt so heavy, so… big. So real. And I couldn’t handle it. I shook my head. “I’ve accumulated too much failure in this place. Nobody’s going to want me after my record. I’m just… just bad luck, and everyone knows it. I need a fresh start.”
“Bad luck? That’s what it is? You’re going to leave this city out of superstition.”
“I know it’s a lot. But…” I sank backwards in the bed, lying down as Earl hopped off my lap and curled up next to me. “But I don’t know what else I can do.”
Cameron sighed, and the weight of it felt like it would overwhelm me, drag me down, crush me. Finally, she spoke in a low voice. “You have your heart set, don’t you.”
A statement, not a question. It felt accusatory, damning, but what was I supposed to do, lie? “My heart doesn’t want it. My good sense does.”
Cameron didn’t say anything. I shifted uncomfortably before I spoke.
“Are you… going to be okay? I don’t want you buying something you’ll regret just because they’re trying to sell you on something.”
She laughed lightly, but it wasn’t really all there. “If I make the wrong decision, there’s nothing stopping me from selling and moving somewhere else.”
“I’m not worried about your financial situation. I’m worried about what’s going to make you… you know, happiest.”
“Ah. We’re into the harder questions now.”
“And everything with… er, Kevin?”
The name was a tension on an already-taut string, and I felt it hang in the air before Cameron spoke airily. “I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”
“I…” I really hope you’ll be okay. I hope you’ll be happy. I’ve been falling too fast in our time together. I’m going to miss you. “I hope it goes all right.”
I could have said it all. But what would be the point? I only knew how to talk, how to connect, how to drive a conversation, when I was trying to lead it somewhere.
Without any sense of direction, I just drifted, alone, lost.
∞∞∞
The jagged, visceral pain of it all had eased up into a dull sensation on the back of my awareness the next day, and I was able to pull myself together a little and leave my apartment. It wasn’t like I had anywhere to go, but I was going to lose my mind if I had to stay closed inside with just the sensation of my own failure and Earl pawing me looking for more food all the time, so I went out.
I took my laptop to a café and sat down with a bagel and a cappuccino by the window, the sky blissfully sunny as if yesterday had never happened, and I got to scroll job listings there instead. It was at least a little less overwhelming, less like it was going to swallow me up whole, but it still felt like every city I could have found, every place I could have moved to, was an empty, soulless void.
I looked up when the chair creaked opposite me, caught off-guard when it was Adam Garcia sinking down across from me, a breakfast sandwich with egg and cheese in hand, and he grinned.
“How’s it going? Been a minute.”
“Hey… it has.” I relaxed, sitting up straighter, closing my laptop. A smile found me naturally. “It’s been an exciting couple of weeks.”
