Page 42 of The Quiet After The Fall

Realization hits me. There’s only one available bed left—Owen’s.

Fucking hell.

I stand in the doorway for a long time, staring at it. Owen’s room, his bed with the same navy comforter he’s had since high school. His lacrosse stuff still in the corner. A hoodie on the back of the desk chair, random clutter on his dresser.

I can’t believe my mother left it like this still. She’s using the wedding as a distraction, I guess. Keeping herself too busy to think about the time capsule in her own home.

If I didn’t already feel sick, I do now.

I almost turn around and go sleep on the couch, but I’m drawn in and before I know it, I’m sitting on the edge of his bed.

Beer in hand, I pick at the label before setting it on the nightstand next to a framed photo I’ve seen a hundred times but never really looked at before. It’s Owen and me. He’s maybe fifteen, the two of us at some Fourth of July thing, him with his arm thrown around my neck, grinning like an idiot. I’m laughing. I don’t remember what was funny or who took it. That photo must have been important for Owen for him to frame it and keep it in his room for years.

And I’ve never given it a second thought. I don’t even think I had any photos of Owen in my apartment…not until after.

There’s a photo of Sawyer, though. It’s been there since I moved in. Me and Sawyer at the lake when we were teenagers…both smiling, with suntans and freckles like there wasn’t a care in the world. It’s in some cheesy wooden frame I grabbed at CVS when I was picking up a birthday card one day, but I love it.

I lean back against the headboard and stare at the ceiling and think about Sawyer in that parking lot. How she looked when she walked away. Her voice as she said don’t contact me again.

There wasn’t anger. I can work with anger. Her smashing my Jeep, screaming at me, fuck, even getting physical with me—that means she still thinks there’s something worth fighting for.

But no, she meant it.

That’s what I can’t stop thinking about. In all the years I’ve spent pushing Sawyer, she’s never looked at me like that. Like she was done. Like she’d finally figured out that I’m not worth a single ounce of her energy.

She should be done with me. I know that. I’ve known it every time I showed up at her hotel, every text I sent, every excuse I made for continuing to see her when I knew the shit I’m against with Moretti.

I know exactly what I am and I do it anyway because the alternative—actually letting her go, watching her move through life without me in it—is something I can’t make myself do.

Is that what love is? Or is it some twisted fucking obsession where I can’t help but pull her into the wreckage alongside me?

Whatever it is, it’s older and worse and more stubborn than I know what to do with. It’s only ever been her. Through everything…the scandal, Owen, the accident, all of it. The one fixed point has been Sawyer. I don’t know who I am in a version of my life where she doesn’t exist.

And now I’m lying in Owen’s bed, thinking about the last time I was in this room with her. The day of the services. When she followed me in, I knew what would happen. There wasn’t any part of me that wanted to stop it. And I know it was the grief and the pain but maybe it was also the most honest we’ve been in our entire lives.

She wanted to feel something other than hurt. We both did. I understood what she needed and I gave her what I could, and it wasn’t enough. It’s never enough with me. I take what I want and convince myself that I give my all, and the worst part is, I’m not sure that’s even a lie.

I want to have more to give. I’d cut myself open and spill myself dry for her. But it feels like I already have. There’s nothing left.

I reach for my phone out of habit and pull up the tracking app.

Her dot is where it should be, at her apartment, not moving. God, I want to text her. Say something…anything. But I know that would be a mistake tonight. Instead, I stare at her dot on the map for another five minutes, text Ella that I’m at my parents’ so she doesn’t make my life hell, and put my phone on the nightstand face down.

I wake up and don’t know if it’s earlier or later than normal. Gray light streams through the crack in the curtains, and for a second, I forget where I am. Until I see the lacrosse sticks in the corner and smell the faint hint of Owen’s cologne still lingering on the pillows.

I can’t believe I came here last night. And even more so, I can’t believe I slept in Owen’s bed.

I’m sure my mother will be thrilled if she finds out. And by thrilled, I mean pissed that I disrupted his space. Little does she know it’s already been disrupted by Sawyer and me.

I pick up my phone and pull up the app. Her dot is gone. That’s fucking weird. I refresh, rub my eyes, and click her name.

No location found.

It’s a glitch, some kind of server issue, totally fixable. I swipe out and pull up our text thread. I’ll just type something easy, a way to get the conversation started.

Me: Hey

A minute goes by. Two. My pulse picks up and I repeat one word in my head. Please.