Page 105 of How To Not Need You

Harper called as soon as she could. I answered because apparently sending help and then ignoring the people who respond is considered poor emergency etiquette.

I don’t remember everything I told her. Most of it came out between tears and several increasingly creative variations of the word fuck. But I remember the silence on the other end when I finally managed to explain what I’d seen.

Harper was great and even offered to come over since that phone call. But I didn’t want company. I didn’t want everyone sitting around me while I fell apart. I didn’t want sympathetic looks or questions I couldn’t answer or Luca arriving with a shovel and a suspicious amount of enthusiasm.

I just wanted my apartment. My couch. My silence.

Harper eventually stopped arguing, but only after making me promise I’d answer if she called. She told me she’d let the others know what had happened so I wouldn’t have to explain it again, which might have been the kindest thing anyone could have offered me in that moment.

Since then, they’ve mostly given me what I asked for.

Space.

Apparently space does not include Harper allowing more than a few hours to pass without demanding proof that I’m still alive, but I suppose there are limits to friendship.

So the phone could be any of them. But it could also be him.

Jake has messaged so many times.

I know because I’ve read every single notification without opening any of them.

The first was about my charger.

The second asked whether Hades had behaved himself.

After that, they changed.

You okay?

Then another.

Liv?

Before it finally became:

Starting to worry. Just let me know you’re okay.

I haven't.

I know that's cruel.

I know Jake is at work. I know he has no idea what happened unless Megan told him, and considering I didn't stick around long enough to give her my name, there's every chance he's spent the last two days wondering why his girlfriend abruptly stopped speaking to him.

I know all of that.

Knowing doesn't seem to make my thumb capable of pressing reply.

Because replying means talking to him.

Talking to him means telling him I went to his house.

That I stood on his verandah with the key he'd given me. That I knocked because I heard someone moving around inside. And that his ex-wife answered his front door wearing nothing but a towel.

Even thinking about it makes my chest tighten.

Wet hair. Bare shoulders. Jake's hallway behind her.

Hi, can I help you?