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“Elise,” I say shortly as I answer.
“Hello, lover boy. How was your hot date with Tatiana last night?”
“Oh, fuck off,” I snap, hanging up. She calls right back immediately, and against my better judgment, I pick up.
“Okay, okay! Jeez, I didn’t realize you’d be so sensitive.”
“Say whatever you need to say, Elise. I’m not feeling up to your shenanigans.”
I hear her huff in indignation, but she takes me seriously. “Fine. I was just calling because I talked to Tatiana this morning. Andries, you wereall she could talk about.She had such an amazing time with you last night.”
“Great.”
“Don’t be that way. Tatiana thinks you’re this flawless human being, and you’re so dismissive!”
I sigh. “I’m just… tired. I don’t want to talk about this right now. I’m touring apartments.”
“You’re really going through with moving!?” she exclaims. “We put so much work into your apartment. You can’t just leave!”
“We can talk later, okay?”
My sister makes a frustrated noise that tells me she has a lot more to say on the matter, but she reluctantly tells me goodbye, and I hang up for the second time.
Knowing Tatiana enjoyed herself is nice, of course, but I don’t have the capacity at the moment to feel anything other than sick and tired. I have told Tati, time and time again, that we are just friends. Strangely enough, she seems to accept it better than Elise, content to spend time with me as friends while my sister tries to make everything into a date between Tatiana and me. It makes me realize that the two of them must be closer than I thought.
I’ve always known they were friends, but if the two of them are planning out my future with Tatiana when I’m around, thenthey must be together more than just occasionally. What worries me is that Tatiana is too sweet for Elise. She’s easy to manipulate because she trusts so easily, and if I know my sister, she’ll take advantage of anyone that she can to get ahead in life. Elise has already expressed unhappiness at how my increasingly sordid reputation is bleeding over to her. If I got with Tatiana, with her pristine reputation and ability to make anyone and everyone smile, it’d make things much easier for Elise. And if Tatiana and I hypothetically went the distance, she’d have a friend entering the family, instead of a random woman. It’s a win-win for my family, even if it meant I’d be bored out of my mind in my marriage for the rest of time.
Tatiana feeding off Elise is a dangerous thing that I’ll have to keep a better eye on. I care for them both, but there is potential for something bad there. Hopefully I’m wrong, but just in case…
“Uh… everything alright?” Dan asks.
“Yeah…” The conversation with Elise has taken all the wind out of my sails in regard to my argument with Dan, and I just don’t feel like starting it anew. “Let’s go talk to the agent.”
Once we’re back in the main part of the apartment, the agent jumps up from where he is leaning on the counter. “Well, what do you think?” he asks, sounding unsure.
“It’s fine. I’ll take it. When can I move in?”
Dan and the agent look at each other before they both turn back to me. “Are you sure?” Dan asks.
“We’ve got five other properties to look at,” the agent adds.
I’m sure I’m going to regret the decision later, but the feeling of being completely drained and unable to do a single other thing, or make any more decisions, is drowning me. I just need this to be over. Plus, it’s just a lease.
“Positive. Just e-mail me the leasing contract. Dan, can you drive me home?”
The ride is weirdly stilted, with my friend looking over at me like he wants to say something, before he gives up and looks back to the road. How can it be so early, but feel like I've been up for ages?
He eventually pulls up to the curb outside my apartment, and as he slows the car to a stop, he finally speaks up.
“You don’t have to do any of this, you know. I think you should take some time off, fly somewhere far away and let all these things that are weighing on you fade. It’d be more manageable, and you’d have a clearer head to think.”
“I know what I want to do, Dan, which is why I’m doing it. I can’t figure out why everyone is so annoyed with me doing something as simple as switching apartments.”
“Andries, we’ve all done stupid stuff because of a woman before. There’s no reason to be embarrassed.”
After giving him a withering look, I step out onto the curb, giving him a brief, “Goodbye, Dan.”
I’m so close to being upstairs in my apartment, alone, that I can almost taste it. I adjust my backpack on my shoulder, already running through the excuses for missing my study group later tonight, when I reach the door to my building.
