Page 62 of Abyss

I always loved art. I was good at it, but until that day, I was just a conformist—creating art that made others happy, coloring within the lines, and sticking to the rules.

I started painting my pain after that day, to hell with anyone else’s happiness.

“That apple represents a day that, despite the blue skies outside, washed everything in gray for me. For a long time after that day, I only painted in shades of gray and brown. But this painting also represents the last day I allowed anyone to bully and bruise me. I wanted tomemorialize the way I looked, the way I felt in that moment, because that’s what rock-bottom looked like for me and I planned to rise from it. It took me a while, but I finally did.”

A few students stare at me, wondering if I’ll elaborate, but this class isn’t about my pain or my past—I’ve had years of therapy to deal with that—it’s about their needs and their trauma.

Elijah speaks again. “When did you decide to bring color back into your paintings?”

I smile, thinking about my first email to Nathan. “When I found my best friend again. It was the day I decided I didn’t simply want to survive; I wanted to thrive. I wanted to live and use my experience to help others. The day I made that decision, color finally seeped back into my life.”

They listen to me intently.

“Sometimes you need the gray to fully appreciate the color. Sometimes it’s okaynotto chase away the pain, the sadness, and the heaviness. It’s okay to let it flow through you and express it in your own way.”

I walk over to my canvases and pull out the painting I’d created a year later, showing a woman with wavy dark hair, a red and blue flannel wrapped around her waist, and orange boots on her feet, holding a half-eaten red apple as she walks into a bustling city—the Golden Gate Bridge somewhere in the background. “Because sometimes that’s what it takes to find color again.”

I checkmy phone for the third time.

It’s Thursday afternoon and, in all honesty, it’s become somewhat of a routine all week. I don’t know what I’m hoping for. If he hasn’t messaged me all week, why would hemessage me now? It’s painfully clear he’s not interested in speaking, aside from copying me on work emails.

Just as I’m gathering my notebook to head off to yet another RCS project meeting, the elevator doors slide open, and Hudson strides out with his phone to his ear.

My heart somersaults in my chest as I run a shaky hand over my skirt unnecessarily. He’s engrossed in a conversation about replacing machinery at a client site, his gaze affixed straight ahead. His free hand runs through his hair as he walks on by without stopping.

No hi, no nod of acknowledgment, not even a millisecond of eye contact.

Well, okay then.

A jagged stone lodges in my throat as I watch him disappear into his office, shutting the door behind him without so much as a single backward glance.

My shoulders slump at the obvious dismissal as I trudge to the elevator to get to my meeting.

Why did his avoidance hurt so much?

Was it because I expected him to acknowledge me in some way after sharing such an intimate moment last Friday? Was it because I thought that—at least until that moment—we were getting closer, finding commonalities, even joking around a little, and that was grounds for getting at least some sort of reaction after days of silence?

Perhaps I’m the one who’s wrong here. Perhaps I’m the idiot who shouldn’t have expected an insignificant kiss to be anything but that,insignificant.

Two hours later I’m back at my desk, about to sit down, when Hudson emerges from his office.

He looks down at his phone when he addresses me, “Can you run my suit to the dry cleaners? It’s hanging in my office. And on your way back, get me a cup of coffee and one of those apple strudels from the coffee shop downstairs.” Hetakes a step forward, stopping again. “Oh, and book my trip to Portland next week. I’ll be meeting with Silas again.”

Before I can even respond, he’s headed down the hall into a meeting room with a few of his staff, leaving me standing there feeling like the dirt on his shoes.

An hour later, I’m back from running his errands with his coffee and pastry in hand. I head over to his office, knowing he doesn’t have any more meetings on his calendar.

I knock on his door before seeing myself in, noticing him standing near the wall of windows behind his desk, hands in his suit pockets as he looks across the city. His broad shoulders, his tapered waist, and his strong thighs have me taking a moment to admire him silently before I take a calming breath and close the door behind me, locking it.

He doesn’t acknowledge my presence so, accessing that part deep inside me that holds all my courage, I pace over to his desk and place his coffee and pastry on the corner before clearing my throat. “Are we just never going to talk about what happened on Friday?”

He doesn’t respond, doesn’t even move.

I huff out a mirthless laugh. “Right. Well, I don’t know what I expected from you, but I came in here to tell you not to worry about it, in case you were. It’ll never happen again. Itcan’thappen again. I’m sorry about my part in crossing those lines—”

“I’m not.”

His voice stuns me silent before he turns to face me, taking me in from head to toe, like he’s cataloging the various parts of me.

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