Page 93 of Weekends with You

“This is what you do, Henry. You speak and you act sometimes without any regard for how it might affect me. It’s like you don’t even see me sometimes. We keep going around and around because you give me hope that things might change. And maybe I’m to blame since I keep believing that might be true.”

“You’ve known this was the plan all along,” he said, his frustration emphasizing the gravel in his voice. “Yes, the timing of the email wasn’t brilliant, I get that. But I’m still on the fence, which you know, and I need to keep my options open.”

“In case something better comes along,” I said. “Right, then.”

“You know it’s not like that.”

“What’s it like, then? Surely it’s not that you’re keeping me on the back burner as a plan B, right? That you’re keeping me around to have a little fun with when you get home, but never had any intentions of being serious about me at all?”

“I’m hardly keeping you on the back burner, Lucy. All I do is think of you. I take photos, I muddle through gigs, and I think of you. I can’t figure out where the hell I’m supposed to live because I’m so busy thinking of you. My focus has goneout the window, and I have no idea where this year is headed, because of how much time I spend thinking of you.”

“Thinking about me is one thing, Hen,” I said, trying to stay collected despite the goose bumps crawling up my spine. “But is it enough to make this work?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” he said. “Don’t you think we both have a lot to consider? You’ve been taking on more and more at the shop, which is sure to continue becoming even more of a massive commitment.” I said nothing. “I’m just saying, I think we both have to consider the timing, that’s all. We’re both going through some pretty significant changes in our lives, and it’s hard to figure out how we factor into each other’s.”

“So the wanting isn’t enough,” I said as it settled in. It didn’t matter how much we thought about each other, how much we wished things were different, how much we wanted to try. It wasn’t going to work.

I watched his jaw clenching and unclenching as he searched for something to say. Eventually, when the lines softened around his eyes, my heart did the same. It was like melting, standing there having that conversation, and I had no idea how I’d make it out in one piece. And by the look on his face, I wasn’t sure he would, either.

“It’s just not as easy as you’re making it sound,” he continued, dropping his voice so low it was almost hard to hear him. “I’m serious about you, Lucy. I’m just also serious about my job and my place in the world, and I still have to figure that out. I have to stick out the year, at least. It’s just so bloody hard to figure out how to handle both. Us and the job, I mean. Both of our jobs.”

“We could have figured it out together,” I said, wishing we’d tried harder.

“Could we have? I mean, I wish that was true, but at the end of the day, if I leave and you stay, isn’t that kind of the end of the road?”

“If you were serious about it, it might not have had to be.” We stared at each other in a glassy-eyed standoff, searching the silence for something worth saying. “You should have told me,” I said eventually.

“Nothing was certain yet.”

“It doesn’t matter. That’s what you’re missing. When you’re invested in someone, this is what you do to make it work. You tell them things. Especially if those things are plans to move to another country, even if nothing was certain yet.” I pulled my hair off my face just to have something to do with my hands.

“I was going to tell you.”

“When, after you slept with me?” I knew it was a low blow, but it came out before I could stop it.

“You know it isn’t like that.” He reached for me, but I didn’t move. “I don’t know how to do this.”

“At some point, you have to try to learn,” I said. “I didn’t know how to put myself out there, but I managed to do it over and over again for you. Even knowing it could end like this.”

“So this is the end, then,” he said, less like a question and more like a heart-wrenching confirmation of fact. One we might have known was coming all along.

“Seems to be what you wanted,” I said, all the edge draining from my voice.

“I’m sorry, Lucy,” he said. “I wish it didn’t have to be like this. But we both have our careers to prioritize at this stage, don’t we? And besides, you’ve said it yourself—we both know you don’t deserve to be waiting around, and I’m sorry I ever expected that of you. It isn’t fair.”

“Right, then,” I said, wishing against all logic that he couldjust be the one to give me what I deserved. I opened the door, but he grabbed the edge before I could pass through.

“I really am sorry.” His voice shook, and I had to get out of there before mine shattered altogether.

“Yeah,” I said, a single hot tear leaking from the corner of my eye. “Me too.”

The gentle closing of his door was a final, conclusive sound. A sound that coaxed the rest of my tears from my eyes in two salty rivers, cutting paths down my burning cheeks.

I pressed my ear to the door of my room, trying to determine whether Liv and Raja were still up and about inside. There was only silence, and I slipped through the door and into bed, unnoticed.

I tossed and turned, letting stray tears stream over the bridge of my nose, feeling them pool on the flannel pillow beneath my head. I should have seen this coming. I should have listened to my gut when it told me not to get my hopes up. I should have walked away the first time he said something he didn’t mean. The first time he led me on.

But I hadn’t. And I couldn’t go back in time and change it. And I couldn’t change Henry, either. If he couldn’t see me, couldn’t see what this could have been, there was nothing more I could’ve done. It really had been over before it started.

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