Page 10 of After Everything
I stood under the spray long after I shouldhave gotten out, letting it beat against my shoulders, my back, my face. As if hot water could wash away the last twenty-four hours. As if I could scrub off the feeling of David's hands on me, knowing where else they'd been.
When I finally turned off the faucet, the bathroom was thick with steam. I could barely see my reflection in the mirror. Maybe that was for the best.
I wrapped a towel around myself and stood in the middle of my bedroom. Our bedroom. Except it wasn't "ours" anymore, was it?
My eyes landed on the closet. David's side was half-empty now. I'd packed his suitcase with the essentials, but there were still things. Shoes he rarely wore. Old hoodies from college. Boxes on the top shelf that we'd never bothered to unpack after the move eight years ago.
I should throw it all out. Bag it up, leave it on the curb, let him figure out how to get it back.
But instead, I found myself pulling down one of those boxes.
It was taped shut, labeled in David's handwriting:College Stuff.
I sat on the edge of the bed and peeled back the tape.
Inside, a mess of nostalgia. His law school acceptance letter. A worn copy ofGetting to Maybewith notes scribbled in the margins. His undergraduate diploma, never framed. A UVA Law hoodie, faded and pilled. And beneath it all, photo albums.
I pulled one out. The cover was dark blue, embossed with "Class of 2017" in gold letters.
I should have closed it. Should have put it back in the box, taped it shut, shoved it back in the closet where it belonged.
Instead, I opened it.
The first few pages were what you'd expect. David at orientation, looking younger than I remembered, his hair longer, his face not yet hardened by years of long hours and billable rates. David with his roommate. David at a football game, beer in hand, grinning at the camera.
Then I saw her.
Page five. A group photo at what lookedlike some law school mixer. Seven or eight people crowded together, red solo cups in hand, someone's arm thrown around someone else's shoulders. And there, right next to David, was Sarah.
She looked different. Younger, obviously—her hair was longer, falling past her shoulders in loose waves. She wore jeans and a simple black top, nothing like the polished, professional woman from the photos on David's phone. But it was unmistakably her. Same sharp cheekbones. Same smile.
David's arm was around her waist.
I stared at the photo. Told myself it meant nothing. People took pictures like that all the time. Arms around each other, smiling, close. It was just a party. Just friends.
But I kept turning pages.
Sarah appeared again and again. Sarah and David studying in the library, heads bent over the same textbook. Sarah and David at someone's birthday party. Sarah and David and a few others at a bar, all of them laughing at something off-camera.
In every photo, they were next to each other. Like magnets. Like it was natural.
I remembered David talking about her, back when we first started dating senior year of undergrad. He'd just finished his first year of law school, and I was still pre-med, drowning in organic chemistry and anatomy labs.
"Sarah's brilliant," he'd said one night, lying in my dorm room bed, my head on his chest. "Like, scary smart. She can read a case once and know it inside and out. We're always partnered up for mock trials because we can finish each other's sentences. It's like we share a brain."
I'd laughed. "Sounds like you two should be dating."
"Nah." He'd kissed the top of my head. "She's like a sister. Besides, I've got you."
Like a sister.
I looked at the photo again. His arm around her waist. Her hand on his chest. Both of them grinning like they'd just shared a private joke.
That didn't look like siblings.
The next page had a photo from whatmust have been graduation. Sarah in her cap and gown, David next to her, both holding their diplomas. Someone had written in silver sharpie at the bottom:The Dream Team - JD Class of 2017.
My throat tightened.
