Space (Laws of Physics #2)(8)

She looked exhausted and sad, and seeing her this way should’ve made me want to break all her unspoken rules about touching. I should’ve wanted to hold her, but I didn’t. If this had been yesterday, I would’ve promised to forgive her anything and everything, and I would’ve meant it.

But now? I had no clarity. Making promises now would be a lie, and I never lied. If she’d been seeing Tyler this whole week while spending time with me, falling for her, I wouldn’t forgive her. It wasn’t in me. I would despise her.

Clearing my throat, I grit my teeth to keep from yelling again. “Forget what? What should I forget?”

“Forget me. You don’t love me. You might think you do, but you don’t.” She sounded tired, but also as though she were trying her best to be compassionate, gentle. “Believe me, you’ll get over this—whatever it is—so fast, I’ll be a blip, a nothing. Seriously, forget it. You don’t want to know me. I promise you, you don’t.”

“So you keep saying.” I pushed back against a creeping numbness climbing up my ribs, stalling, needing a way to fix this.

“Then what’s the problem? Why don’t you believe me? I’m messed up, okay? I don’t know who I am.” Like a switch, her mood and manner turned exasperated. “I don’t know what I want. I’m all fucked up. I am telling you the truth, but you refuse to believe me!”

In a huff, she turned and stomped to the back stairs.

“I don’t understand what’s happening,” I called after her, another unplanned statement of my thoughts.

She stopped on the third step, turning halfway, giving me just her profile.

I walked to the bottom of the stairs, not seeing her or anything else, but wading through a general sense of everything crumbling to dust, a barren landscape.

“What changed? Between last night and this morning, what changed? What did I do wrong?”

Lisa swallowed, shaking her head. “I’m two different people, Abram.” She pulled her sleeves down to cover her hands, turning completely away and crossing her arms. “I’m the person I want to be and the person I currently am, and if my parents disown me, I feel like I’ll sink to the bottom of the ocean and drown. I feel like it’ll be the end of the world.” Initially her voice had been strong and steady, but it grew quieter and quieter as she spoke.

I stared at the back of her head, working through my own bitterness and this trail of crumbs she was leaving. I couldn’t believe what she was saying. I couldn’t believe this was the same person I’d spent the last week with. But there she was, looking just the same.

I’d thought her trust was a beautiful thing. I thought her values unbendable. But now? I couldn’t see what had been right in front of me the whole time, I’d been blind to the truth: she had no trust in me, maybe not in anyone.

Swallowing around the vice tightening my throat, I glanced up at the ceiling. “Let me see if I have this right: you lied to me, about something big, and you think I’ll tell your parents if I find out. Is that right?” The bitterness snuck into my voice.

We were now broken. This wasn’t like before, where she’d used logic and ethics and temperance to push me away. I could forgive that. In retrospect, it had almost been cute.

But this?

Maybe it’s for the best.

No. Fuck that. It wasn’t for the best. Us together was for the best.

Eying her back, her stiff shoulders bunched around her neck, I felt myself soften.

What happened to make her this way?

I couldn’t let her go without trying one more time.

“Lisa.” I placed a hand on her arm, keeping my touch light.

She tensed and I swallowed fear. I ignored my drumming heart, the taste of sand, the uncomfortable tightness in my chest that made taking a complete breath unbearable, and I reminded myself of Leo’s truest words: I try to stay soft, but the world makes it hard.

Be open. Be brave. Be soft, for Lisa.

“I told you yesterday, I just want to make you happy. Do you believe me?”

I watched her back rise and fall with a deep breath, and the barest glimmer of hope had me curling my fingers around her forearm.

But then she shook off my hand. “You can’t make me happy, Abram. People can’t make other people happy. I’ve tried that. It doesn’t work. The truth is, I’m still—I’m still in love with Tyler and—” She took another deep breath, and when she spoke next, I could barely hear her, “And sorry for dicking you around but nothing is ever going to happen with us, so just give me some fucking space.”





1





Electric Charge and Electric Field





Two and a half years later.





*Mona*





“You left.”

Shifting my eyes from the computer screen to the doorway of my office, I blinked at Poe’s sudden appearance. “Pardon?”

“The reception.” He pushed his hands into his pockets, strolling to the chair in front of my desk and helping himself to a seat. “You left before the speech.” Poe smiled at his own statement, though it was clear my leaving the reception was what he found amusing.

“I guess I did.” I leaned back in my chair and returned his smile. “She always gives the same speech.”