The Pact(94)

He’s sitting on the back of the couch and staring at me, like he’s been waiting for me to come inside this whole time.

“What’s up?” I tell him, putting the box of beer on his kitchen table. The room smells like weed but I can’t tell if he’s high or not. “Why do you have your crazy face on, brother?”

“I can’t believe you lied to me,” he says, his face eerily blank, and that’s when I know it’s all over. It’s almost a relief.

Still. I have to try. “What are you talking about?”

“Stephanie,” he says. And my first thought is, oh my fucking hell, did she speak to him? Did she tell him that she knows he’s in love with her? What else did she say?

Is she okay?

Of course she’s not fucking okay. You broke her god damn heart.

“What about her?” I ask, still hoping.

“You’ve been screwing her. For months.”

And here it is. The fucking truth.

I raise my chin in defiance. “Who told you that?”

“Her friend, Kayla,” he says. “She says you broke her heart. I guess I had something to do with that, didn’t I?”

I don’t even know what to say, so I don’t say anything. There is nothing to say.

“No apology?” he asks bitterly.

Right. Well I guess there is that. But I know that it won’t do any good. “I’m sorry I lied to you.”

“Sure,” he says with a quick nod. “Okay. You lied. Point blank to my face. You told me you had never been with her.”

“I had been with her.”

“For months.”

“For months,” I agree.

“How long have you been in love with her?”

“About as long as you have.”

He shakes his head and laughs humorlessly. “And of course, you end up being the guy she falls in love with. It had to be you, didn’t it?”

I can’t seem to swallow the brick in my throat. “It didn’t have to be. But I’m not sorry it was.” I pause. “But I broke it off with her because I didn’t want to see you get hurt. I didn’t know you loved her, James. Come on.”

He narrows his dark eyes. They look like a viper’s. “But did you at least suspect? You said you didn’t before, but you were lying then anyway. Did you at least think I had some feelings for her?”

I nod. “Yes. Maybe not in that way…”

He clucks his tongue. “Typical. Well, I can’t say I’m surprised. I saw her first but I guess in the end she had to become yours anyway.”

“She’s no longer anybody’s.”

He shrugs. “Why do I care?”

I’m stunned. “But I gave her up for you. That counts for something.”

“You gave her up for you!” he suddenly yells at me, spit flying from his mouth. “None of this was for me. This was to get rid of your own guilt, to make yourself feel better, like you’re a noble, better man, when you’re nothing but a self-centered asshole. You always have been and always will be.” He takes in a deep breath. “But now at least you’ll know what it’s like to lose. You’ve lost her. And now you’ve lost me.”

I don’t need to protest. I don’t need for him to tell me to get the fuck out like Stephanie did. I can only nod, turn around, and leave the apartment. James and the box of beer stay behind.



***



It’s amazing what people will do on Christmas Eve if you pay them enough money. By the time nine o’clock rolls around and I’m hauling my suitcases to SFO, my entire flat is packed up and in the back of a moving truck. Not only were the moving people willing to work all day loading my shit for the right amount of pay, but some grumbly Jewish man was up for the job of driving all my belongings across the country.

Originally I was going to do it myself. But when I called my father last night and told him I was going to take him up on the flat in Manhattan, he insisted I get there in time for Christmas. Which is, you know, tomorrow.

It will be the first Christmas with my family in ten years. I’m not even sure what to expect anymore or who my family is. But I know it’s better than staying in San Francisco where I have absolutely nothing left for me. My father had been right – what was the point of putting down roots if there was nowhere for me to grow?

There is no Stephanie. There is no James. And though I loved my job to death, there are always new jobs to be found. Manhattan is full of helicopters needing to be flown.

Manhattan is full of possibilities for a new world.

I get on the airplane and as we race against another flight taking off at the same time, I stare out the window, at the tips of the Transamerica Pyramid building and the Bay and Golden Gate Bridge as they poke through the shroud of fog.