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“How
could you?” I asked. “How could you do something like this? How could you
continue to accept my help?”

“Alex-”

“How
long?” I snapped. “How long have you known?”

When she
said nothing, I spoke her name. It felt like ice against my tongue.

“Cait,” I
said.

“One
month,” she answered.

One
month. An entire fucking month.

I stared
at her. I stared at her, sitting there, making her pathetic attempt at saving
her face. And I wanted to hate her, you know. I wanted to hate her as much as I
hated Mason, or even hated myself.

And I was
angry. God, I was livid. But instead of yelling, I took one last look around
the bedroom – at the little duckling with the black-bead eyes, the frilly
bedding, the pink trim along the walls, and said:

“I...” I
paused. “I'll leave now, I think.”

“Alex,”
she started again, and I raised my hand.

“Don't,”
I told her. “Let me leave. Let me walk out. And please, for the love of God,
Cait, don't ever contact me again.”

I could
hear her strain to get up as I bolted down the steps. In the kitchen, Mason set
the ladle he was holding down, and looked at me.

I hit him
square in the nose. Fist to bone. The blood spurts were immediate; the scream
that followed ringing throughout the entire apartment.

In the
Porsche, I sped away, ignoring the blood on my knuckles.

My hands
had already been stained.

Chapter 23

MIA

The two
weeks that followed were nothing but shelving books and silence. Alex didn't
call, and didn't answer any of my attempts. Not a single word.

On the
nights I wasn't working, I spent them inside, wrapped in a blanket, staring at
whatever was on the TV, feeling pathetic and devastated and self-deprecatingly
foolish.

I was a
twenty-two year-old young adult. I was a strong, capable woman that didn't need
some guy to make her complete. So why was I letting some affair drag me down?

Don't
cry, I told myself. It's not worth it.

When
Aimee eventually came over, she sat with me for a long while, looking
distraught.

“Don't
make any comments the current state of things,” I told her. “I know I need to
clean.”

“I wasn't
going to say anything,” she said.

“Good,” I
said. All of my joints felt unhinged. My eyes were swollen. But I still hadn't
cried. “It's over, you know. Between Dr. Greene and I.”

“Is it?”
She asked, vaguely dubious. “I mean, I'm sorry. I'm sorry to hear that.”

“I
thought it was just some stupid spat,” I told her. “We got into it the other
night. I got offended after he tried giving me this gift, and I asked him about
our future, and he totally blew it off. But I didn't think...I didn't expect
this
.
I didn't expect it to just end, like jumping from the edge of a cliff.
Nothing.”

Aimee
curled up next to me, pressing a palm to my cheek. Her hands were warm, and she
smelled like raspberry lotion.

“You have
amazing things going on in your life,” she told me. “Remember that. You've got
Cambridge to look forward to. You have this incredible thing that you've worked
four years to attain, and now you have it.”

“I know,”
I muttered.

“Don't
let this swallow you,” she said. “It's only love. You'll find another.”

“I know,”
I said. “I get it.”

After a
moment's pause, my insides coiling, I added:

“I'm
going over there,” I said. “I'm going to go by his apartment, and officially
end it on my terms. I'm going to speak with him. I'm not going to allow him to
play this off like some fucking coward.”

“No,”
Aimee said hastily, sitting up. “That's
not
what I was implying. That's
not what you should do, Mia. Stay here. Watch a movie. I'll make you some hot
chocolate. But do. Not. Go to him.”

She followed
me around as I pulled on a T-Shirt, a pair of jeans, and my sneakers. I threw
my hair up in a hasty ponytail.

“I need
to do this,” I told her. “You don't understand.”

“No, you
don't,” she insisted. “You need to sit down. That's what you need to do. You
need to take a deep breath and realize that some things end, Mia. They just
end. And it sucks, and it's terrible. But going to him isn't going to help you.
It's going to make this worse.”

“You
don't know anything about anything,” I told her.

Aimee
looked down, her blonde waves tumbling against the periwinkle-colored top she
wore.

“I'm
going to ignore that,” she mumbled. “And chalk it up to the fact that you're
hurting right now.”

“I'm
sorry,” I told her, and it was true. I felt horrible. “But I need to do this. I
need to go. I'll be back. You can wait up if you want.”

Aimee
nodded.

“At least
let me drive,” she said, and looked around. “Spare yourself the cab fare. Also,
this mess is actually kind of frightening.”

I hugged
her tightly. I knew how I was behaving, of course. Younger than I should have
been behaving; a twenty-two-year-old in the body of a scorned teenage girl.

But as I
threw on my coat, ignoring the first droplets of the coming storm, I paid no
real mind to this. Pain makes you numb, but love makes you blind.

So even
if it was right in front of me, my fate laid out like a deck of Tarot cards, I
couldn't see what was coming.

Chapter 24

ALEX

I sat on
the edge of an empty hospital bed, in the same empty hospital room where I had
first met Mia. I tried to recall that first moment – shuffling in, standing
there with her file clutched tightly, the little traits that I picked up at
first glance: the freckles on her nose, the way her eyes darted about the room.
The look of concern on her face.

I picked
at the thread-bare blanket, ignoring the buzzing in my coat pocket. It was
Cait. She'd messaged me about a dozen times, and I'd ignored each and every one
of them.

It was
late. I was on call, and technically could have left an hour earlier, but I
didn't want to go home. Mia's hand-prints were still on the window; her scent
was still on my sheets. Her lip gloss still kissed the glass that sat on my
kitchen counter.

My heart
twisted. Looking towards the window, I caught my reflection, almost as if I
weren't really a man at all, but the shadow of one. I could see the eyes, the
figure; the hair and mouth that made up all the parts belonging to Dr. Alex
Greene. But who was he, really?

Lost.
Gone. Out to sea.

A tap on
the door gave me pause, and Dr. Weisman entered carefully.

“Give me
your files,” he said. “I'll take them. You go home.”

“I'm
finished,” I told him. “I just can't bring myself to leave.”

Weisman
sat down beside me. Just two grown men, two white lab-coats. Two doctors with
patients to see and files to skim and a lifetime ahead of us spent shaking
hands and hoping that the hands we touched wouldn't end up tagged and slid into
a refrigerated slot.

“I've
fucked everything up,” I
 
murmured. “And
now I don't know what to do.”

“Move
on,” Dr. Weisman said mildly. “There's nothing else to do, Al.”

“Yeah,” I
said, then: “Maybe.”

I combed
my fingers through my hair, which had gotten maybe a little too long than could
be considered professional. It was almost to my chin, which was covered in
soft, overgrown stubble. Smarmy, not sexy. I looked haggard.

“How old
was she?” Weisman eventually asked. “Your girl, I mean.”

“Why does
it matter, Nick?” I asked, feeling slightly on the defense. “Twenty-two. She's
twenty-two.”

“Jesus.”

“Oh, come
on,” I said. “How old was that girl you were screwing? Around the same age, if
I recall.”

“She
was,” he confessed. “But I knew what it was, and she knew what it was. We
weren't tied to any delusions. And even though I fell, it was of my own
volition. I dug that grave.”

“So why
is your marriage over?” I snapped. Weisman drew back, appalled, and I added:
“I'm sorry, Nick. I'm not in the right mind right now.”

Dr.
Weisman lowered his eyes, glanced at his watch, and looked away.

“Could I
ask exactly what you were expecting from all this?”

“You
could,” I answered. “But the truth is, I don't even fucking know. I just know
that I've never been so obsessed with someone in my entire goddamn life, Nick.
And now I feel like all the blood has been drained from my veins. I can't eat,
I can't sleep. And the worst of it is, I know better. I should have known
better.”

He
looked, in some way, as if he understood. But before he could say something,
keep the conversation flowing, his sighed.

“I can't
stay,” he told me. “I've still got patients waiting for me.”

“Okay,” I
said, vaguely morose.

“Go
home,” he repeated. “And get some sleep, man. You need it.”

As he
stood , I watched him brush the imaginary bits of lint or whatever from his
knees.

“Nick,” I
said. “One more thing.”

“Sure,”
he said.

I paused,
eyes cutting towards the window again. But I didn't meet my own gaze.

“Do you
miss your wife at all?”

Dr.
Weisman chuckled, but the sound hung heavy with a kind of mournfulness.

“Not
yet,” he confessed, his voice giving way to what might have been a slight uncertainty.
“Goodnight, Al.”

When he
was gone, and it was just me in the silent room, I mulled everything over. I
aligned everything, every little notion and desire in front of me as if the
thoughts and feelings themselves were chess pieces spread out on a checkered
board.

What was
I expecting, really? A future? Would Mia be my wife, or the mother of my kids?
Would I be the one she saw when those church doors opened, and she came walking
down the aisle?

No. And
the truth is, I knew it from the fucking get-go. I was just too selfish, too
consumed to acknowledge it.

She had
fallen into my hands like a snowflake, only to melt in my palms. Our meeting
meant only one thing – that were destined to say goodbye.

The door
was open half-way when I got home. Startled, I stepped inside carefully,
quietly. And while I was expecting – desperately hoping, even – for it to be
Mia...it wasn't.

Cait
stood in the kitchen, holding the same glass with the pink smear of lip gloss
on the rim.

When she
saw me, she set it down.

“You've
had company,” she noted quietly. “It's scattered around this place like little
love notes.”

“Get
out,” I told her. “Now.”

She
walked over to the window, looking at the hand-prints on the glass. She ran a
fingertip over them, pressing her lips together bleakly.

“You've
lied to me this whole time,” she said.

“You've
officially lost the right to talk about lies,” I said coldly.

“And what
if this was your baby?” she asked. “What then? Were you never going to tell
me?”

“We
aren't together,” I told her. “There's nothing I need to tell you. You live
your life, I live mine. And now, please, I would like you to go.”

She
nodded. She looked hurt, but it was impossible to quite make out what was going
through her mind.

“I came
to apologize,” she said. “I had to beg Mason to stay home. He was ready to
follow me here and exchange the blow you gave him for a full-on blood bath.”

“I
couldn't give less of a shit if he showed up here wearing boxing gloves,” I
snapped. “Now leave. I won't say it a fourth time.”

“Why
won't you let me apologize?” she asked. “I'm trying to tell you...I'm just
trying to say, horribly, that I'm sorry.”

We looked
at one another. We looked at one another from a distance of maybe several feet,
standing in a place that she had once shared with me. But all of that was over.
We were strangers now. More than strangers.

I didn't
know her. She didn't know me, either.

“I
forgave you back at your apartment,” I said. “You're forgiven, Cait. Now
leave.”

“Who is
she?” Cait asked. “Who was here with you?”

I pulled
off my lab-coat, ignoring her. I tossed it on the one of the bar stools, walked
into the kitchen, and poured myself a straight Maker's Mark.

Cait
watched me drink. When I set the glass down, I asked her:

“Would
you like something?”

“I asked
you a question,” she said. “You won't answer.”

“Because
it's none of your business,” I said. “It seems like you have your own basket
full of problems to concern yourself with. Keep your hands away from mine.”

“You're
such a fucking asshole, Alex.”

“You're
right,” I said. “Now leave.”

She was
glowering at me, her eyes narrowed, sphinx-like and riveted.

“I don't
love him,” she said, as if saying that the weather was hot, or it the clouds
looked ominous. As if it were a simple, stated fact. “I don't love Mason.”

“You don't
love me, either.”

“I'm
scared,” she said. “I'm scared, Alex. I don't know what to do.”

I turned
to her. She wasn't looking at me anymore. Her eyes were on the polished wood
floors, empty, her blonde hair covering part of her face.

“I'm
sorry,” I said softly. “But I can't help you.”

“You
have,” she said. “I still want to pay you back.”

“I don't
want you to,” I told her.

“What do
you want, then?” she asked. “I need to give you something in return. Words
aren't enough. You can't do anything with words, Alex.”

“You're
right,” I said. “That's why I want you to leave. I want you to leave my
apartment, right now, and never speak to me again.”

Her mouth
dropped, her bottom lip quivering like that first quake before the sobbing
erupts. But she sucked in a long breath, wiped the hair from her face, and
nodded.

“Fine,”
she said. “I'll leave.”

She
walked in slow footsteps over to the couch, picked up her sweater, and tugged
it on. It was slightly too small, and the fabric strained against her stomach
as she tried to button it up.

When a
knock suddenly rattled against the door, she halted, startled.

“It's
nearly midnight,” she said.

“Ignore
it,” I said.

The truth
is, I didn't even think it would have been Mia. But I wasn't too sure who I had
imagined it to be, because frankly, I wasn't sure about any single fucking
thing in my life aside from the arresting fact that I was a miserable man, who
had engaged in a miserable fucking deed, and had lost the one thing I had ever
truly wanted.

The one
thing I would have never truly been able to keep.

Slinging
her purse over her shoulder, she walked to the door.

I stayed
in the kitchen, draining the rest of my cocktail.

And
that's when I heard it:

“You're
the girl,” Cait said. “You're his patient, aren't you?”