It was that way with most things. He was always there to help guide me, to help me grow. To support me, no matter what. He did the same with my mom, even though they didn’t see eye-to-eye on everything. He loved his family fiercely, and he would’ve done anything for us.
So on paper, he may not have lived the most amazing life. He didn’t have many friends, didn’t travel the world or make a name for himself. But he meant the world to me and my mom, and he enriched our lives with every ounce of his own.
And he was gone.
Gone.
Inevitably, eventually, my thoughts drifted back to my fight with Anna.
The things that Anna wanted, that creative, independent life that she asked for...before, I’d thought it was admirable. Now it just seemed ridiculous, the childish dreams of a spoiled girl.
I’d truly grasped tonight that wholeheartedly loving people was what gave life stakes...it’s what made things matter. Family mattered.
Family loves you, no matter what. They are a part of you, and you, a part of them. Someone who could just cut out her own family didn’t understand loyalty, what it really meant to fight for what you love, to cherish people despite their flaws. It was selfish and naive.
Anna just...didn’t get it. She’d left my apartment after a simple fight. She’d abandoned her family, had left her mother to fend for herself against her shitty situation.
She wasn’t a fighter. She was someone who gave up and ran away.
It could never work out between us.
Some time later, I sent an email to my manager asking for the week off, explaining the situation. Then I turned off my phone and fell asleep on the couch.
Chapter 19
-Anna-
Things had been too good to be true. We’d had three glorious weeks together, week after week after week of sensual pleasure and fairy tale romance. But of course it couldn’t last. Fairy tales weren’t real. I’d simply...forgotten for a moment.
Outwardly, he’d respected me, treasured me, even made me feel things that I didn’t care to name. But deep down, he’d thought that I was broken. Fucked up. And not worth staying and fighting for. He’d left and slammed the door on his way out, just as Asher had. I hadn’t upgraded. Things would always be the same. Every man I cared for and depended on would just get up, walk away, and slam the door on me. It was inevitable.
Because the truth was, I was fucked up. I was broken. And I didn’t deserve him.
Not that this was completely one-sided. He had his issues, too, and I’d meant what I’d said. By any standard, he was a great guy, a dream boat. But he was a dream boat that was sailing nowhere, and I didn’t want to go nowhere. I had aspirations, life goals. Things to do, places to be.
So while part of me knew that it was rash to leave, that we, like billions of couples before us, had simply had a fight...the other part of me couldn’t bear to stay. I felt trapped, mired in emotions, and I had to get out.
I called the only other person that I could in New York.
“Please,” I sobbed, “You can charge me more rent or whatever. I just...I don’t have anywhere else to go right now.”
I could hear Asher thinking through the phone. Finally, he sighed and quietly asked, “Anna, where are you?”
I told him the address. Within the hour, he swung by with his band van and helped me haul my crap into the back of it. It took only two trips up and down before we were done. We closed the rear doors of the van and he got into the driver’s seat while I ambled back upstairs to return the key.
I numbly swept my gaze around Ian’s sleek apartment, one last time. It seemed cold and sterile, with no hint of the warm happiness that Ian and I had shared together. It was merely a place now, no longer a home. No longer my home.
I closed the door, locked it, and slipped the key under the door. Then I went downstairs and slid into the passenger side of Asher’s van.
He didn’t say anything, just pulled out of the parking garage and onto the road. We sat silently for a long time, with only the occasional rattle of my things in the back of the van.
“Thank you,” I whispered, hands fisted in my lap.
He kept his eyes on the road, but I knew that he was hyper aware of me, of my every word. “Did he hurt you? Did he do something to you?” His knuckles whitened on the steering wheel.
Not physically. I shook my head. “No. We just...we’re too different. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
Asher kept silent, mulling over something. Then, “I’m sorry, Anna. If I hadn’t kicked you out, you wouldn’t have had to deal with this.” He put his right hand on top of mine, glanced at me, then looked back at the road. “I’m glad you’re coming back.”
“Me too,” I whispered. My heart squeezed painfully at the lie.
◆◆◆
I considered calling in sick the next day. I wasn’t sure that I wanted to see Ian again. I imagined him greeting me coldly, maybe walking by and not meeting my eyes. Or perhaps pulling me into a conference room to talk it out, trying to kiss me and hold me to make up for things. I wasn’t sure which of those possibilities I wanted.
But none of them happened. He wasn’t at work that day. He never missed work, so where was he? Had he taken my leaving so poorly that he was at home, nursing a broken heart? Was he still angry and just unwilling to face me?
I thought about calling him. I saw that he’d texted me and left me a voicemail, asking me to call him back. Cassie called me
