I smile benignly and shake my head. “Nope.”
“Well, when does he go on lunch? You can always try again after, all this water goes straight to my bladder,” she says on a laugh.
I offer another bland smile but her continued interest in my use of her phone is alarming. And wouldn’t a normal person with no vested interest wonder why I need to use her phone, why I can’t use my own?
I wish I could just leave, but that would probably look suspicious, too. I don’t want to alert these assholes that I’m onto them.
The most alarming thought is that if Liam wouldn’t have told me they were watching my house, I wouldn’t be.
I would’ve taken this opportunity to tell someone about Liam. To reach out to him. Just like someone wanted me to.
Annabelle
I make the ziti.
I’m angry so I don’t want to, but I don’t want to tip anyone off. At least I feel like I have the upper hand if I know something they don’t.
The whole night passes uneventfully. Part of me wants to signal Liam somehow so I can warn him that they’re going to frankly unprecedented lengths to catch him, but signaling him would increase their chances of doing just that, so I don’t.
It’s the most depressing thought I’ve had lately, but I think the best thing I can do for him is leave him alone. It’s the last thing I want to do, but since nothing good can come of it and even stolen moments risk him getting hurt or killed, it is the best thing.
He can’t protect me, but maybe I can protect him. Liam would’ve never gotten tangled up in this mess to begin with if not for my sojourn to the apple tree.
Another day passes, then two. The only thing that changes is we’re that much closer to my mother’s stupid anniversary party. The pretty dress hangs in my closet, never to be seen by the man I want. The man I’ll never see again.
I lapse into sadness and stay in bed for a couple of days. Paul doesn’t come home, so there’s nothing to interrupt me.
I’m out of bed by the time he finally does, but not terribly energized. He looks tired, too.
I didn’t make dinner. I’m not hungry and I didn’t know he’d be here, and honestly, it’s not like knowing would’ve changed things.
He sighs irritably and tosses his keys across the counter. I glance in his direction, but remain curled up in the cozy chair with my blanket wrapped around me.
Raking an aggravated look at me as he walks past, he says, “You could turn up the goddamn heat, you know.”
I don’t respond. It’s nothing new, but it infuriates him.
“I’m fucking talking to you,” he barks.
Dimly aware that this isn’t going in a great direction, I glance at him, but I don’t have the energy to care, and if I did, I wouldn’t waste it on that.
When I don’t respond, he tries again to start something. “You wanna make some dinner?”
“There’s a frozen pizza in the freezer,” I inform him.
“I don’t want a frozen fucking pizza.”
“Well, we don’t have anything else.”
I mean, we do, if I felt like making shit from scratch, but that’s not going to happen.
“Then go to the goddamn grocery store,” he snaps, glaring at me. “That’s your job, isn’t it? We don’t have food? Go buy it.”
“That requires money.” And leaving the house.
He turns red and storms over, grabbing my blanke
t.