I peer down at it with wide eyes, my heart pounding in the silence of the living room, where I’m reading on my Kindle. Well…that’s not scary.
I’m gonna take care of you. Just don’t make it tricky. Don’t get out ahead of me or do anything crazy like a midnight run in CP.
Or a spur of the moment trip to the cabin? I smile down at the phone, even as tears fill my eyes. I won’t.
He replies: I’m sorry for this…
Another text comes: I know I shouldn’t say shit like this…
I wait a second, holding my breath as I watch him typing. In another life, you would be mine forever. No more wanting.
Then another text from him: It’s making me tired
Tears gleam in my eyes as I swallow. I’m tired, too, cuore.
He sends rows and rows of dark hearts. Then red roses. I send rows and rows of wilting roses, mostly for dramatic effect.
He switches back to dark hearts. When I wake up the next morning, there’s a new app on my phone; it’s unlabeled—just a red box. I tap on it, and there’s a picture of him lying in his bed. No…it’s not a picture, it’s a video. He mouths, “Goodnight” and gives me a small smile.
I send him a video of me in my bed whispering, “Good morning.”
That’s what I’m doing when Dani walks in, dressed for meditative yoga.
“Wait…what are you doing?” she asks, bouncing over as I cradle the phone to my chest.
“Nothing.”
“You were sexting!” She tries to get a peek at my phone, and I give a ridiculing laugh.
“I’m fully clothed, Einstein.”
She snatches my phone so quickly, I don’t have a chance. Then she plays the video he sent me in the app. I’ve never seen her eyes so wide. Her jaw falls to the floor as a wild laugh burbles from her throat. “Oh my God—I’m telling Ree!”
“You’ll give her another stomach ulcer!”
Dani flops onto my bed and rolls around, stuffing her face in a pillow. “Holy shit!”
I snatch the phone up, my eyes stinging as emotion nearly overwhelms me. She snatches the phone back and scrolls through.
“Oh Elise, he loves you. I knew he did. I knew it! Nothing could change that boy. He was the nicest guy we knew.”
“You don’t even like nice guys.”
“That’s not the point.” She cradles the phone to her chest. Then she tosses it lightly at me. I wince as it hits me in the belly. Then I grab my robe and pull it on in bed.
“You’re here early,” I say.
“I was bored, but you cured that. I don’t even think we’re doing yoga now. I’m turning on the fireplace, and you’re going to tell me everything.”I don’t—tell her everything. No one but me knows everything. Not even Luca himself. Dani leaves my house almost four hours later. I’m so tired, I take a two-hour nap. When I wake up, I get into the tub, dump bath salts in, and text him a heart.
Then I drape my hand over mine. It’s not up behind my breastbone anymore. It’s a little lower…in my belly.* * *LucaI’ve been having nightmares. Flashbacks. Sometimes all of that gets worse in the fall. I don’t know why. Circadian rhythms? Some such something.
I look up therapists on the internet and book an appointment—not because I want to chat, but because I can’t sleep. It’s been weeks, and I can barely drive my car, which isn’t okay. My hands shake, and my heart pounds all the time. I just need some shut-eye.
The guy is in Queens, in a loft above a mom and pop bookstore. I sit in a wing-backed chair across from the couch where he’s sitting, leaning forward with his hands touching at the fingertips. I can feel dude looking at me…analyzing, or whatever they do.
I try not to let it get to me. I slot in details that resemble the real ones, but don’t mention the mob, and, with some reluctance, I tell him about Elise. How much I love her, how her job makes her more visible, and how I’m scared something will happen to her. Not scared, even—terrified. He tells me that’s not logical. He says if I’m worried for her, it probably goes back to another time when I lost someone else. But he doesn’t know. That’s the problem. It’s a waste, to talk to someone who has no idea and can’t be given details. I don’t know why I bothered.
I send her hearts a lot now, almost every hour. I send her a picture of myself when I can’t sleep one night. She sends one back the next morning. She’s lying in her sunlit bed.
We start texting pictures every night, and almost every morning. I try not to text her in the wee hours, but one night, when it’s been a whole four nights since I shut my eyes, I send her a picture of me looking miserable beside my bedroom window.