I just glare at him.
“Well,” he says, smiling as if he’s solved world hunger in one night. “I’ll be sure April sends you an invitation. We’d love for you to be there.”
The little devil on my shoulder taunts me. “Hey, how did April feel about your f**king her best friend?” I ask. Rumors are fun, when they’re not about you.
A muscle in his jaw ticks. “That was a mistake.”
“You make a lot of those, don’t you?” I ask.
“I’m human,” he says. He hitches his waistband higher.
He’s a human with no morals or conscience. Can’t say April didn’t get what she deserved with him, though.
“If you come to the wedding, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t mention that best friend thing to her.” He looks everywhere but at me. I point toward the hallway, and he goes in that direction.
I don’t say anything more. He waves as he goes out the door, and I slam it behind him. It hits so hard that the walls vibrate. Paul comes out of his room.
I get another beer from the fridge and repeat my opening procedure, singing “Score!” in a vehement whisper when the top sails into the trash.
“You okay?” Paul asks.
“Fine,” I bite out.
“You sure?”
“Yep.”
“You don’t look fine.”
“Fuck you very much.”
Paul heaves a sigh.
“How much did you hear?” I ask.
He winces. “All of it?”
I go and sit on the couch, not saying anything that’s in my head. Truth be told, I would be tearing shit up if Paul wasn’t here.
“I can’t believe they want you to come to the wedding.” He snorts.
“Why did you tell him I’m seeing someone?”
Paul grins. “Seemed appropriate at the time. Bastard was being all smug, telling me how wonderful his life is.”
“So you made up an awesome life for me.”
Paul shrugs. “Didn’t seem like it would hurt.”
It does f**king hurts. My life might be lonely, but it’s mine. It’s all I’ve got, and when you’ve come close to losing your life like I have, you appreciate every single thing about it.
“Are you going to the wedding?” Paul asks.
I shrug. “Don’t know.” I play with the tassels on a pillow, wrapping them around my finger over and over.
“Maybe it would be good closure,” he says.
“It’s already closed.”
“It’s not.”
I lean toward him. “You want to talk about closure, Paul. Then let’s talk about you and Kelly. Let’s talk about the fact that you’re still f**king your baby mama, even though you’re both f**king other people, too. Let’s talk about closure on that, shall we?”
Paul presses his lips together. Then he gets up and goes to his room, closing the door softly behind him. He doesn’t punch me, which is what I deserve. He just walks away. I think I hit way too close to home.
My heart aches for what I just did to him. But it was the only way to get him to drop it.
Closure. Fuck closure. That wound is still open and festering and painful and raw and so damn irritating that I don’t know what to do with it. Will it ever get better? I don’t see how.
Sklyar
I just closed my eyes when my phone buzzes in my pocket. I never did hear back from Phillip after the funeral. He just left. But that’s very much the way he is. He’s there one minute and gone the next. And then gone for a really long time. I take my phone out and see his smiling face on the screen. Do I have to answer it? I mentally steel myself and pick up.
“Hello?”
“Skylar, hi,” he says. I can almost see his toothy grin in my mind’s eye, and it makes me cringe. It shouldn’t be that way, should it?
“So nice of you to finally reply to me,” I toss out.
I can hear the click of his dress shoes against the pavement. “Sorry about that. I had to get back to work. I’m just leaving the building now.” I hear the slam of a door and imagine him getting into his Mercedes.
“Working late?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says very softly. He gets quiet for a moment and silence falls over the cell waves.
“So what’s up with you?” I ask.
“Big case at work,” he says.
“Oh, tell me about it.”
“You know I can’t.”
“We both work for the same firm, Phillip, for God’s sake.”
“About that,” he says.
I sit up. Phillip is a managing partner at my firm. He holds my future in his hands.
“We had a board meeting today to discuss your situation.”
“Oh, really.” I try not to add a pffft at the end of my comment, and almost succeed, but I feel like someone just jerked the air from me.
“We decided you need to take some family leave time to get things settled on your end.”
I sit all the way up and cross my legs criss-cross-applesauce style. “I don’t think that’s your decision to make.”
“I think it’s in your best interest, Sky,” he says softly. “You need to get settled with the kids, hire a nanny, decide where you’re going to live…”
“Well, eventually, we’ll live at my apartment. We’re just here temporarily, while the kids adjust.”
There’s silence on the line.