1: 1
That evening, home from work, I called Curtis Harding on video the way I always did.
Not a minute in, he said, "Never mind, I'm going to go shower."
So I sat on the couch, phone in my hands, waiting.
He didn't call back until four hours later.
His face filled the screen, laughing, more alive than I'd seen him in ages.
"My assistant made a fool of herself again. She can't even get the numbers right on a slide deck."
"Annie, if she were half as smart as you, I'd be set."
A moment later,
he laughed again. "Well, you can't expect every woman in the world to be as driven as you. She can just be the cute one."
In that instant, everything I wanted to say stuck in my throat.
Three years long-distance.
He used to call back the second he was out of the shower.
He'd ask what I'd eaten that day, whether the commute had gone smoothly, what color flowers I'd bought.
But at some point, all of that liveliness started going to someone else.
What was left for me was one word. Whatever.
Watching the side of his face, still smiling, I suddenly felt so tired.
It turns out that when a person is thoroughly let down, they don't even have the strength to be sad.
……
The call ended.
I watched the minutes slip by.
Sixty-seven of them.
Curtis never called back.
Something clogged my throat.
It was like this every time.
He'd say whatever he'd wanted to say, then hang up.
Only Maggie Cox made him talkative.
"Maggie got lost again today. Wandered around the office building for half an hour."
"She actually spilled coffee all over a contract. She's hopeless."
I tried to steer the conversation somewhere else.
I said I was craving a barbecue back in Harborview, and out it came:
"Maggie can't handle anything that greasy. She's always begging to go get cupcakes."
Then, backpedaling:
"Next time you're here, I'll take you."
My phone lit up. I opened my feed.
Curtis had posted photos from a work get-together.
The last two were of him and Maggie together.
They stood under the string lights, easy and familiar with each other.
I looked at it for a long time.
I typed, over and over.
【Are you two together a lot these days】
Then deleted it.
I scrolled up and down through our chat history.
Since two years ago, all that was left between us was:
Mm. Sure. Got it.
It hadn't always been that way.
Back then, he'd photograph a stray cat just to send it to me.
But once, I told him my supervisor had chewed me out.
All he wrote back was: 【Don't you have your own work to do?】
It was as if, from that moment on, something began to tip out of balance.
I took a deep breath.
【Curtis, my supervisor gave me a lot of days off. I've booked a ticket to Harborview to come see you tomorrow. Are you happy?】
By the time my phone was down to three percent battery,
at 1:17 in the morning, he finally replied, his tone like a stranger's:
【Annie, why wouldn't you tell me about something this big ahead of time?】
【Why do you always just decide things on your own? Is my whole life supposed to be tied to yours forever?】
The words blurred where water had smudged them.
【Never mind, do what you want. I'll pick you up tomorrow.】
Never mind.
He'd said those two words too many times.
When I asked where we should go for the long weekend, he said never mind;
when I asked him to call me every day, he said never mind;
even on video, in under thirty seconds, it was never mind.
The next day I got up early.
I put on the dress he'd said looked nice last year.
At the boarding announcement, I texted him:
【I'm through security】
【Half an hour until takeoff】
【I'll send you my location when I land.】
No reply to any of it.
The plane touched down in Harborview, and I rolled my suitcase toward the exit.
Thinking he might be late.
Bracing myself to wait another hour.
Last time he'd said he'd come get me, and because of some proposal of Maggie's, he'd left me standing in the arrivals hall for an hour.
But now, I spotted him right away.
He stood there, two milk tea lattes in his hands.
I couldn't help lifting my hand to wave.
The smile hadn't fully formed on my face
when I saw Maggie come out from behind him and take his arm.
Curtis frowned.
"What took you so long? Maggie can't stand the heat. She was so close to passing out, waiting."
Maggie laughed and swatted at him.
"It's just been so long since your wife came to visit. Don't be so harsh."
Her hand, looped through his arm, never let go.
Getting into the car, I caught an unfamiliar scent.
The seat covers had all been switched to pink.
In the storage compartment, a little mirror, lipstick, hair ties.
A plush toy hung from the rearview mirror.
Maggie took the passenger seat.
Curtis stuck a straw into her milk tea and handed it over.
She bit down on the straw.
"That client last time was hilarious. He actually asked if I could turn the proposal into a slide deck. Please. It was such a pain."
"So what did you do?"
"I just sent him the PDF. If he can't convert it himself, that's not my fault."
Curtis laughed out loud, his eyes crinkling.
I hadn't seen that in a long time.
And he talked. A lot.
So much that, in the forty minutes from the airport into the city,
it was more than all our video calls of the past week combined.
I turned my face to the window.
Harborview's buildings were so tall they made my eyes sting.
The car stopped below his apartment building, and I followed him up.
The door swung open, and I froze in the doorway.
The living room was completely different.
That home, once cold and bare to the point of emptiness.
Now pink was everywhere.
A pink rug, pink cushions, the coffee table piled with face masks and snacks.
A piece of lace lingerie hung over the couch.
On the plant stand out on the balcony, rows of succulents.
Before, I'd set a single pothos in his place and he'd complained it was in the way.
But now it was different.
Maggie kicked off her shoes like it was second nature.
She gave me a sheepish smile.
"Don't mind it, okay? I've been looking for a place and haven't found one yet, so I'm just crashing at Curtis's for a few days. You're not mad, are you?"
