* * *
There’s silence between us after. I ignore it, but it follows us to the kitchen. I watch Alex as he watches the kettle. I don’t want to speak into the silence because I’m scared of what it will give back. Alex taps the counter; I feel him gearing up. He pours hot water into a mug with a green tea bag at the bottom and places it in front of me. Then he takes a seat at the dining table.
“There’s something you’re not telling me,” he says quietly.
I want to hold it in, to lie again. I’m just so good at it. For something so universally condemned, lying truly appeals to me; it often seems like the only way to maintain peace and comfortable continuity. But another part of me is tired—tired of pretending and keeping track, tired of being worn out after sex, like I’ve spent the entire time running away from my own shadow.
“I don’t particularly like sex,” I tell him. “It’s painful and always has been.”
“Oh.”
I watch him consider all the paths this conversation might take him down, but he doesn’t need to tell me something so clearly printed on his face.
“That’s a deal breaker, isn’t it?”
“No,” he says quickly.
I smile sadly. “Please be honest.”
Alex drops his head into his hands and something sharp hits me in the chest: a burning swell of rejection. Yet again.
“I’m sorry, Maddie,” he says. “I’m going to sound like such a dick, but sex is important to me; I need that physical connection and intimacy. I wish I could pretend otherwise, but I know myself and I don’t want to promise you—especially you—one thing and secretly want another.”
I look down at my cup of green tea. The water’s completely taken up the tea bag’s color and the smell is partially medicinal, but it’s soothing, like that of eucalyptus.
“Maybe we can try again?” I offer.
Alex has already sat back in his chair, pulled away from the table and from me, but I’m desperate. “Maybe it will get better and I just have to keep trying?”
“I can’t know you’re in pain and still…” He looks up, at least. “I really am sorry.”
It’s that easy to get rid of me. To erase me from his life and whatever slot I may have filled in his future. He doesn’t need to think on me a little longer. Short-term.
Just like you wanted, right?
I nod my head because this is what I deserve, and he does the same.
One thing I can appreciate is his honesty, because God knows he received none of that from me.
Chapter Thirty-six
Friday afternoon, Penny reminds me of my first official appointment with Angelina. I nod. “I’m going now.”
Penny never reminds me of anything because it’s my job to do that for her, but I know it’s because I look like the bird the cat dragged in, and I can only imagine what people told her once I’d left the office yesterday.
I put my computer in sleep mode and head downstairs.
* * *
Today Angelina’s hair is straight and tucked behind her ears and her wooden earrings almost rest on her collarbone. Her lips, like her nails, are painted a burnt orange—how bold.
“Maddie, you look … Are you all right?”
“Of course,” I answer. Last time, the HR room was hot, but I’m shivering today. “My dad’s funeral is tomorrow, so I’ve not had much sleep. I’m fine, though. I’ve been meaning to ask, do you have a yellow pantsuit?”
Her face remains illegible. “I do.”
“Me too, but I still haven’t worn it.” I look at the clock. Only two minutes have passed. “I talk to myself a lot. In my head and out loud,” I tell her. “Is that weird?”
“Why do you talk to yourself out loud?”
I shrug. “Sometimes my head is too full and it makes what I’m thinking clearer. I know not to do it in public.”
“So you’re often alone, I take it?” she asks. “If you talk to yourself a lot, but not in public, you must be by yourself quite a bit.”
“I like my own company.”
“Have you always?”
“What do you mean?”
“I believe in two dominant introvert types. Those who have always enjoyed their own company and those who have grown to prefer it because they weren’t given much of a choice. Which do you think you fit into?”
I think about how small my room back home is and how I used to tell myself I loved it because its purpose was to house only one and I fit comfortably inside. James had a life I wasn’t cool or old enough to fit into, Mum had a life on another continent, and my dad had his slowly taken away.
“Maybe the second,” I answer.
“Do you talk much to other people?”
“Of course.”
“About more significant things?” Angelina clarifies. “Not just everyday pleasantries, but private matters. How you are and what you’re thinking, for example.”
“Why?”
“Maybe you talk to yourself because then you don’t have to factor in another person’s reaction. Or even, you enjoy engaging in conversations where you can be completely open and honest, but maybe you feel the only way to do this safely is when alone. Do you tend to keep how you’re feeling bottled up?”
She steadies me with a look that informs me she already knows the answer.
Our matters are private, remember? You tell one person, they tell another, and the next thing you know, important people are asking all sorts of questions.
Saliva is building in my mouth, and I hope I’m not going to be sick. “Maybe,” I answer. “I’ll have to think about that one.” I look up again and five more minutes have passed. This isn’t going by fast enough. “I also say ‘I love you’ a lot. Is that weird?”
Angelina tilts her head. “What constitutes a lot?”
“People might think I use it too frequently and it’s starting to lose meaning, but I do mean it every time I say it. At the end of a conversation, or when I’m saying goodbye to someone. I always make sure I say it.”
“Who do you say it to?”
“Oh, not everyone. Friends and family. People I love.”
“And maybe people you want to love you back?”
I don’t answer.
“Do they verbally reciprocate?” she asks. “Actually, do they ever say it first?”
“I’m sure they do. I just remember it always being a response.”
“What about your parents?” Angelina asks. “Did they say it often?”
“I never heard them say it to each other. Is that weird?”
Angelina slowly closes her notebook and gently says, “There is no weird, Maddie. Every individual’s experience is unique. Did they ever say it to you?”
I shift in my seat. “Say what? That they love me?” I nod. “Of course. Well, my dad did twice. Once when he was drunk and another when he was … unwell. I think his brain had forgotten itself. A little loose and addled with medication at the time, you know? But I know he loved me; you can’t not love your children, especially the unproblematic ones.”
“And your mother?”
“Yes, she must have.” I think of all the compliments Mum’s given me; she calls me darling, her baby, and a blessing. They’re all the same thing as love. “I tend to end our phone calls with ‘I love you.’”