I moved my mouse over to File > Open Recent, and scrolled down to the first one. Ann_Nichols_4. I never titled the books until I was almost done, and most of the time the titles came directly from the text itself.
The document opened to where I left off.
A year ago.
I remembered, so viscerally, the beginning of the end. When I had looked on his laptop, convincing myself that I did trust him, but I wanted to know what his book was about. I remembered that he’d gone out for laundry and left his laptop open to the Word document. I remembered setting down my laptop—opened to this very scene—and crawling across the couch to where he had just sat a few minutes before. The space heater hummed softly.
And as I read, my world began to break apart, piece by piece, like a puzzle coming unglued. When he came back to the apartment, his laundry in tow, he froze in the foyer. I didn’t look up from his computer.
“When the Dead Sing,” I read, and finally turned my gaze up to him, refusing to believe what I read. “Babe—is this . . . is it about me?”
“No, of course not,” he said dismissively, dumping the laundry on the ground. He came over, took his laptop from my lap, and closed it. “Your stories gave me inspiration. You’re my muse,” he added, and kissed me swiftly on the lips.
As if it would shut me up.
As if it would make everything good again.
Spoiler alert: It didn’t.
How could I write about two characters, Amelia and Jackson, reconciling, trusting each other again when—when I myself couldn’t? One moment I had every grand romantic gesture right at my fingertips, I had faith these two characters would come back together, and I could sow them a happily ever after. But then it felt like the story had been ripped apart at the seams. I didn’t feel them anymore. I didn’t know who they were, this woman who always knew what she wanted, and this world-weary musician with a heart of gold. I didn’t know the kind of love they had, or if they even believed in it.
I knew I didn’t.
Hesitantly, testily, I placed my fingers on the keyboard, feeling the rigid bumps on the F and J keys. It was like stepping back into old, worn shoes that had gone stiff without a partner to dance with.
I took a deep breath.
The only way out was through—
Wait.
I took a big gulp of my drink, and then settled my fingers back into position.
Now I was ready.
“You can do this, Florence,” I muttered, and sank into the scene.
Amelia didn’t want to hear his confessions. About the lies he wove about a life he didn’t live. She knew why he left. Why he abandoned her. The facts stuck to her skin like her wet clothes in the rain. He had lied to her—omitted the story that was most stitched into his life as though, if she learned about it, she’d look at him differently.
Well, he was right in that regard. She did learn about his ex-wife, and she did see him differently. “Were you ever going to tell me?” she asked. “About her?”
He hesitated, rubbing nervously at the scar on his hand that she thought was from one of his wild party nights, but had been from the accident. “I didn’t think you’d understand.”
“Did you give me the choice?”
“I—”
“No, you just made it for me.”
“Amelia, I—” Suddenly, Jackson went pale and dropped dead from all his lies—
“Nope.” I deleted the last sentence.
Suddenly, Jackson went pale and dropped dead from all of his lies.
Amelia didn’t want to hear his explanations. “You lied. You wanted to. Why should I trust you now? Why do I still love you?”