I stand up and start pacing, distancing myself from him. I know I could let the discussion go if Harriet hadn’t put the idea in my head that we would write repressed feelings into this book. It’s her fault, not ours, that I’m reading into everything Nathan and I say. But with Harriet’s warning ringing in my ears, I can’t agree with what Nathan’s proposing, not if there’s a chance this conversation isn’t just about our characters.
“They care about each other,” I get out. “But their passion has changed form. Love to hate.”
Nathan watches me from the dining table. “So you want to end this book with them signing their divorce papers and burning every memory they have of each other?”
I falter, pausing on one end of the room, under the tauntingly tranquil painting of a sailboat on open water. I want to say yes. Nathan is, however, unfortunately right. The ending I’ve wound up proposing isn’t interesting. It lacks nuance.
Which means if I were to push for it, I realize, it would only be out of personal feeling. Because it’s the ending I want for myself—sending in this book and forgetting every memory Nathan and I have of each other. If I let that hope become Evelyn and Michael’s, I would prove Harriet exactly right. Instead, I have to write with my feelings utterly to the side no matter the ending.
“No,” I say.
Nathan slants his head a little, like he’s not sure he heard right.
I elaborate, finally seeing with refreshing clarity what the ending should be. “You’re right. This book is about how love changes and how it stays the same. Even their parting is itself an act of love. Love to hate, then back to love, less passionate this time, but there. Forever.” The final word comes out weighty, making the hair on my neck stand up.
Nathan studies me, undoubtedly trying to parse what I’m feeling from what I’m saying.
I don’t give him the chance. I sit back down at the computer. “So we end with them finalizing their divorce then telling each other they love each other,” I say while I type, pouring ideas into the outline. “Both things, though contradictory, feel equally true to them. The past lives on in the present.”
He pulls his gaze from me. “And they kiss with real emotion. One last time.”
I blink at the tone in his voice. “Then they part ways for good.”
“The end,” Nathan says.
We’re silent for a moment. Sweat springs to my hands. I ignore the sensation, focusing instead on the flicker of pride I have for the ending we’ve just formulated. I did it. What’s more, I did it with Nathan. We did it. We can keep our own emotions out of this.
For the first time in weeks, I start feeling steady, even confident. Because I don’t just know how the end of the story will look, I realize. I know how the end of writing it with Nathan will look. We’ll hold ourselves apart from each other the way we’ve been doing since the café. We’ll deploy unkindness instead of growing dangerously close. We’ll write from story structure. Not from feeling.
Nathan’s eyes return to me, and I hear him draw in a breath like he’s about to say something.
I preempt him, reaching for my phone. It shatters the moment somehow, changing the pressure in the room. Chris has texted me, I find when I illuminate my screen. Making headlines, he’s sent. The next message is a link, a Vanity Fair article.
“Shit,” I say.
“What?” Nathan glances over.
I unlock my phone and open the link. In the website’s stylish font, I read the headline. “Your Favorite Bestselling Duo Might Be Back Together.” My stomach drops. Underneath the headline, there’s a picture of us at the café. Nathan’s standing on the chair, speaking to the crowd. I’m watching him, entranced and grinning. My eyes catch on my expression in the photo, and I can’t drag them through the rest of the story.
Nathan moves closer, reading from my screen. “Vanity Fair didn’t even review Refraction,” he says grumpily. “Then they post this shit?” He shakes his head. “Whatever. It doesn’t matter. It’s not like they confirm the book. Just speculation.” Leaning back before I finish scrolling to the end, he pushes his hair from his forehead brusquely.
“Right. Yeah,” I say. “It’s nothing, really.” I scroll up, pausing once more on the photograph. The smile on my lips. The way Nathan is mid-motion, like he’s about to turn to me.
“Are we having an affair yet?”
Nathan’s question yanks my head up. “What?”