Only the furniture remained.
She even missed Gertrude, for crying out loud.
Chris’s apartment could only be accessed by stairs from the back hallway of the store—how was Graham maneuvering those with his crutches? His cast was supposed to come off Monday, something she’d initially planned to be present for.
She wished she could see his face when it happened.
A light knock sounded at the doorway and Reagan peeked her head in. “How we doing?”
Claire gave a thumbs-down.
The bed dipped as Reagan sat, turning to face Claire and crossing her legs. “Ready to tell me what happened yet?”
Her roommate had been patient. Claire had worked several days since Reagan witnessed the awkward conclusion of Claire and Graham’s relationship, and on the days she hadn’t, she’d pretty much stayed in her room. Claire would have been pulling her hair out by now if their roles were reversed and Reagan hadn’t relayed the full story.
With a heavy sigh, Claire pushed herself up to a half slouch, half sitting position with her upper back against the headboard. She rubbed the heels of her hands over her eyes. She probably looked like a total mess.
“While you were gone, Graham and I sort of… Well, we kind of…”
“Hooked up?” Reagan finished, sounding unsurprised.
“Yeah. Well, it started as that, anyway. After his accident I started sleeping in his bed since he couldn’t talk and I was worried he might need something in the middle of the night. Then he got better, and I stayed.”
Reagan nodded as if that made complete sense.
“We talked a lot, too. Through texts when he couldn’t speak, and then his voice came back about a week later. We spent more one-on-one time together than we ever have. He told me about his life and let me into his head in a way that was totally different than ever before. That, plus the addition of sex… It was inevitable we’d fall for each other. I mean seriously, I was so naive to think we could keep our feelings out of it.” She paused. “Actually, that’s not true. I was naive to think I could keep my feelings out of it. But the thought Graham might fall in love with me was never on my radar. This is all his fault, really.”
“It usually is,” Reagan agreed. “But, um, I need to make sure I’m understanding you correctly—are you saying you and Graham fell in love?”
She closed her eyes and nodded. “Unfortunately.”
“Wow. I…didn’t see that coming.”
“I know!” Claire slapped the comforter. “Me, either. And now everything is awful, and it’s my fault because I broke the heart of the one man who’d sworn never to give it away in the first place. He’s sure as hell never gonna do it again. I basically just guaranteed he’ll grow old damaged and alone.”
Reagan raised her hand as if she had a question. “Okay, I’m lost. When we sat on the porch and you guys talked about the pact—which went from marriage to sex—you said the reason you wouldn’t consider marrying him was because of his fear of commitment and intimacy. It sounds like he overcame that somehow with you, right?”
Claire’s heart splintered at hearing the words from someone else’s mouth. “He did.”
“So why can’t you be together?”
“There’s more to it than that.”
Before now, she’d told Reagan nothing about her dad’s death, only that he’d died when she was eleven. So she started from the beginning and told her roommate everything about his job as an aerobatics pilot and how it affected both Claire and her mom. About witnessing his death, and the grief that hovered over their household for so long after. The recurring nightmares, and how old feelings of worry and fear resurfaced when Graham moved in and became even more visceral when she’d thought he was injured on the job.
Reagan patiently listened to everything Claire said, her expression oscillating between horrified and sympathetic. “Wow. I—I had no idea. That’s so awful. I can’t imagine what it could have been like to go through that.”
Claire dipped her head. “I feel so selfish, but I can’t put myself in that position. My mom was never able to turn it off, and her anxiety was through the roof anytime he flew. If I stayed with Graham, I’d be on top of the world when he was home and we were together. But I’d fall to the lowest low when he went to work or left for one of his daring climbing trips, like the ice-climbing expedition he did last year. For once in my life I want stability, you know?”