She had jerked away, glaring at him. “You’re not ever going to call me again, are you?” she asked, nose red, eyes watering. She no longer sounded angry… just tired. Very, very tired. That, somehow, was worse.
Numbly, Sebastian had shaken his head. “I thought you were just interested in, you know. Hooking up.”
She’d glared at him. “Nobody just wants hookups forever,” she’d said. Before he could ask why she’d indicated on her profile that hookups were exactly what she did want, she’d spun around again. Sebastian had clenched his hands into fists, digging his nails into his palms, thinking that this was never going to end, not ever. He was in hell, with a girl he’d slept with who never left, who started to leave, who acted like she had every intention of going, but just stood in the doorway almost leaving, before turning around and hurling accusations at him, each one worse than the previous, forever and ever, world without end.
But, finally, Alyssa had gone. She hadn’t even slammed the door. She had let it close, gently, behind her. And now, she’d discovered that he’d also spent time with some of her friends, and she’d reappeared in his life, in a TikTok video that declared him a man slut. Finally, his lifetime of luck had run out.
“It’ll pass,” said Lincoln. “I promise.” Sebastian knew he was right. Still, it was so colossally unfair. And that it had to happen now, when he’d finally found the one woman he did want to see again, the one woman he’d actually hoped would make a reappearance in his life, and he’d been forced to declare her off-limits, to preemptively friend-zone her. Karma, he thought miserably, and wondered if, in some previous life, he’d been a person who’d kicked dogs, or handed out raisins at Halloween.
Of course, maybe the off-limits thing wouldn’t be forever. Be her friend, Lincoln had said. It would have been easier if he’d just told Sebastian to avoid Abby completely, he realized, because spending time with her while knowing it could only be platonic would be torture. It might not be what she wanted, either. True, there was Doctor Mark, but he was pretty sure he’d sensed some hesitation when Abby had talked about him. A certain lack of enthusiasm, an absence of all-in-ness. Plus, Mark was a podiatrist. Did she really want to spend the rest of her life tethered to someone whose profession was feet?
Maybe she didn’t really want to be with Mark. And maybe she didn’t know about his disgrace. What were the chances that she was on TikTok? Lots of people weren’t.
Sebastian started pedaling again. He pressed his lips together, grinding his teeth as he rode, faster and faster, until his wheels were barely skimming the path, until it felt like he was flying; like he could ride away from Lincoln, away from the other riders, away from his problems, away from—
“Hey!”
A car’s horn blared. Sebastian jerked his head up to see that the trail had come to an intersection with the road; an intersection marked by STOP signs and a sign that read CYCLISTS WALK YOUR BIKE. A pickup truck with a State of New York logo on its side was on the road, directly in his path.
He squeezed his front and rear brakes as hard as he could, feeling the bike’s frame shudder. For one awful moment he was convinced he was going to go flying right over the handlebars and into the side of the truck. The bike’s rear wheel slued sideways, skidding, spinning 180 degrees before finally coming to a stop mere millimeters from the side of the truck. Sebastian tried to put his feet down, forgetting that his shoes were still clipped into his pedals. He bounced off the truck and fell onto the pavement, landing on his right side, with his bike on top of him. He lay there, like a bug, trapped under his bike, as the truck driver rolled down his window to deliver a lengthy and profane soliloquy, casting aspersions on Sebastian’s eyesight （“Are you fuckin’ blind?”）， the legitimacy of his parentage （“Stupid goddamn bastard!”）， and the obliviousness and arrogance of cyclists in general （“You assholes dressed up like Lance Armstrong think you own the road, like it’s everyone else’s job to get out of your way!”）。
Sebastian waved at the guy in what he hoped was an apologetic fashion and tried to work at least one of his feet free from his shoe, which was still clipped into the pedal. And then Abby was there, her eyebrows drawn down, lips pressed together, freckles prominent on her pale face as she got off her own bike and hurried toward him.
“Are you all right? What happened?”
Sebastian gestured at himself, and the bike that was still on top of him, and said the obvious. “I fell.”