Page 81 of I'll Look for You, Everywhere
‘What the fuck happened?’
Magdalen’s gasp makes me jump, and I look at her, confused. ‘What?’
Eyes wide with horror, she lets the blanket drop in a pool around her. ‘It looks like someone drowned you in blood.’ She starts towards me, but I stop her with a shake of my head, remembering that I must look like the lead in a slasher.
‘No, no, I’m fine.’
‘Here we go again,’ she huffs, hands on her hips in annoyance. ‘Fine, you said?’ It’s so cute, so utterly Magdalen, that I bite my lip not to smile.
‘If I recall, you were the one who was fine last time.’
‘And you were the one who walked away with some other girl.’ Her voice comes out raw and my skin prickles with guilt at trying to lighten this. Eyes piercing into mine, her pain is on full display. Seeing her so hurt is fucking devastating. I step closer, needing to explain everything, but I have no idea where to start.
The silence of the house magnifies the shakiness of my breath. ‘I’m useless at this. At liking you. I’m terrified of how much I need you.’
Magdalen’s eyebrows crease in confusion. ‘You literally dismissed me. You didn’t want me anywhere near you.’
‘I slept with Chiara.’ The words tumble out. ‘The day I ran into you shopping, I called her right after and had sex with her that evening.’
I watch as Magdalen tries to process my words but she still looks confused. ‘Yeah, obviously you slept with her.’
‘You knew?’
‘Isn’t that why you didn’t want me around? So you could pick up where you left off?’
I blanche, stunned at her conclusion. ‘You think I wanted to have sex with her right after you gave me a hand job in the ocean?’
Magdalen’s eyes widen and she quickly glances at the front door as if someone will mystically appear inside the house. ‘Theo! Don’t say that word in this communal area.’ She waves her hands frantically around the living room.
‘You said it at the beach! That’s the definition of a communal space.’
‘Ah, semantics.’ She looks at me closely, eyes observing the blood crusted around my nose and chin.
‘What happened, really?’ she asks again, but the idea that she thought I was on a date with Chiara this whole time is so painful that I struggle to answer.
‘I didn’t want you to find out that we’d fucked, from Chiara. Saying you were tired was the quickest way I could get you out of there before she said anything.’
‘You made me feel really ugly.’ Magdalen looks down at herself and a stab of shame courses through me. ‘Like I was this leech, sucking up your fun while you flirted with another girl.’
‘Stop,’ I croak. ‘Stop, Maggie.’
‘Then stop hurting me.’
A wave of déjà vu hits me, at how my father would box up my mother’s pain so he could ignore it, walk over it, shove it far inside a closet and forget it was there at all.
My hands ball into tight fists at my sides to stop myself from reaching out and holding her. Where do I begin? I settle for words, for the truth, and hope she understands.
‘I see you in everything,’ I whisper. ‘I look for you around every corner, hoping for just a glimpse so that I can endure the rest of my day.’ My voice catches on the last word and I sigh, looking at the ground for a moment before meeting her eyes again. ‘I keep trying to stay away, Magdalen. Because you’re Anika’s best friend and because you’re Dante’s little sister and your father means the world to me. And my papa...’ I swallow, keeping my breathing even and slow. ‘Sometimes I think I’m more like him than I want to be.’
The truth, even the sliver of it I’m admitting, seems to drain any energy I have left. It would be the right moment to confess everything, right here, say it all now and pray for forgiveness later. But as much as I try, the words won’t fucking come out. I bend down in front of her, so close that my nose can graze her knee if I just lean forward an inch, the heat of her skin warming me as I reach around her, gathering the fallen blanket.
‘You’re nothing like him.’ Her voice breaks as she looks down at me. ‘But you need to stop running away from me.’
I stand up, bringing the blanket with me so that it runs behind her calves, her thighs, and eventually, as I stand up, I lay it onto her shoulders, cloaking her tightly in the knitted wool.
‘I’ve been running to try to save you,’ I say and smile tightly.
‘I didn’t think it would be this difficult to get you to sleep with me.’
