Page 91 of Cut Off
“That’s really generous, Jonah. Thank you.”
“You don’t have to thank me.”
“I’m thanking you, anyway.” I blink, the blood in my veins turning frosty.
I don’t look him in the eye, just plant my hands flat on the counter when I say, “So, I’m gonna head to my parents’ tonight. Maddie can take the Nanny Baton starting tomorrow, so you’re covered.”
“Zoe, you don’t have—”
“Don’t worry—I’ll take Eli to ice cream tomorrow,” I cut him off, no longer interested in what he has to say. “I’ll make sure he understands that I’ll still be here for him. He can FaceTime me or text anytime he wants, dayor night.”
I turn before he can read whatever’s assembling itself on my face. I make it out of the kitchen and past the lamp in the living room. I make it to the foot of the stairs before my legs remember they’re not made of steel. I put my hand on the banister and take a breath.
Then I continue to my room, close the door behind me, and get to work like I’m in a race against the clock.
One suitcase, one duffel bag, plus my laptop, charger, phone, and a package of Twinkies. Clothes and shoes in the suitcase, toiletries in the duffel, which I zip it with one smooth motion, and survey the room.
It isn’t mine, never has been.
I check the bathroom again for any missed items, and I catch my reflection. My eyes are the wrong kind of shiny, so I do the thing where you shake your hands out and exhale and focus on what’s next.
When I come back out, the kitchen’s empty, and there’s comfort in that. Maybe he thought it would help, or maybe he just needed air. Either way, I’ll take it.
I shoulder my duffel, pull my suitcase, and walk down the hallway. The Twinkies are wedged under my arm.
The afternoon is cool as I walk through the shadow of the porch, past hockey sticks and plastic dinosaurs in the yard.
I pop the back of the Jeep, which coughs open. I load the suitcase, duffel, then the laptop, and keep the Twinkies.
Then I’m driving. Hands on the wheel, telling myself this is what moving on looks like.
I make it all the way to my parents’ house and park on the curb.
I’m not crying, but it’s stacking up in the back of my throat. For now, I’m just absorbing it, the way you absorb a hit you weren’t braced for, the way your body takes a second to register that something’s broken before the pain shows up.
Do lunch.
He’s giving me a bonus.
I let that sit for a while.
I said it first: that’s the thing I keep coming back to. I’m the one who said it, in the parking lot of Room Bloom. No feelings. No complications. He wasn’t allowed to fall for me.
I made the rules. Me.
And then, somewhere—I don’t even know where, exactly, somewhere between the night spent on Eli’s closet floor. The Death Star on the living room rug. Mac and cheese nights, three stools at the island. Pantry. Paprika. Jonah’s palm at the small of my back, showing me off to his teammates. The ballroom. The night in the dark.
I’m the one who broke my own rule. I’m the one who fell in love with him since the night in the dark, and I let myself believe—because he kissed me like that, because he looked at me like that, because he came to my room with no socks on—that he had broke the rules too.
He hadn’t.
He’s going to be fine. That is the thing. He’s going to be fine, Eli’s going to be fine, and I’m going to be the woman who used to live here, who they FaceTime on holidays, who sends Lego sets in the mail.
Eli.
Oh, Eli.
That’s the one that does it. Not Jonah. Eli, with his Flash action figure and his too-old eyes and the way he hooked his toes around my fingers without looking up from the book. Eli, who lost his mother almost three months ago, and who’s just decided, against considerable evidence, that some people stay. I’m going to have to look him in the face and tell him I’m leaving. I’m going to have to be the next person whowalks out of his life with a suitcase, and I’m going to have to do it with a smile on because that is what adults do.
