Page 235 of The Lies We Play

“Sounds like he’s still there,” I whisper.

“Yeah.” Creed’s mouth twists. “It does.”

“And you?”

He stills.

Of course he does.

I ask about Hal, and Creed answers. I ask about Creed, and he turns into a locked room with marble floors and a concierge.

“Creed.”

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re beautifully dressed and avoiding the question. Those are different things.”

His eyes cut to mine.

There.

The smallest flare of something.

Longing. Amusement. Pain. All of it wearing on his face.

“I’m functioning,” he says.

“That is not an answer.”

“It’s the only one I have that won’t make this worse.”

I almost tell him that nothing could make this worse.

Then I remember I have said that before, and life took it as a challenge.

So I stay quiet.

Creed rubs his thumb over the tattoo on his wrist. Once. Twice. A motion so intimate I feel it on my own skin.

“We’ll help him,” he says. “Once he’s back with us, we’ll help him.”

With us.

The words enter the room gently, then detonate anyway.

Not with me.

Not with you.

With us.

The old shape. The impossible shape. The one I have spent years telling myself belonged to a woman who no longer exists.

Except I am here.

Creed is here.

Hal is alive.