Page 82 of 32 Days in May

“I know,” I say softly. “I’ve never brought a guy home to meet anyone before. They can be a lot. It’s not like a white picket fence type of situation. It’s all very messy and loud and someone is always in crisis. I always sort of . . . kept people away, because I was embarrassed. And it can be hard to explain . . .” I gesture around the room. It can be hard to explain something so simple, so traditional, so pretense-less when it always seemed like everyone around me was reaching out for more. When I had always been reaching out for more. How many times had I pushed my mom to replace the brocade couch? How many times had I made fun of the swollen, squeaky doors that wouldn’t shut? How many questions had I evaded from Kai—and all the guys like Kai—over the years?

Saturated with good things.

Marco keeps his eyes trained on the photo of me and my siblings as he speaks. “I had the white picket fence situation for fourteen years. And it was dark. A lot of fucked-up things happen behind white picket fences in big beige houses.”

His sudden confession stuns me; I stay planted with my back against the island, holding my arms around myself.

Marco felt at home in a world of self-harm masquerading as hedonism and glamour. In a crowded room full of people trying to feel something, Marco could finally shut off the part of him that felt too much. The little boy, scared and lonely on the boardwalk.

The man who stepped behind the camera and wanted to disappear.

How idiotic am I? It’d never occurred to me that Marco’s struggles with substances came from something deeper than the vicious speed run through Hollywood he’d endured. I feel stripped down, embarrassed. It’s not just that Marco doesn’t know I have lupus. Do I really even know him enough to say I love you?

Or are we just fucking kidding ourselves?

In the moonlight, he looks older. The boyishness in his eyes is tucked behind a self-affixed blankness, that distance he can so easily create creeping back in. His mouth is settled into a tight, humorless smile, and he looks very, very tired. I want to kiss every part of him, make him feel good and loved. I don’t need to know everything about him in order to know I want to love him.

I round the island and cross the room.

“Hey.” I push his hair back from his face, letting my fingers glance along the heavy pull of his brow. I want to massage away his frown. “You’re okay now. I’m here.”

His mouth twitches as he shakes his head, as if he’s clearing his mind like an Etch A Sketch. “Sorry. I don’t know what my problem is.”

“No.” I want him to reach out and pull me to his chest, but he’s already turning away, toward the hallway.

“I’m exhausted,” he says, voice flat. “Show me those sheets you’ve been talking about.”

That distance. It’s been weeks since I’ve felt it. And even though Marco waits for me to lead him down the hall, his hands eventually coming down to rest on my hips, there is a heavy, leaden weight dragging through my chest as I realize I’m not the only one who can run away.

Tuesday, May 23

“I’m sorry, okay? Please, Nadia, please pick up. I really need to talk.”

I listen to Liv’s voicemail over and over while I sit awake on the cold bathroom tile. I try typing a message out to her three, four times but I don’t know how to explain any of this. It’s all too much, too long.

Where do I start? How do I even begin to explain what’s happened since we last spoke? That my silence was only one part righteous anger—another part humiliation?

I press my eyes shut and fat tears roll down my cheeks. I miss my sister so much it hurts. It’s like I haven’t slept in years and the entirety of what I’ve done is physically weighing on my brain, pressing it down into my spine so powerfully I feel like my eyes might explode out of my head.

I’m curled around the toilet bowl in the hall bathroom, sweat pouring down my back. Marco’s here with me, in my parents’ Shore house. He says he likes it. Would he tell me if he didn’t? He only has to pretend for eight more days.

I suppress a small whimper, holding back a bigger, heavier, pain-filled sob. What’s that old adage—a hit dog will holler? A sick woman sobs.

The last few days have been consumed with trying. Trying to keep my pain at bay. Trying to keep Marco from noticing something’s wrong. Trying to act like this version of myself I’ve been isn’t a flickering mirage, bound to disappear if he gets any closer.

I force up what’s left in my stomach, praying this will relieve some of the leaden dread pulling me toward the center of Earth, collapsing me in on myself. It doesn’t.

I rinse out my mouth and then crawl into bed, skating through the freezing sheets until I find Marco’s warm body. He’s almost always boiling hot. That’s something I’ll remember about him—about us. I’ll see his face on the cover of Variety, and I’ll remember, decades before, the way his tanned, soft summer skin felt when it met mine.

“What’s wrong?” he whispers, turning toward me, his mouth finding my forehead. I breathe in his scent. Do you really love me? I want to know, even if it hurts my feelings. I want to know everything he’s ever thought; if we had met in a different way, I’d spend a lifetime teasing each thought out, turning over his opinions like precious artifacts. “Hey, tell me what’s wrong.”

It’s happening again. Not like last time. But almost. “I’m sick,” I whisper.

A hand replaces his lips on my forehead. “You’re okay.”

I laugh a little through my tears and he pulls me close, wrapping heavy arms around me. He presses his lips into the salty rivulets on my cheek. “You’ll feel better soon.”

“What’s this?”