The Heartbreak Hypothesis

14 - the lover and the beloved

I swallowed. Hard. "No."

The word was final. Definitive. And, by the look on his face, James thought it was all he'd get. He accepted that, dropping his eyes to the quilt below us and running a finger along its intricate pattern.

But I found myself speaking again.

"I was willing to do it," I mumbled, still scrolling around on Holly's Facebook with my clumsy left hand, albeit aimlessly now. "Long-distance. I don't really see how distance counts as much of an excuse anymore, what with phones and social media and Facetime. You can be with someone, be right in their pocket, even if you're oceans apart."

Through the glass of his laptop, I could see James peering up at me sheepishly. He was conflicted, it seemed, between his curiosity and his civility. He wanted to know more. Clearly—I'd somehow mustered enough strength to punch a six-foot guy square in the nose, after all. But I could also see that he didn't want to push me further than I was willing to go.

"Then again," I reasoned slowly, my words turning bitter and dry. "It wouldn't be enough for Eli even if I was right in his pocket. It certainly wasn't enough that I was with him six out of seven days a week. He needed more."

"More?"

"I think you can guess."

He bit his bottom lip thoughtfully, as though he were contemplating whether to utter the words that danced on his tongue.

"You said that you were always his," he said hesitantly, "but that he wasn't just yours."

The words, though my own, stabbed me in the chest. God, to hear them out loud like that—being said to me rather than by me—stole the breath right from my lungs, leaving me with only panic.

I turned my head away from his reflection completely, studying the wall on the other side of his bed. The plaster was peeling in the corners, revealing rows of exposed brick underneath. I could tell that they'd been there for years—they were weathered and dull, with cracks and holes decorating their facade like scars on a face. Like punctures to the heart.

"Elijah wasn't faithful," James guessed.

I scoffed. Faithful. The word itself was laughable. It inferred honesty and trust and loyalty. Three things that Eli had taken and ripped to shreds until they were only words that existed without meaning.

"I told you that we started dating in seventh," I said, still tracing the cracks on the exposed brick. "He was sleeping with Lola by eighth."

"Lola?"

Nausea pricked at my insides. It often did when the pretentiously beautiful face of Lola Sinclair crept into my mind. Her high, striking cheekbones and full cover girl lips. Her silver-blonde hair and hooded green eyes that could bring the burliest of men to their knees. I knew that face almost as well as I knew my own.

"I met her in kindergarten. Our mothers took a liking to one another, so we were practically forced into being BFFs. We were always at each other's houses having slumber parties and putting on fashion shows. She was like my sister."

"Christ, Madison—"

I turned further away from the sound of his voice as he sat upright. I didn't want to hear what he had to say. How terrible it was, how painful it must be to have been betrayed by the two people in the world that I trusted with the deepest parts of my heart and soul. I already knew how painful it was. I lived it every day.

"I always thought that I was lucky. To have a best friend and a boyfriend who got along as well as Lola and Eli did." I shook my head, failing to embellish my voice with the kind of indifference that I'd been going for. Instead, it sounded strained. Tired. "They weren't just acquaintances, they were friends. They even planned my eighteenth birthday party together."