Good Things Fall Apart

Trine

Victor stops dead when he turns a corner and sees that she's already there, bundled up in a purple hoodie, perched on the curb. At least he'd been right. The art gallery is closed until later on Saturdays, but through the windows he can see sculptures, different from the grisly ones they'd suffered through on their first date. The sun bleeds in through the windows and casts bizarre shadows.

Mia looks up when she sees him coming. Victor's lips quirk into an anxious smile. She doesn't smile back, just stands and pulls her sleeves over her hands.

"Hey," he says and stops a few feet from her.

"Hi, Victor," she says. The bags under her eyes make his stomach hurt.

Victor wagers one more step forward. "Should...should we sit?"

Mia shrugs. " I guess." She returns to her place on the curb and crosses her legs. Victor lowers himself down next to her.

"I don't really know where to start," Victor says, his voice breathy. The words vibrate in the air. He's gone over it a thousand times in his head, but never has he figured out what to say first, how to lead into everything. "I mean, I'm sorry. That's where I should start, obviously."

Mia gives a sort of cynical laugh. Her eyes are locked on the pavement; she drags a small rock across the concrete beside her, scraping a sketch into the surface.

"I was going to tell you."

"But you didn't. And you tried to lie your way out of it. Andrew really didn't say anything, you know."

Victor sighs and covers his face with his hands. "I know. I know. I really messed up, Mia. I know that. And I can't even imagine how you feel right now."

"I feel like shit, Victor. I—" but she stops, shakes her head, waves her hands once in front of her to indicate that she can't even go there.

"It's just..." he starts. He licks his lips and forces oxygen into his lungs. "There was already so much going on, and I really wanted to at least give you a night to get away from everything. I was going to tell you today, Mia. Well, I was going to tell you before the dance, when we made that sushi, but then—"

"But then my dad dropped two huge bombs on me," Mia says, her voice like gravel.

Victor nods. He scoots closer. "I never wanted to hurt you, but it just kept going wrong. It never seemed like a good time."

"There isn't a good time for that, Victor. For the truth? And to find out the way I did..." Her eyes are vacant.

Victor doesn't know what to say.

"It was all a lie."

"Mia, no," he says. He reaches out and touches her shoulder; she flinches away. "I care about you. I really do. I meant it when I said you're my favorite person. I've just been going through a lot, and I know that's not a good excuse, but you need to know that when this started, I really thought it was going to work out with us." Even as he says it, he wonders how true it is. The moment he saw Benji he felt this pull, this uncanny desire. Had Mia been a distraction from that, just a way to fill the black hole that resulted from Benji's gravity?

"Was that the first time it happened?" she asks. She finally turns to Victor, expression fierce and tears dazzling in her eyes. "Have you kissed him before? Or anybody else?"

"I've never kissed anybody else," Victor says quickly, then realizes he's sort of answered both questions.

Mia's anger subsides some; realization moves in to join it. "That trip," she says, looking back to the pavement. "When you bailed on me to get that stupid coffee machine fixed."