Page 148 of Goodbye Note

“For always taking care of me.”

“I’ll always take care of you.” I exhaled, telling myself to be happy with what we had. Any part of Arik was better than no part of him, and maybe if I kept that in focus, I could do this.

“I’ll always take care of you too.”

We dozed for a while, but only a couple of hours before my body decided it was hungry. We ordered pizza. Thank fuck for New York having places open twenty-four hours.

“I still can’t believe you’re here.”

“We’ve got to make this work somehow.” I took another bite of my pizza, struck with the weight of what we were trying to do. How did other people make it work? We weren’t the first couple to be going in two different directions all the time. “Maybe we have to set up set times to call. Stick to something?”

“With our schedules always changing, how can we even do that?” Arik put his leg over mine.

“A lot of work. But we are worth it.”

FORTY-THREE

ARIK

I was flying high the days after Varian left. We forced calls. I checked my phone every free second I had. I woke up to updates.

Varian: We are heading up to Neuschwanstein on our day off.

Varian: I want to buy this castle and live the rest of my life here.

Varian: This is the most beautiful place I’ve ever been. You need to come back with me one day.

A series of pictures joined the texts, and he looked good, too. Better than he had when he’d showed up here. It gave me hope. I wore a smile before I even got out of bed.

I hit video call to see if he’d answer.

Varian picked up, putting an earbud in. “I’m on a tour. I have to be quiet.”

“Do you want me to let you go?”

“No, it’s private, but I don’t want John to flip.” He gave me a look, and I laughed. “Let me show you the view.” He stepped into the wind and flipped his camera around to reveal the most breathtaking view of a valley from what looked like a balcony on top of a mountain.

“Are you in the Alps?” I think that was the mountain range there.

“The castle is up the mountain. The walk is a bitch.”

“You should have been a lazy fuck like me and taken the horse-drawn carriage,” Fox called, waving from behind Varian’s shoulder.

“I wasn’t going to snuggle up with you and my brother and John.” Varian’s lips pulled as he fought off laughter.

“So you can be gay with him, but not with us. That hurts.” Fox winked and stepped out of the camera view.

“See what I have to put up with?”

“Can’t be that bad if you are touring castles. I’m in Florida, and it’s been raining since you left.” I wished I could reach through the phone and cup his face.

“Still, I bet it’s warmer there than it is here.”

“Much. It is the South. How is everything else going?”

He lifted his shoulders and tilted his head side to side. “I can’t complain, other than I’m not there. How is it there? The meds stabilizing?”

“They are good. I feel good. Other than missing you.”

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