Page 121 of Fated

Thud.

I jerk upright. Blink.

Shake my head.

Thud!

Robert smacks his fist to the kitchen table. “Say something! For crying out loud, saysomething!”

I’m disoriented and dizzy, and it takes a moment for the ringing in my ears to settle and for me to land back on the island.

I’m sitting at the little round table in the small kitchen of the cottage. The kitchen light is bright, sending a harsh glow over the room. Outside the sky is a faded bruise, blue-and-black. In the kitchen a crackling electricity rides the air as if lightning is about to strike—or it already has.

The air is humid, the heat thick, and the prickly current rides over my skin.

Aaron stands across from me, his jaw hard, dark eyes fathomless. I search his face, and when I do, my stomach drops and my chest clenches. He’s in pain and he’s hiding it. He looks just like he did when we were on the beach and he said to me in a broken whisper, “I thought I’d lost her.”

There’s a well of emotion buried deep and contained only by his will.

He’s in shorts, a navy T-shirt. His thick black hair is messy, and on the kitchen counter is a stack of books. It looks like he was in the middle of unloading a cardboard box full of them. And when I see the titles, I understand they’re the books I asked him to find for Amy.

He did it. He did it as a surprise.

And on the counter there’s something else.

A travel book.

For Switzerland. And on top of it there’s a small gray velvet box with gold lettering. I know exactly what’s in it. I picked out those boxes almost a decade ago when Daniel and I rebranded our packaging.

Aaron’s bought me an Abry.

The mail plane must’ve come while I was awake. And in the delivery, Aaron carried his heart.

The kitchen is quiet except for Robert’s harsh breathing and the ticking of the clock hanging on the kitchen wall.

Robert stands next to me. He’s as perfectly put together as the day I first saw him. Linen pants, a buttoned shirt, short copper hair, and perfectly symmetrical features. Before, he hid his intelligence with a purposeful look of naivety, but now the naivety is gone.

“Aaron. We just told you we’re leaving the day after Christmas. That Becca is moving in with me until then. That she’s leaving you.” He thrusts a hand at the pile of suitcases I missed, stacked in the living room. “You have nothing to say? Call me an asshole. Hit me. Do something so I can leave holding my head high.”

Aaron shakes his head. And I remember what he told me when I asked him what he’d do if someone he trusted betrayed him. He said he’d hold his anger, he’d hold his rage, because he wouldn’t want to live to regret his actions or his words.

“Robbie,” Aaron finally says, and Robert flinches as if he’s been hit. “Robbie, what are you doing?”

Robert flinches again and then looks away, his jaw clenching. “Becca and I are going to New York. I love her. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you. You’re the best friend I ever had, and I know that makes this worse, but I can’t help it. I’ve never been asgoodas you. I’ve never wanted to be. I broke when Scott and Jay died. I broke when I saw you not able to go on. Becca understands, because coming back here broke her too. We’re leaving together. I didn’t want this, but I can’t stop it. I’m too weak to stop it. Like I said, I’m not as strong as you. I’m sorry.”

He lifts his shoulders then steps across a discarded toy truck and a sippy cup on the floor to grasp the handle of a suitcase.

“Becca?” Robert asks. “Ready?”

I’m struck by the moment I’ve landed in, by the discarding of a life. I knew it was goodbye, and this dream, it acquiesced and placed me in the moment where I let go.

I can’t say to Aaron that I’m leaving, going back to my real life in Geneva, but I can do what the dream Becca wants. What this dream has been leading toward since I arrived. I can say goodbye tonight and never come back.

It’s the end. Not in the way I wanted, with a soft closing of the watch’s case, sliding it back into its antique box to collect dust and memories. No—it’s a painful, rip-the-bandage-off, game-over type of ending. But perhaps that’s the only ending this dream can have.

Robert’s waiting in the half-light of the living room, the suitcases in his hands. Aaron’s face is turned away, and when I follow his gaze I see that he’s looking at the travel book with the snow-capped Alps on the cover.

“Can I talk to Aaron alone?” I ask quietly, and when I do, Aaron’s shoulders stiffen and he jerks his gaze back to me.

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