Page 63 of Keeping It Professional

“After the way he dumped me? Even if I wanted to, what would I say?”

“Maybe just ask him how he’s been doing. You can feel him out from there, if he’s ready to talk.”

I tried to picture how that would go, me calling Miles. Would he explain himself, or would he shut me down? He might give me some peace. Then again, he might not. He might hurt me all over again, or screen my call. I couldn’t decide which would be worse: a quick, stilted call where he said not much at all, or my call bouncing to voicemail after one ring. Or he might’ve blocked me, as I’d done him.

“If you’d rather be through with him, that’s all right too.” Mom reached over to pat my arm. “But if you still care for him, or you want closure, you can’t let your wounded pride get in the way.”

I didn’t feel like I had much ego left, but I guessed I had enough that Miles could still bruise it. And Ididstill care for him. That was the worst part. I still thought of him sometimes in bed, how he’d kept one hand on me even in sleep. I thought of him in the mornings when I cooked breakfast, flipping my eggs the way he’d showed me.

I pulled my feet from the foot bath and dried them off. “Maybe,” I said. “But he dumped me. If he wants to talk to me, the ball’s in his court.”

Later that night, I ordered Chinese. I ate it stretched out on the living room couch, where I’d once sat with Miles with my feet in his lap. Our show was on, our favorite hate-watch, this medical drama set in New York. We’d bet on clichés, like if someone got pregnant, someone else had to die while they gave birth.

It’ll be Phyllis. She sucks anyway.

Uh-uh. It’s Sam. Because he slept with Elle. It’ll be this whole guilt arc…

Miles had said once, we should make it a drinking game, one shot for each misuse of surgical equipment. Two for each bungled medical term.

We’d die,I said.

Ten minutes in.

Now, the camera zoomed in on one of the doctors, blank-faced as she gave a patient bad news. She stumbled over “hemochromatosis.” I laughed, and reflexively reached for my phone. Was Miles out there watching? Had he seen that?

I unblocked him and typedDr. Perrault just said hematomachrosis, lol.Was this what Mom had meant by feeling him out? I could hit send, and maybe we’d chat. Maybe we’d laugh, and it’d be like before. Or maybe my text would pop up green and not blue, and I’d know he’d blocked me, and we were done.

I hovered my thumb over the send button.

It’s only a text.

My stomach went sour, and I backspaced it out. I reblocked Miles and tossed my phone down the couch, and kicked my quilt over it to remove the temptation.

One rejection was plenty. More than enough.

If Miles had something to say, he could man up and say it. It wasn’t my job to drag it out.

CHAPTER 23

MILES

Amonth into my new job, I’d settled in. I’d found a rhythm with Magda that wasn’t so bad, underpinned mostly with a system of grunts. We got through entire shifts without two words exchanged, other than what we needed to do our jobs. I didn’t want to admit it, but we were the same, both with our walls up, both slow to trust.

I’d come off a shift with her, stop by the gym, then grab a pizza on my way home. It’d been a while since I’d wanted to cook. Since I’d wanted to do much, really, beyond the basics. I’d go home, watch TV, fall asleep on the couch. Wake up to my phone alarm and do it all again.

I came off a rainy shift too late for the gym. Tonight, I decided, I’d cook. I’d clean up. But by the time I got home, I was dead on my feet, the whole week’s exhaustion catching up at once. I dug through my freezer and found some egg rolls, a year past their expiry date, but they’d be fine. I was shaking them out when someone knocked on my door.

I clenched my jaw.Go away.

The knock came again.

I stood perfectly still, listening. Waiting. If I ignored them long enough, the knocker would leave.

“I know you’re in there. I can see your shadow.”

Brian.Damn it. I hadn’t talked to him since our skipped bowling date. He’d given up on me, like I knew he would. Now, he’d dropped by, no doubt, to leave my spare ball.

“C’mon, man, it’s raining. Open the door!”

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