Page 71 of Implode

I hang out in a street spot, waiting for Claire’s lights to turn on in her place. I need to know she is safely inside her room before I can tear myself away. Time hasn’t made my compulsion die down, and I doubt anything will.

I start to worry when I see zero movement from Claire’s window. She has a routine of turning on lights and opening her curtains once she is home. I am about to hop out of my car and go check for myself when I see an SUV pull up and Collins walks around to the back passenger side to let Angie out. He walks her to the door, and Claire greets her with a weak smile.

I quickly pull out my phone and shoot him a text.

Nic: I’m here making sure Claire got back safe and I see you are bringing Angie?

Collins: Graham isn’t happy. But she insisted on seeing her tonight.

Nic: Couldn’t wait for morning?

Collins: Apparently not. And she refused to let him come. Said she had to handle this on her own.

I curse under my breath, and my mind races to figure out what this meeting is about and why my brother has to stay out of it. Dammit. This isn’t good. All the warning bells are going off in my head. I already lost Claire once—due to my own fault—but I can’t lose her again.

19

CLAIRE

I can feel a tic forming under my right eye as I usher Angie inside, followed by an extra quiet Collins. His calm and rigid personality puts me on edge. Seeing him with Angie, who looks like she is going to throw up, just adds to my already building anxiety. Something tells me whatever she has to say has nothing to do with the wedding and everything to do with our friendship.

“I wasn’t expecting this tonight,” I say, trying to make small talk. We aren’t those types of friends who have to fill the silence with unnecessary words. Yet at this moment, I am twitching with nerves to figure out what is going on with her—with us.

“Couldn’t wait,” she says methodically. Her whole demeanor seems off. Angie didn’t come over to paint nails or to talk about work. No, she came over to discuss something personal, and I fear that everything I have been doing to try to cause her less stress is going to blow up in my face—just like basically everything else in my life.

I unlock my apartment door and start to turn on the lights. I watch as Angie turns back to Collins who is texting on his phone and asks him to stay outside the door or go back to the SUV to wait.

“Want a drink?” I ask, watching her shut the door and walk into my tiny space. It feels even more claustrophobic all of a sudden. “I wasn’t planning for a visitor tonight, so I didn’t stock the fridge or buy any drinks other than water.”

“I’m fine,” she says blankly.

I study her face. She has a wrinkle forming on her forehead that appears to be stress lines. “You obviously aren’t,” I point out. “What’s going on?” My heart races at her silence. She is eerily quiet, and every second she doesn’t speak makes me even more paranoid. “Please, don’t keep making me wait. Something is obviously bothering you and it has to do with me or you wouldn’t be here at night unexpectedly.” My voice trembles in fear that all this time I have shut Angie out, I just put a hole in the foundation of our friendship. Guilt floods through me at the sight of her standing before me looking destroyed.

“I thought we were friends,” Angie says sadly, a quiver vibrating her words. She has always been a warrior of strength, so seeing her this agitated is alarming.

“We are.” Tears well up in my eyes. I did this to her. I had so many opportunities to come to her with the truth that I was secretly pursuing an on-again-off-again relationship with her future brother-in-law and at no point did I trust her with the information. I treated her like a fragile flower that would wilt from the stress that this could cause to the dynamics of her soon-to-be family if we were to break up. And I never considered the alternative of what not telling her would cause. Sure, I told her that we kissed while in Vegas, but Nic and I have always been more than a kiss. I am a selfish friend. She would never do this to me. “We are best friends.”

“Then why all the lies, Claire? Obviously you don’t trust me or respect me enough to tell me the truth. And after all we have been through over the years? I have shared a part of my life with you that I don’t share with just anybody. Why can’t I get the same courtesy?”

I sigh and sit on the edge of my bed, while Angie paces. “I thought I was protecting you.”

She stops and glares at me. “Protecting me? From what? I am tired of being treated like some chronic victim. Yeah, last year was a hell of a year, but quit downplaying how far I have come with my methods of coping with stress. I am not going to relapse. Quite frankly, it is insulting how I am being treated by someone I thought always had my back.”

I lean forward and put my head in my hands. This is one disaster after another. I can’t handle any more disappointment. “I’m sorry.” I mean, what else can I possibly say to make this any better? “I suck at being a good friend.”

“In a few days I am supposed to get married with my best friend by my side, and it is like you don’t want me to be part of your life. You don’t trust me, and I already have anxiety that as soon as I say ‘I do,’ you will say, ‘I don’t.’”

“That’s absurd, Angie.”

“Is it? I mean, you are basically treating me differently and I am not even married yet. You think that tying myself forever with Graham will somehow diminish our friendship, so you are pulling back now to protect yourself from what you assume is going to happen. This isn’t about protecting me. It is about protectingyou.”

I let her words marinate in my head, and when I process what she is saying, I realize how true they are. I do worry about Married Angie being different from Single Angie. We have had so much fun together that her tying the knot is essentially saying that she doesn’t need me anymore. I hate feeling left behind, and maybe subconsciously I didn’t trust her to handle all of my bombshells with grace.

And right now, I need some grace.

“You are the very best friend I could ever ask for. I fucked up. Majorly. And I have been so in over my head for months that I can’t even recognize the person I used to be from the person I am now. I’m sorry. I mean it.”

“What changed?” she asks, taking a seat next to me on the bed.

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