Page 23 of Exit Lane
“Sloane, I can’t—” I sigh, frustration overtaking me. I pull my mints from my bag. “Violet, head to your gate, OK? You don’t have to hear this, and you’re boarding soon anyway.”
I’m shocked to see Violet widen her stance, feet planted on the printed carpet. “You broke his heart, Mar.” Her indignant tone matches Sloane’s. “He’s sick. I don’t understand how you could do that.”
My eyes dart between both pairs of theirs, searching for something to anchor me. “I... I... losing Dad almost killed me. I still carry it with me constantly, and it fills every crevice in my life that I don’t find a way to fill with something else. I would do anything to avoid the hurt ofthat loss, and I have spent every day since trying to get further from it. I can’t... I can’t go through that again. Not for Teddy, not for anyone.”
Sloane starts crying, quietly, her body pitching against Violet’s for support. “He’s notanyone. Teddy is the love of your life, and that is so fucking obvious to everyone around you, and you’ll never get to know what that feels like as long as you’re scared to let anything happen beyond your control. I love you. You’re my best friend. You know that. But I’m so disappointed in you.”
We stand in stunned silence as they wait for me to respond. When I don’t, Sloane kisses me on the cheek, then rests her palm on my jaw and locks eyes with mine like she’s trying to impart wisdom, strength, or both, before walking Violet to her gate.
Home, alone, without the warmth of playing slumber party with Sloane and Violet or the bliss of playing house with Teddy, my apartment feels pointless. What’s the meaning of all these artisanal dishes sitting empty in the cabinets? These beautiful throws I just want to hide under?
I distract myself with tidying, listening to “Nothing Compares 2 U” on repeat until the Bridget Jones vibes become too unbearable.
Changing my sheets, I notice one of Teddy’s threadbare Iowa T-shirts smashed between the mattress and the headboard. The realization starts as a question, seeking anychink in the armor of my self-protection.What if Sloane was right?What if the person who makes me forget that time exists, the person who has cataloged every single one of my emotions by how they present on my face, the person who shatters me with a single glance, is my way out of this hurt? And what if the thing keeping me in this despair is me?
Maybe protecting myself from more heartbreak and any future grief is as pointless as pretending bad things don’t happen. Folding the T-shirt, holding it against my chest, I let the revelation wash over me. I’ve made a horrible mistake that I’ll never come back from, not as long as I care about Teddy enough to hope he can find the selfless partner he deserves. I picture him in a hospital bed, and I don’t see my dad or think of myself. I imagine being with him for this impossible, terrifying next thing. The idea of him facing those endless appointments and complicated decisions and me being here sends me into a fresh bout of tears. That I ruined any chance of that.
I wash three sets of espresso cups, three forks, and three plates in the sink, aware of my loneliness, and commit to at least making amends with everyone I’ve been pushing away. I write Sloane an apology email without proofreading it. I leave Violet a voicemail telling her I’m going to start back up with therapy and saying sorry for not sharing what I’ve been going through. For not being the sister she actually deserves by being one who opens up to her the way she does to me.
I call my mom. It’s been weeks since we last talked, and I’m nervous as the line rings. “Hello, Marin?” Just the soundof her voice undoes me. “Mom,” I whimper, curling into a corner. “I messed up.”
I haven’t come to her with a problem since middle school. I always told myself it was because I didn’t want to give her anything else to deal with while I watched her buckle under the weight of her own grief, but I wonder if it might be because I didn’t want to need her. Didn’t want to rely on a parent when I knew how abruptly they could be ripped away.
She listens as I sob into the phone, and she repeats that it’s going to be OK over and over again. After a few minutes, I steady myself enough to ask if she knew my dad was the one, a conversation I’ve always meant to have with her. “From the minute I saw him, doing donuts in his car in the snowy parking lot.” Her voice takes on a softer tone, the nostalgia making the conversation between us more tender than usual. “And it terrified me at first, loving someone so much.” I wait, catching my breath from the crying. “I waited for it to dissolve. But that fear, that never really went away. I just carried it with the love, and I still do, with you and Violet.”
She sends me to bed with the promise to call the next day—“just a quick hi, so I know you’re still with us”—and I hang up feeling if not better, exactly, then not entirely hopeless.
The next morning, I put off catching up on work and start drafting Teddy a letter. I’m rewriting it for the ninth timeover lunch when I see Carter’s name flashing on my phone. I feel stuck on an inhale.
“Is he OK?” I answer. My relationship with Carter has always been mediated through Sloane, our shared connection with Teddy rarely acknowledged.
Carter clears his throat. I start pacing. We’ve never spoken on the phone before, and the unfamiliarity of it puts me even more on edge. “He will be. Marin, it’s a lot, everything with Teddy, and I wanted to ask you for something, and I know it’s awkward and probably doesn’t seem like my place, but it is my place because he’s my best friend, and—” Carter pauses, stumbling over his words, and I am desperate for him to just spit it out. My mind is spinning with the possibilities of what he’s going to ask. Does Teddy need money? An organ?
“If you were thinking about it at all, and I don’t know if you were, but either way... please don’t reach out to him. Please let him heal on his own. You almost broke him in Copenhagen, and he needs every ounce of strength he can muster right now.”
All the regret and sadness I’ve been carrying throughout my body consolidates in a tight ball at the pit of my stomach.
“I know that... and I know how selfish I was. And I want to apologize to him.”
“He doesn’t want that right now.”
“He doesn’t want that, or you don’t?”
“He doesn’t.” Carter clears his throat again. “He told me.” A deep shame washes over me. I respond immediately.“Of course, Carter. I’m so sorry.” I start sobbing, the irreparable damage I’ve done setting in, and I don’t try to hide it.
Carter softens. “Mar, Sloane will make sure you hear if anything... big happens with him. We know you love him.”
I gasp for air. “Just please take care of him.”
I hang up without saying goodbye and force myself into the shower. As if I can pretend the tears aren’t pouring out of me if there’s water flowing over me too.
Wrapped in a robe, I turn back to my computer to delete the email I’ve been drafting to Teddy, but even I have to acknowledge that the level of emotion I’ve laid bare in text is something of a personal first. Instead of erasing it, I reach for a little hand-painted notebook I bought when I took Sloane and Violet to Etiket. Cracking it open, I copy down every word, if only so I can have a record of how it feels to love someone like this.
Three Years Later
XVIII
Marin
