Page 102 of Until the Storm Breaks
My biological father ambushed me at breakfast and the woman I love has my words tattooed on her body.
Calvin:Yeah. Just needed to get back. You know how it is.
Theo:Sure. Hey, Maren seemed upset when I saw her earlier to drop off Laila. Everything okay there?
My chest tightens. So she’s not pretending to be fine. She’s upset. Visibly upset. Upset enough that my brother noticed.
Calvin:It’s complicated.
Theo:It doesn’t have to be. Hope you two can figure things out. I’m here if you need to talk.
I don’t respond to that. Can’t respond to that. Theo means well but he doesn’t know the full story. Finding out someone’s been hiding something that fundamental changes things.
Dark River is smaller than Seattle. Quieter. Less impressive on paper. But somehow, I felt bigger there. Like I was expanding into spaces I didn’t know existed. Here, surrounded by everything I thought I wanted, I feel like I’m shrinking. Like I’m disappearing into my own life.
That evening, the walk to campus is meditative in the rain. Or it would be if I could stop thinking. The UW liberal arts building looms Gothic and imposing. The back entrance is propped open for cleaning staff, and I slip through like I’m nineteen again, sneaking into after-hours study sessions.
The hallways smell like industrial cleaner and academic anxiety. That specific combination of floor wax and desperation that every university in America probably shares. I pass my old classroom, peer through the narrow window at the empty seats where I’ve spent the last decade trying to teach something I’m not sure I understand anymore.
How do you teach people to write about truth when you’re lying to yourself?
There’s a framed faculty photo on the wall outside the department office. The whole creative writing department grinning at some long-ago holiday party. I find myself immediately: shorter hair, stiffer smile, trying so hard to look like I belonged. Like I’d made it. Like getting a tenure-track position at thirty was the answer to everything.
You look miserable, I think, studying my own face.You look like someone performing happiness.
The grad assistant working the late shift in the department office looks up from her laptop when I enter. She’s maybe twenty-three, wearing a Sleater-Kinney t-shirt and the exhausted expression of someone grading freshman composition essays.
“Professor Midnight,” she says, surprised. “Didn’t expect anyone this late.”
“Jasmine, right?” I remember her from orientation.
“Yes! I’m impressed you remember.”
I hand her the envelope. “Can you time-stamp this?”
“Sure.” She pulls out the date stamp, marks it officially. “Want a receipt?”
“Yeah. Just in case.”
She prints out a small confirmation slip, hands it over.
“Thanks,” I say, pocketing the receipt.
“No problem. Have a good night, Professor.”
Back in the apartment, the silence is still oppressive. I sit at my desk as night falls over the city. The rain has stopped, leaving everything shiny and clean-looking, like the whole city has been pressure-washed.
I pour a vodka on ice, then pour it down the sink. Getting drunk alone in this apartment isn’t going to fix anything. Neither is staying sober, but at least I’ll hate myself less in the morning.
I should text her. Should call. Should drive back to Dark River right now and tell her that I understand, I believe her. That I want to try again. But I don’t. Because soon I have to stand in front of people and pretend I know something about surviving loss, about finding meaning, about all the things I write about but can’t actually do.
I scroll through my photos instead. There’s one from last week, Maren and Laila on the beach. Maren’s laughing at something, hair wild in the wind, Laila mid-leap for a stick. I took it without them noticing, wanting to capture that moment of pure joy. Now it feels like evidence of a life I’ve already lost.
Back at the desk, the cursor still blinks at me from the blank document. I need something to read, something to say. But all I can think about is Maren, probably closing up the bar right now, wiping down tables, counting the till. Going home to that cabin alone. Wondering if I ever meant any of the words I said.
I close the laptop without writing a word. The conferencestarts the day after tomorrow. After that, I’ll decide whether to go back to Dark River or not.
CHAPTER 27
