Page 91 of Isn't It Obvious?
Thatcuts through. “What?”
He lifts his head, looking directly at her, more pain than hunger in those dark eyes of his. “That wouldn’t have been fair to you. Or me, really,” he says. His thumbs trace circles on her hips.
Yael takes a moment to process, then pushes him away. She expects protestation, but he just looks resigned. Like he knew this train was coming, and all this has been him bracing for impact.
This, she realizes, is why he didn’t tell her last night.
“Nothing has changed for you, has it?” she asks, eyes welling.
He stares at her for a long moment, then, finally, gives a small shake of his head. Yael has to dig her nails into her palms to keep the tears from falling. “Mia and Suresh need me—”
“You don’t need to explain yourself to me,” she interrupts. “If you don’t want me, that’s okay.” God, there really is no point in trying not to cry.
“Yael, we both know that’s not the problem,” he says. “I need you to understand that it’s the situation I’m in. I can’t—I have to take care of my family. I can barely take care of myself. I can’t take care of anybody else. You deserve a better partner than I can be to you.”
She furrows her brow for a moment, then brings her hand to her mouth to contain the sob racking through her.He can’t mean…
When Ravi met her, the olanzapine hadn’t even worn off. She’d told Kevin—she’d toldhimabout how bad it could get. Of course he thinks a relationship with her would just be another person to take care of.
How could he think anything else?
Her chest starts to crowd with shame, her breath coming out shorter than it should.Halle was right, she thinks.She was right.
“I still want to do the podcast with you,” he says. “I can… I can quit the club, if you need.”
“That would probably be best.” She gasps, tears streaming down her cheeks. He reaches out for her, and she steps away. “I don’t think I can take you touching me.”
“Okay,” he says.
Her vision blurs. “I guess this is it,” she gets out.
“Can I walk you the rest of the way to your car?”
Yael shakes her head, and Ravi’s face falls further.Halle was right, Yael thinks.
“I’m going to miss you so much,” Ravi says.
Yael shakes her head again, turning away. She knows she couldn’t speak if she tried.
Halle was right, she thinks on a loop as she heads down the sparsely lit street, her arms wrapped tightly around her stomach. She walks at a brisk pace, then faster, until she takes off in a sprint.
She makes it to the car with her lungs aching, tears still flowing, relieved to be able to slide into a space she can close around her. And she sits there, crying into the back of her hand, until the tears don’t come anymore.
Here it is. The bigger heartbreak.
RAVI MAKES THEwalk home, slowly hollowing out, wishing that knowing he’d done the right thing would make it any less devastating.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Sending Kevin—Ravi—theCatcher in the Ryerough cut on Thursday morning is a uniquely horrible experience. That’s what Yael keeps thinking, repeating it to herself as she agonizes over what to write, her cursor hovering over the send button for minutes on end.This is horrible.
She thinks about her rant at the end about censorship—how she had to pay for copies ofCamp Damascusout of pocket because of Chuck Tingle’s erotic body of work. It’s only in the vaguest of terms, but Ravi will know exactly what she’s talking about now. Because she talked to him about it in person, too.
Horrible.
In the end, the entire body of the email readsIt’s attached. I’m thinking “RIP Holden Caulfield, You Would’ve Loved the Yourfaveisproblematic Tumblr or the Incel Subreddit and I’m Not Sure Which” for the title.Ravi’s reply comes a couple hours later, when she’s setting up for an ad hoc seminar on using JSTOR:
To:Elle Rex
