Page 24 of My Best Friend Is Broken
My hands are clean, but they’ll never be clean.
When I finally turn off the water, the bathroom is thick with steam, the mirror fogged over so I don’t have to see my reflection. I dry off slowly, putting off the moment when I’ll have to face Liam again, when I’ll have to see that careful fear in his eyes and know I put it there.
I pull on clean clothes, soft sweatpants and a tee shirt that smell like fabric softener instead of blood, and try to convince myself that changing my clothes can change what I am.
When I emerge from the bathroom, Liam is exactly where I left him. He hasn’t moved so much as an inch, still curled up small in the corner of the sofa with the blanket wrapped around him like armor. But his eyes follow me as I cross the room, tracking my movements with an alertness that makes my skin crawl.
He’s watching me like I’m dangerous. Like I’m something that might strike without warning.
And the worst part is, he’s not wrong.
“Better?” he asks, and there’s something almost clinical in his tone. Like he’s conducting an experiment, measuring the distance between who I was when I left and who I am now that I’m back.
“Yeah,” I lie.
I hover near the kitchen, unsure whether I’m welcome in my own living room. The space between us feels charged, electric with all the things we’re not saying. I want to sit with him, to close the distance, to pretend that nothing has changed. But I can see the tension in hisshoulders, the way he’s coiled like a spring, ready to bolt if I come too close.
“Are you hungry?” I ask, because it’s easier than asking the questions that really matter. Easier than asking if he still loves me, if he can ever forgive me, if there’s any part of the boy I used to be that he can still see.
He shakes his head without looking at me.
“You should eat something,” I press gently. “You barely touched dinner yesterday.”
“I’m not hungry.”
The words are flat, final. A door closing between us.
I make coffee anyway, because I need something to do with my hands. The familiar ritual of grinding beans and measuring water feels almost normal, a piece of the life we were trying to build together before everything went to hell.
While it is brewing, I make Liam tea. When the drinks are ready, I pick up the two cups and carry them to the living room. I set the tea on the coffee table within Liam’s reach, and then I settle into the armchair across from him, careful to maintain distance. The sofa is his space now, his sanctuary, and I’m not invited in.
He doesn’t touch the tea.
We sit in silence as the morning light grows stronger, painting the apartment in shades of gold and shadow. From here, I can see the city waking up. People heading to normal jobs, living normal lives, carrying normal amounts of guilt and regret instead of the crushing weight that follows me everywhere.
“What happens now?” Liam asks suddenly, his voice so quiet I almost miss it.
I look at him, trying to read his expression, but his face is carefully blank. Neutral. Like he’s learned to hide his thoughts behind a mask, and I wonder if that’s something prison taught him or something I taught him just by coming home covered in someone else’s blood.
“I don’t know,” I admit.
It’s the most honest thing I’ve said in hours. Because I don’t know. I don’t know how to bridge the gap between us, don’t know how to be the person he needs when I’m barely holding onto who I am. I don’t know how to love someone who flinches when I touch them, don’t know how to build a life with someone who looks at me like I’m a stranger.
“I could go,” he says, so quietly I almost don’t hear it. “If you want. I could find somewhere else.”
The words hit me like a punch to the gut. “No.” The response is immediate, visceral, torn from somewhere deep in my chest. “No, I don’t want that. I want you here. I want...”
I trail off because I don’t know how to finish that sentence. I want things to go back to the way they were, but they can’t. I want him to look at me the way he used to, but he won’t. I want to be the person he chose as his best friend, but that person is gone.
“I want you to stay,” I say finally, because it’s the only truth I have left.
He nods slowly, but there’s no relief in his expression. No warmth. Just careful consideration, like he’s weighing options in an equation I’m not privy to.
“Okay,” he says.
But it doesn’t feel like a victory. It feels like resignation, like someone agreeing to serve a sentence they didn’t choose.
The coffee and tea grow cold between us as we sit in our separate corners of the same room, close enough to touch but separated by something wider than the distance between the sofa and the chair.
