Page 104 of You, with a View

I hold up my hand. “It’s not me. There’s an emergency with... a friend.”

The fear is replaced with understanding—and curiosity. One blond eyebrow raises. “Is it your friend from this weekend?”

Friend.The word felt like a lie coming out of my mouth, and it sounds like one coming out of Dad’s. He needs the truth, and I want to say it out loud. “You know what, no, he’s not my friend. It’s Theo, who I”—I gesture to his phone—“well, I’ll tell you more later. The short story is that I’m dating him and I’m pretty sure I’m in love with him and something happened and I need to go see him in the city.”

Dad blinks at my outburst, then wipes a hand over his mouth. The frustration is still there, tightening the corners of his eyes, but I see that ever-present kindness, too. “Wow, Beans, okay. That’s a lot to process.”

“I know.” I let out a breath. “I swear when I get back, we’ll talk. I’ll lay out exactly what happened and answer any question you have. But Theo needs me, so I really have to go.”

“Take a deep breath,” Dad says. “Don’t start your car until you’re calm.”

“I’m calm.” I stuff my shaking hands in my pockets, heading toward the door.

He steps aside but touches my arm to stop me. “I love you. Okay?”

“Okay.” My eyes fill and I lean into him, placing my cheek on his chest. His heart thumps beneath his chambray button-up. “I love you. I’m sorry.”

He drops a kiss on top of my head, then pushes me gently. “Goon. I’ve got to watch all these videos anyway. I only got through the first few.”

Oh god. I compartmentalize that and run to my car, backing out of the driveway at a speed my parents’ next-door neighbor will probably post about on the neighborhood online message board. Doesn’t matter to me. Theo’s alone, processing this news, and he doesn’t have to be.

I get to the city in record time. When I park at his house, I squint up at the living room windows. There’s no movement.

My heart pounds against my ribs as I climb out of my car. I head toward the front door, but then I hear it—sad boy music, drifting out on the light breeze from the backyard.

“Shit,” I mutter.

There’s a slender alleyway between his house and the next one, so I make my way down it. The music gets louder the closer I get; it’s areallysad song, which is saying a lot considering it’s Radiohead. When I get to his gate, I reach over and unlatch it, swinging it open.

Theo is slouched in a chair at the patio table. His left hand is circled around a drink resting on his knee, and his cheek is propped on his right hand. He’s staring out at nothing. If he hears me, he doesn’t acknowledge it.

It’s an achingly solitary picture.

“Hey,” I call quietly, closing the gate behind me.

He looks over and my heart falls all the way to my feet. His hair is mussed, eyes subtly rimmed red. His expression is blank as he watches me slide into the seat next to him.

“You saw,” he says.

“Yeah, I did.” I swallow against my helplessness seeing him like this. So leached of emotion, no trace of that dimple.

“I’m surprised you’re here.”

I frown, confused. “Why wouldn’t I be? You just got horrible news.” His gaze bounces away, but he doesn’t say anything, so I press on. “You must be in shock.”

A humorless huff bursts from his mouth. “Shockisn’t the word for it.”

“What is the word?”

For a moment, he doesn’t say anything. Then he inhales sharply and starts talking, blasting past my question. “It’s like every time I think I’ve done something worthwhile, every time I think I’ve gotten to a place where it’s safe to say, okay,thisis success, I’vefinallydone enough, it’s still not fucking enough.”

“Enough for wh—”

He sets his drink on the table and leans forward, scrubbing both of his hands over his face with a frustrated grunt. “And I can’t even deal with the fact that I’ve been pushed out of my own company by myself. They had to put that fucking statement out right away, and my dad’s been calling me all afternoon. I’m never going to hear the end of how I wasted that first fifty K he gave us, even though we’ve grown it so exponentially I can’t do the math off the top of my head.” His laugh is humorless. “I guess it’s notweanymore. I need to stop saying that.”

I scoot closer, laying a hand on his arm. Our knees press together, and my body wants to take it further, curl up on his lap. No matter how close I get, though, there’s a distance between us, shaped like his profile as he looks away.

“Talk to me,” I say. “Tell me what happened. Are they even allowed to ambush you like this? Just tell you it’s over? Can’t you fight that, like, legally?”

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