Page 14 of Hard to Forgive

“You have two pillows.” My voice sounded dry and flat to my own ears. There wasn’t the right amount of emotion to it, but the words still made him smile.

“There we are,” he whispered. “Okay, see you’re coming back. Tell me four things you hear?”

I closed my eyes and listened. What could I hear? “One of your neighbors has shitty music taste. The air conditioner.” I couldn’t hear anything else. The crooning coming through the thin walls was too loud. “Oh, your neighbor can’t sing either. That’s three.” The more I focused, the more things snapped into place around me. I heard a muffled sound. “I hear you trying not to laugh now that you realize your neighbor sounds like a dying horse when she sings.”

The comparison made Seb burst into laughter. I opened my eyes, and the sound had synced up with his lips again. My head felt clearer, a combination of a fast acting anxiety medication and Seb’s grounding techniques. I wondered how much of it was a placebo effect with the medicine and how much of it was actually just Seb.

He had always been patient with my anxiety issues. He’d been there from the first panic attack and had never looked back. He’d researched ways to help me and convinced me to find a therapist in college, when it was too difficult to keep under control without him and my friends to anchor me in place. He knew better than anyone how to bring me back down, how to pull me out of a spiral.

I offered him a weak smile. “Thank you.” The words felt insufficient for everything he’d done, both then and in the years we’d known each other, but there was no other words to offer.

“You never have to thank me for helping you, Jojo,” he assured me. The use of his childhood nickname for me calmed me more than anything else, “but you can tell me what happened.” I scrunched my nose and he shook his head. “Nope. You don’t getto show up losing your shit and not talk about it. You know the rules.”

I picked up one of the hideous throw pillows and buried my head in it. Maybe I could smother myself and never have to think about Silas Morgan again.

Sebastian wasn’t having it. He reached over and grabbed the edge of the pillow, pulling it down away from my face. I glowered at him, but it had no effect. He just gave me an expectant look and yanked the pillow away from me. My eyes darted immediately to the second one, but before I could make a grab for it, it was in his crossed arms, smushed together with the first pillow. “Spill and you can have the pillow back,” he promised.

“I fucked my new coworker last night,” I told him bluntly. It was more than that. We both knew it was more than that. He just kept staring at me. “Turns out, I know him. Or I knew him. I just didn’t recognize him.”

“Who is he?”

Did he have to cut it down to the simplest question? I sighed. “Silas Morgan.”

Sebastian blinked, once, twice, thrice. I watched his expression change with each blink. The first, confusion. The second, familiarity. The third, realization. “Oh shit.”

“Yeah. I fucked Silas Morgan last night.” I reached out for one of the pillows so I could suffocate myself again. He, very unhelpfully, did not give me one of them.

“How did you not recognize him? You had the world’s biggest—”

“Stop,” I cut him off. I did not need to be reminded of the fact that once upon a time, I’d had a crush on Silas. I didn’t need to remember that he’d been one of the most attractive boys in our high school. I really didn’t need to remember the way everything played out.

But the memories tried to barge in.

A locker room and the way he smirked.

“Jojo?” Sebastian’s voice shattered the memory.

I looked back up at him. “I’m not about to lose it again.”

I was completely about to lose it again.

“Are you going to be able to do this project?” I hated that all of my friends knew what had happened between me and Silas back then. We’d been kids, and I’d stupidly believed that it meant more than it had. I’d gone blabbing to my friends, and they’d been happy for me. Then, they got to witness the devastation the next day.

It was the fastest I’d ever gotten over a crush on anyone in my life.

I forced myself to focus on Sebastian. I didn’t want him worrying about me more than he already was. I drew in a deep breath, but it didn’t fill my lungs the way it should. When I exhaled, I nodded. “I’ll make it through,” I assured him.

And I would. Even if it felt like some kind of torture, I’d make it through working with Silas Morgan.

I was not going to make it through working with Silas.

That became evident as soon as I got to work the next morning. I made my way to our work area and hoped that Silas would be distracted by the girl he’d spent the previous day talking to, Isabel or Irene or whatever her name was. He’d scoped out a desk next to her. I’d noticed that much before the wave of anxiety washed me out to sea.

Instead, he was waiting at the cubicle I claimed as mine. My eyes darted around the room, looking for anywhere else to sit. If I were bolder, like Eli or Sebastian, I’d have marched right overto him and told him that it was my desk. Even Matthew would’ve done that, but that was more because Matt would have seriously believed the man was confused. Holden would’ve gone and sat down next to him. I was the only one of my friends who’s fight or flight instinct was forever set to flight.

I found an empty seat and started toward it. I’d just sat down when suddenly, Silas was looming over me. “What do you want?” I demanded, crossing my arms over my chest.

“I think we got off on the wrong foot,” he all but purred.

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