“So what happens, Julia?” he asked as he zipped her bag. “Are you coming back?”

She met his eyes, the sadness in hers reflected back. “I want to, but I really need to think about everything now. I need a solid week apart. No contact. To make sure I’m not making a mistake. It’s easy for you if this doesn’t work out. You’re not giving up anything. I’m changing everything.”

“And I would never take that or you for granted. I promise, I will cherish you, as I already do. Will you let me buy you a ticket to return?”

“You are free to do whatever you want, but I need to be certain that this is right for me. So I can’t promise you I’m going to use it. This has been a crazy weekend, from the game, to things ending with Charlie, to you and me. You hurt me, and I need to go home and take some time alone to make sure I’m not being foolish again, Clay.”

“You’re not,” he said, reaching for her hand, clasping it in his. Oh, how she wanted to fall into his arms. Those strong sturdy arms that had protected her, fought for her, held her. But this wasn’t about him. It was about her, and whether she could let herself turn so much of her life, and her heart, and her home, over to someone else again. “I swear.”

“You asked me to move my life across the country for you and I said yes in a heartbeat. Because I love you. And the whole time you were hiding something from me. And that something makes me feel like a fool,” she said, whispering the last words like a eulogy.

To her, it was the worst name in the world she could call herself. Because she’d been there. Oh, had she been there.

A little while later, she walked to the door, down the stairs, and to the waiting town car that would whisk her to the airport. He’d offered to ride with her but she’d declined, saying it would be too tempting, and she needed not to be tempted in that way.

He held onto that sentiment like a fragile glass globe of hope, clutching it for several minutes on the way downstairs. But then, he knew better. They’d always been good together physically. What was happening between them now was no longer about chemistry. It was about trust, and she needed to know he was a man of his word in all matters. There was no room for anything less. He had to keep all his promises to her, the big ones and the small ones. Life was rarely about the big things; it was usually about the impact—the potentially damaging impact—of the little things.

After the driver stowed her bags in the trunk, Clay reached for her, pulling her in close. She tucked her face in the crook of his neck, her breasts pressed against his chest. He could feel her heart beating against him and he could have stayed there all day. As she broke the embrace, she cupped his cheek with one hand, a soft fingertip tracing his jaw, sending tremors like quicksilver through his body. He would miss her touch; he would miss all of her.

She stood on tiptoes, brushing her soft lips against his, lingering slowly on his mouth. The kind of kiss that stays with you for days. The kind of kiss you never forget.

Because of how it tastes.

Like goodbye.

He clicked on the flight tracker, and watched the black arrow snake across the Midwest. He dropped his head in his hand, and looked back up minutes later, as if the computer would tell him something. As if she’d appear on some futuristic TV screen from the plane, waving, saying he was forgiven.

“It’s okay. I know you were just so caught up in loving me that you forgot to tell me,” she’d say with a twinkle in her green eyes, then a pretty wink. She’d press her soft lips against the screen and blow him a kiss. “I’ll be back,” she’d say and the screen would crackle out, like static, fading to black, but everything would be okay and she’d return to him.

Instead, his life was up in the air. Because he’d been an ass. He’d been scared, wanting to secure his future before he faced his present. He, of all people, should have known better. You don’t ask someone to sign until you give them all the facts, and spell out the terms. He’d gone about it the wrong way, thinking that by asking her to move in first, he’d be able to keep her without reservation. But you don’t get the girl until you’ve gotten the girl. And even then you have to put in the effort every single day to keep her. You don’t win before you’ve won. You keep playing, and fighting for love every day.

He reached for the screen, running his index finger across the cartoonish line of her airplane, scurrying her back to San Francisco. Was she sleeping on the plane? Watching a movie? Having a drink? Vodka on the rocks, probably.

Wait.

If she was drinking, it was whiskey.

Whiskey for loneliness.

But then, maybe she wasn’t lonely, he figured as he shut his laptop and made his way to the kitchen, opening the cabinet. Maybe she was happy, and toasting with champagne to better days without him. Chatting it up with the random stranger next to her in seat 2B. Sharing her story. Telling the stranger about what an ass Clay had been. They would laugh at him, and he deserved it. Maybe he didn’t deserve anything but to have lost her this way.

This foolish way.

He should have taken the chance, and told her when it happened with Charlie’s change-up, rather than waiting. Waiting never did anyone any good. When you waited, the world passed you by. Life passed you by. And the love of your life flew in the dark of night over the country, stretching the distance between you to so much more than three thousand miles.

He left the kitchen and opened the door to his balcony, walked to the railing, and stared at the city as he finished his glass, the liquor burning his throat as he wanted it to.

They should have spent those precious last few hours tangled up together. Or having lunch together. Or shopping together. He wasn’t even fond of shopping, but he’d have happily taken her anywhere, letting her pick out the towels she wanted, the new bench for the balcony. Hell, she could redecorate the whole house from stem to stern, any way she wanted. They’ve have shopped, and then wandered through the neighborhood, his arm around her, discovering the places in the Village that would become theirs: a cafe here, a store there. He’d have gotten her worked up at lunch, touching her legs under the table, slipping his fingers under her skirt, driving her so wild he’d have had to pull her into the restroom at a cafe and fuck her against the wall, her legs wrapped around him, certain that she’d be returning to live with him.

Instead, he was left with this loneliness that could have been avoided with a few simple words spoken hours before.

Avoided with the truth.

He held up his glass, cocked his arm, and considered chucking it five stories down to the street below. Cabs and cars streaked by on a Sunday night, and soft jazz music floated up from a few floors below him. Some kind of melancholy John Coltrane song that might as well have been ordered up for him by the gods of regret.

Maybe that’s what whiskey was good for. Maybe whiskey was best for regret, because that was all Clay could taste tonight.

He lowered his arm, the glass still in his hand. He wasn’t going to make a mess for someone else. He’d somehow have to find a way to clean up the mess he’d made of this love.

He left the balcony, closing the door behind him as if he could seal shut the memories of all they’d done there. But he couldn’t. She was everywhere in his home. She was naked on his couch. She was undressing on his stairs. She was laughing joyfully over a gift in his kitchen. She was dancing in his bedroom. She was sleeping peacefully on his bed. She was giving him her most vulnerable yes in the bathroom, telling him she’d leave her life in San Francisco for him.