The Muse's Undoing

“Did you realize leaving would hurt me?” I ask.

He looks down at his folded hands and shakes his head. “Yes and no.”

The reason I believe him is so hard to explain. Being with Fischer when he was recovering sort of trapped me inside myself. He made me feel things—shit I wasn’t ready for—that I knew I had to hide. It’s hard to undo that impulse no matter how much I want to be open with him today. It helps knowing I wasn’t completely alone in wanting more from our time together, but ultimately he’d rejected me, even if he hadn’t realized that’s what he was doing.

“I assume you also figured getting married wouldn’t bother me, either,” I say.

“I figured you’d moved on. I didn’t think it mattered to you what the fuck I did, and I don’t mean that in a shitty way, I just thought I was off your radar. So no, I definitely didn’t think that would hurt you. I just misread things.”

“So, you didn’t think twice about me. Good to know.”

“Matthew. Jesus. Think back for a second. What were you up to when I was dating Nicole? Do you remember?”

He’s making it sound like he does. “Working,” I say. “Going out.”

“Hooking up?”

“How would you know?” I ask, curious.

“Because whenever I did see you, you were hungover with multiple hickeys in various stages of healing.”

“Yeah, I got around a lot back then. But that’s my point. Are you sure you wanna be doing this?” I ask. “It’s not like it’s uncomplicated.”

“What would you rather be doing?” he asks in a fun twist. Sometimes it feels like he’s probing my mind like an alien abductor. I feel his sideways questioning like thumps on my skull. I drop my forehead to my knees because what a fucking great and impossible question. “I don’t know,” I whisper.

“If I left now, what would you do?”

“Freak out probably.”

“And what would that look like?”

I’m honestly not sure.

He may have deleted my apps, but they’re still in the cloud. Even with no phone, this city is Babylon—teeming with debauchery and temptation. Normally, I like that about it, but whatever Fischer and I have is real, and it has consequences, and I already have too many feelings attached to it—to him. If he left, I might just curl up in a ball and let myself wither.

“Matthew?” he asks, when I haven’t answered after a while.

And I still don’t.

“You don’t want me to go, do you?” he asks, and I see that vulnerability that kills me creeping into his expression again. The one that says he’s dying to put a hand somewhere on my body just to remind himself that I exist. That we exist.

I finally look at him again. Our eyes meet. “No. What about you? I haven’t scared you off yet?”

He shakes his head.

“I might eventually.”

“You’re gonna let me try for eventually?” he asks, sarcastic.

“You want to?”

“How many times do I have to say it?”

“You scare the shit out of me,” I say.

His silver eyes narrow, and a slow smirk curves his mouth. “You scare me, too. It’s why I’m not sure I mind that I fucked you up for all other men.”

I shake my head. “Your ego, though… I never said that.”