More Than Words(66)

“He won’t talk to me,” Caro said when Nina walked in. “I don’t know what’s going on with him, or you, or you and Rafael, but whatever it is, Nina, this isn’t acceptable. This is not how we do things around here. Not in this family.”

Nina felt tears spring to her eyes. Now that she didn’t have to pretend anymore, the weight of the whole night, the whole weekend, the whole last month, crushed down on her. “I know,” she whispered.

“Can I leave you to figure this out?” Caro sighed.

Nina nodded, and the two women embraced. “I love you both,” Caro said.

“I love you, too,” Nina answered.

Tim didn’t respond, and Caro walked out the door.

Nina looked at Tim.

Tim looked at Nina.

“What the hell were you doing?” Nina said, on the verge of losing her temper, her fists clenched, her voice shaking. Her first fund-raiser without her father. Her fund-raiser for Rafael. “Did you really think that was going to make things better? Seriously, Tim. You screwed up the whole night.”

Nina braced herself for a fight, but Tim’s face crumpled. He started to cry drunken tears, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry. I fucked up. I’m sorry.”

And as angry as she was, Nina’s heart broke for him. For the pain she knew he must be in to act the way he had. She walked to him and opened her arms. He fell against her and then she cried, too, for all she would lose when their relationship ended. Because she knew now it had to.





61



The next morning, after Tim had taken some Advil and a shower and drunk a cup and a half of coffee, Nina walked into her kitchen and sat down next to him. She’d contemplated asking him to sleep at his place last night, but she had been worried about him. He needed someone. He needed her. So they slept in the same bed one last time.

But now the night was over. And everything was clearer in the harsh light of day. She opened her hand and the engagement ring he’d given her was inside. He looked up at her.

“I really am sorry about last night,” he said. His voice was ragged.

“It’s not just last night,” Nina said. “I wanted us to work. I really did. But we don’t anymore.”

Nina knew she was losing the children she’d imagined having with him. She was losing the life she’d expected. And she was probably losing Caro, too. Be careful, Caro had said last night.

Tim took the ring from Nina’s hand.

“I don’t have the energy for this now, Nina.”

She looked at him. His eyes were tired, his face pale.

“I don’t have the energy to keep pretending,” she said. “I can’t be your fiancée anymore.”

He took a deep breath in, like he’d been slapped, and then slid the ring on the tip of his pinky. It stopped at his first knuckle.

“If you can’t be my fiancée,” he said. “Then . . . I can’t . . . I don’t want to be the friend watching from the sidelines, Nina. I think it would kill me to see you with someone else.”

Nina ran her fingers along the rim of her coffee mug. She couldn’t look at him.

“If we say good-bye now,” Tim continued, “you shouldn’t call me for a while. If I’m not your fiancé, I can’t be your friend. Not for a long time.”

Nina couldn’t imagine her life without Tim in it. She wanted to argue. She wanted to explain why that was ridiculous. Spiteful even. That they were better as friends. And that he’d miss her, too. But she loved him, she truly did. And if she couldn’t give him the first thing he wanted, at least she could give him the second. She took a deep breath and let it out. “Okay,” she said. “If that’s what you want.”

Tim seemed surprised she didn’t fight it. He almost wavered; Nina could see it in his expression. But then: “It is,” he said, reaching into his pocket and putting her apartment keys on the table. “I’d like my keys back, too.”

Nina walked across the apartment to where her bag was sitting and unhooked his keys from her key ring. “I guess this is bye for a while, then,” she said, as she handed him the keys, tears blurring her vision.

Tim stood up.

“I guess so,” he answered.

They hugged stiffly, Nina afraid to let herself hold him the way she wanted to, realizing she no longer had the right to. Now he was just supposed to be someone she used to know.

Nina couldn’t watch as he walked out her front door.





62



A little while later, Nina left her apartment in her running clothes feeling stunned. There was a pit of guilt in her stomach that made her stop and lean against a street post, sure she would throw up. She didn’t; the guilt just ate at her. And the uncertainty. She’d made a decision her father would never have agreed with. She’d given up the man he’d imagined her marrying for more than thirty years. She’d lost her best friend.

A truck was parked in front of her with a mirror at eye level. Nina peered at herself. She hadn’t gotten all of her eye makeup off from the night before. Her eyes were swollen from crying. And her hair was stringy now, ratty in its ponytail. Nina fumbled in her runner’s backpack for a tissue and another hair tie. Even if she felt like shit, she didn’t need to look like shit. A braid might fix things a little.