Space (Laws of Physics #2)(33)

A shock of something unidentifiable, but that felt dangerous, had me standing and pacing to the large window. It was the furthest spot from her.

I don’t need to think about this.

This new information changed nothing. Mona had pretended to be someone else, and then she’d left. Lisa being in jail and Mona covering for her sister explained the initial lies, but it didn’t justify the rest of it, and it didn’t change the fact that the woman I’d fallen in love with didn’t actually exist.

“Abram, I—”

“Why’d you do it?” I turned to face her. My feet were carrying me across the room while her confused stare moved over me. Again, nothing she could say would make me forgive her, so I wasn’t sure why I asked the question.

“Like I said, she needed my help.”

“No. Not that. I’m not asking why you stepped in for your sister. I get that. What I want to know is . . .” I needed to stop advancing, but my feet had a mind of their own. Soon I was upon her, inches away, and this time she didn’t retreat. She lifted her chin to maintain eye contact and seemed to sway forward just as I asked, “Why did you pretend. With me?”

Mona shook her head, her attention dropping for a split second to my mouth and then darting back to my eyes. “I didn’t.”

“You did.”

“I didn’t.”

“You left.”

“I promised Lisa I would protect her! You don’t know, you don’t know what it’s like to have parents who don’t care about you except as an extension of their reputation. I wasn’t going to be another person who let her down.”

“I get that, Mona.” Her name came out sounding like an expletive. “That’s not what I’m asking. Why talk to me at all if you knew you were just going to leave.”

“I tried to avoid—I didn’t—I don’t know.”

“You don’t know.”

“No. I don’t know what I was—I didn’t think—”

“Did you love me?”

Mona snapped her mouth shut, a hint of what looked like terror playing behind her eyes. Her lips parted, and she took several gulping breaths, making me think she was preparing herself to say something difficult.

I decided I didn’t want to hear the answer, whatever it was, and guessed, “You regret it.”

“I do,” she agreed immediately.

My eyelids lowered and I flexed my jaw once, twice, absorbing the blunt force of her honesty, not understanding why her response had hurt as badly as it did. “Okay.”

“No. Not okay. That’s not what I—I mean, I do regret what happened. I regret so much, but I didn’t have a choice, did I? I couldn’t not—I couldn’t let Lisa down.”

“You could have told me.”

“Really?” She sounded both curious and disbelieving. “Really? You would’ve forgiven me for lying to you? You wouldn’t have told Leo, or my parents about Lisa? You would’ve lied too?”

“Yes! You ask for forgiveness, I give it!” I answered honestly, because such was the idiocy of my devotion to this woman at the time. Blind. Senseless. Without reservation. “I thought I loved you. I was crazy about you. I wanted nothing but to make you happy.”

New tears sprang where the old ones had dried and she pressed her lips together more firmly, working to subdue the unsteadiness of her chin.

“I was an idiot,” I said.

She flinched. And then she struggled to swallow, still wincing, like my latest words had a lasting, painful effect.

I wasn’t finished. “I regret it. No one falls in love with another person in six days, that’s stupid. I was stupid and na?ve, trusting. Soft.” I spat this last word, despising her for not understanding the importance of it.

Mona reached out, as though she might touch me, so I backed away. She used the hand she’d lifted to cover her mouth, her eyes following me, turning as I walked to the door.

I opened it, but I couldn’t leave without making one more thing perfectly clear. “Don’t worry, Mona. I have no more illusions. I’m not in love with you, because I never really was. I know now, you are no more that woman than your sister is.”





8





Introduction to Quantum Physics





*Abram*





“Has anyone actually seen Mona? Since she and her friend arrived?” Charlie spun a drumstick between his fingers, the movement absentminded as he shifted his eyes from me to Kaitlyn, to Ruthie, and then back to me.

Ruthie shook her head and Kaitlyn reached for another of my lyric notebooks, setting it on her lap. Sitting in the large room on the main floor, we were going through my old notebooks with the band, looking for lyrics to pair with her recent compositions. Since the partners/husbands/wives/significant others were delayed—including Kaitlyn’s fiancé Martin and Ruthie’s girlfriend Maxine—we’d decided to make the best of it.

Or more correctly, I told everyone to meet me in the living room and so they did. I told them we were working on new music and so here we were. I told them to bring their instruments and so Charlie had drumsticks, Ruthie had her Martin D-28 acoustic, Kaitlyn sat at the piano and had a composition notebook on the music stand, and I’d brought a Fender Kingman acoustic bass and the lyric notebooks.