I’M NERVOUS when I walk up to the studio’s door.
Nervous is kind of an understatement. Things are normal, though. Normal for Crash—which means weird and old and dirty. The walls are painted a horrible off-white color, the carpet is thick and fluffy and smells like nicotine, and both the actual studio and the door to John’s office are closed.
That means it’s going to be an unpleasant day, but not one that is seriously bad.
I need to be here.
I need to make sure this is real, that this is the place I work at, that I know these walls, the back entrance, these cracks in the ceiling. And then I need to talk to John.
But I’m not really sure how to have this conversation.
Or what I can even talk about.
Should I tell him I’ve had a seizure? Should I tell him about Levi? I want to tell him everything. I want to ask him what happened on Saturday morning, and I also want to avoid him and never think about him again.
I take a deep breath before I walk towards the office. I know what I need to do.
I NEED to quit.
I know I need to quit—which is the only reason I’m at work in the first place. Even if it wasn’t for Levi, my parents have doubled down on me not having a job. They say I need to take the summer to rest, and then maybe—and they stretched out the word while they looked at each other as if I wasn’t in the room—I can go back to university when next semester starts.
I wanted to tell them I’m an adult, but I don’t feel very adult right now. I’ve not even had this job for an entire month and I’m already quitting.
Basically, because I’m useless.
It’s just every time I look at John, I lose my nerve. He’s kind of stayed out of my way too, which has made it difficult for me to start an actual conversation with him. I nearly forgot what happened last week, until I walked in the door, but he obviously hasn’t. That doesn’t make this any easier.
I clear my throat, trying to get John’s attention. He’s at his desk, writing something on a notebook. He turns to look at me.
He’s frowning when he speaks. “What?”
I shake my head. Maybe this was a bad idea after all. “I, um, need to talk to you,” I say.
The silence seems to stretch out for so long. He speaks really quietly when he finally does speak. “Is this about Friday? Because—”
“No,” I say. “It’s about something else.”
He looks me up and down and I’m pretty sure he can see how shaky I am, but my words seem to put him at ease anyway. “Yes?”
I sigh. I guess I better get this over with. I hope he doesn’t ask me any personal questions, because I’m not sure how I’m going to answer. “Something has come up,” I say. “I’m really, really sorry, but I’m going to have to quit.”
“You’re quitting?”
I nod, feeling the knot in my throat tighten. I don’t really want to speak, but I guess this is how adults handle things. By talking. Which is what I am. An adult.
He stands up and walks over to where I’m standing. His face is so close to mine. I’m looking away from him, but I’m not moving. I don’t want him to feel like this is about him, because it’s not. It’s about me. It’s 100 percent about me.
“I’m sorry,” he says. I can feel his breath tickling my skin, but I still don’t move. “I didn’t mean to scare you. It’s just that being around you—you’re like no one I’ve ever met in my entire life.”
I swallow, still saying nothing. He’s making this hard for me. I wish he would just take my resignation and be done with it. Or maybe I want him to beg me to stay.
I don’t know.
He moves closer to me, but he’s not touching me at all, which I didn’t even know was possible. My heart is beating really, really fast.
“Don’t quit,” he says. “I—”
I look at him for the first time since he’s been standing in front of me. He’s closed his eyes and his breathing has quickened.
“It has nothing to do with—”
He stops me from talking by putting his lips on mine. It’s not like the first time we kissed, where it was aggressive, his tongue pressing, exploring against me. This is just his lips: soft, warm, and lingering. He’s not touching me except for his mouth, but it’s so tender that I don’t have the heart to stop him.
In two weeks I’ll never see him again. I know that I need to stop coming here as soon as I can, but part of me wants to keep seeing him for the next two weeks. Plus, he’s obviously confused—he doesn’t deserve to be outright rejected. That wouldn’t be fair.
He moves away from me. His eyes are wide and watery. He’s still standing so close to me, the tip of his nose is almost touching mine.
I close my eyes and swallow.
This is my job. I don’t know him. I don’t know anything about him.
It’s just a job. I don’t understand why he’s making this so difficult.
“I have to,” I say. “It’s not up to me.”
He shakes his head. I can feel his breath on my mouth. “You don’t understand.”
I’m trying to think of any response that might be coherent, anything that I could say to him to make him understand, when someone speaks up from inside the office.
“Oh,” the voice says, utterly bored. “So that’s what you were doing.”
John jumps—there’s no other way to describe it, he jumps back a few inches and then he looks at the person the voice belongs to.
He seems flustered, his eyes huge and his cheeks reddening. I turn to where his gaze is and let my mouth fall open. I can hear myself saying something, but I don’t know what it is.
The man looks at me. “Yes,” he says. “That’s my name.”
I nod, feeling dizzy again, and sit down on the floor. I really hope I don’t have another seizure, but at this point it’s probably the least unexpected thing that’s going to happen. “You’re alive.”
“Yes,” he says, frowning and looking at his hands. “I expect so.”
“You’re—”
“Busy,” John says. “What do you need, Sam?”
Sam Riordan shrugs. “Just come see me when you get a chance. Wouldn’t want to bore you when you’re otherwise occupied.”
John nods, balling up his fists. That’s the only indication he’s upset. Sam looks me up and down, shrugs again, and then turns around and leaves the office.