I wish I hadn't.
Because the words on the screen reduce my whole world to a bottomless pit.
You forgot your wallet. I can come by tonight and bring it.
The sender: Natalie.
For a moment I think that the earth beneath might indeed have opened in an abyss and swallowed me, because everything before me goes black. But then suddenly James is standing in front of me, talking, and I think I preferred the darkness.
"You went to her?" I whisper, taking a step back, because his proximity is too much to bear.
"Yes, but—"
"Did you sleep with her?"
His answer comes a fraction of a second too late and too tense. "No."
"You're lying."
"I'm not," he says and makes a motion toward me, raising his hands as if to take me in his arms.
"Don't you dare touch me."
"Serena—"
"Why did you go to her?"
He lowers his hands, answering in a defeated voice. "I wanted to distract myself. I wanted to forget you and everything that happened between us. I wanted to get the idea that I could ever be in a normal relationship out of my mind."
"I can't believe you had the nerve to give me your teary self-pity talk after you had sex with another woman."
"I did not have sex with Natalie. We didn’t even kiss."
"Don't say her name."
"Nothing happened, I swear."
I snort and fold my arms over my chest. "Nothing, really? You said you went there to distract yourself."
"Serena, please. Listen to me. I admit I wanted to sleep with her, but I didn't. I couldn't. I thought of you and I just couldn't."
Every single word burns me. Not only my skin. My flesh, my bones. My very core. I need to get out. Before I turn to ashes. Before I reach that place from where there is no coming back. It can't take me more than ten steps to get out of this damned room. I can make ten steps.
"Believe me, please, I—"
"Don't say one more word, James," I utter in a broken whisper, stepping further and further away from him. "I can't believe I actually thought this could work."
He freezes in the act of walking toward me, shock apparent on every pore of his face. "Serena, I swear nothing—"
"I believe you, James. But you wanted it to happen. That was your first impulse. That's how it will always be. We have a misunderstanding, or a fight, or God knows what will happen, and you will rush into someone else's bed."
"No, I won't. It's only you for me. It'll always be only you."
"I want to believe that too, but I can't," I murmur.
By the time I realize what's going on, he's inches away from me, his sweet breath paralyzing me, his arms forming an inescapable chain around my waist.
"Don't leave. We belong together. You know this."