Page 110 of The Leaving Kind

Fred laughed. “You look far too young to have made that connection, but just so.” He sobered a little as he nodded toward the open examination room where the vet had taken Honey. “That’s Lucy.”

At her name, Honey turned and panted, tongue lolling out in a doggy smile.

Cam resisted the urge to press his hand over the wound in his chest. Never show them how much it hurts. Stupid advice, but he’d follow it to the letter. He forced a smile. “We called her Honey.”

Fred glanced between him and Jorge. “I can see she was in good hands.”

Ginny arrived at Fred’s side. “How much do we owe you for her care?”

“No-thing.” Cam backed up a step. “So, ah ...”

Fred and Ginny put on matching frowns. Ginny spoke. “Do you want to say goodbye? Maybe we could exchange numbers? If we’re down this way, we could stop by and let you all visit. I’m sure Lucy will miss you both. You’ve obviously taken real good care of her.”

Cam shook his head. “No need.” His own frown was in an effort not to let the tears gathering behind his eyes spill out. “Take care of her, okay?”

Honey—Lucy—watched his retreat, and when he got to the door, she scrabbled as though trying to make a leap from the examination table. Cam’s heart collapsed inside his chest as he turned away from her and pushed through the doors and out into the parking lot.

He made it to the truck but lacked the strength and coordination to open a door. Instead, he sort of molded himself to the side and hid his face in the dark space of an open window.

A heavy hand landed on his shoulder, and Jorge’s solid, implacable presence rested beside him a moment. Every breath Cam managed sounded wrong, as though he’d run a mile in this stupid September heat. The humidity was the killer. He could have run ten miles over there, in that other heat. Without this pain in his chest. Could have—

“Want to go get a drink?” Jorge asked.

Cam nodded vigorously. Fuck, yes. “Let’s take a bottle back to the house so we don’t have to drive, because in about an hour, I plan to be insensible.”

With a nod, Jorge held out his hand for the keys. Cam passed them over, climbed into the passenger side, and closed his eyes against the ever-present need to cry.

Victor sat at one end of the long kitchen table and turned his phone over in his palm like a bar of soap. After several rotations, he checked the notification pane, not expecting to find anything new but compelled to look anyway.

Cam hadn’t checked in for three days.

After Wednesday had passed without a text, Victor spent his evening wavering between giddiness and a flatter, duller feeling of inevitability. Cam had given up on him. That he had expected but not the disquiet that came along with it. When had he come to rely on the fact Cam would be back? When had fantasy become his reality? Or had his reality diverged into unreality?

Stop.

If he let his thoughts continue along that line, he’d be on his knees in front of the wine rack. “I should get rid of all the wine in this house.”

He wouldn’t. He should, but he couldn’t.

Sahar, when he’d called her, had been supremely unhelpful on that score. “It’s your choice, Victor.”

Choice could go get mired in fudge.

She had put him in touch with a psychiatrist, however, and they had tentatively planned a course of medication meant to help balance his moods. He’d been warned that alcohol and the prescription wouldn’t mix. He’d decided to think about it over the weekend. While he journaled. Because Sahar still felt it was important for him to work though his feelings.

If only she knew.

She probably did.

His textless Thursday had been more difficult to bear. Thankfully, he’d had back-to-back afternoon classes, the extra session a poor substitute, really, for the class he’d missed while wallowing in self-imposed grief.

He still felt slowed, but that was perhaps all for the good. A slower climb to equilibrium usually signaled a longer period of evenness. But it was Friday now, and Cam’s absence remained a bump in his otherwise smooth road.

Victor had no reason to call him, except to apologize for being an ass.

A pang of longing hit Victor hard in the chest. If he wanted this feeling to go away, he’d do better not to call. Not to stay in touch.

What he couldn’t figure out was the why. For any of it. Why he’d decided he needed to give Cam up and why he wanted him back. The giving up made sense from a certain perspective. Victor always did away with what made him happy while on a downward slide. The need to take Cam back up was pricklier.