“I could say the same about you.”
“What?”
“Storming off to the bathroom because you couldn’t give me a fucking minute. Just one fucking minute is all I needed, but you were all up in my shit!”
“Wow, okay. Sorry for caring about you. Sorry for being invested in you.”
“Don’t do that. Trupti always played the martyr, and I’m over it.”
“Don’t you dare compare me to her.”
“Then don’t act like her,” I said, a fake overly sarcastic smile stretched across my face.
“I was being myself, Dev. I was being a woman who speaks her mind, remember? A woman who does what she wants. You said you loved that about me.”
“Yeah, well, sometimes it’s fucking annoying.”
“Wow,” Lyra said, looking up at the sky. “That’s convenient.”
“What?”
“Well, you claim to want a woman like me, to love that I say what I think when I think it.”
“Sometimes I do.”
“Exactly. And that’s why it’s convenient.”
“Oh my God, Lyra. Just give it a rest, okay? You’re beating a dead fucking horse. I mean, like you killed that fucking horse, then you beat it with a shovel, and now you’re running it over with a semi!”
“Would you calm down?” Lyra said, looking around us. People on the sidewalk were crossing the street to avoid passing by, but I didn’t care. Instead of calming down, I yelled at them, throwing my arms out into the air. “Keep walking, assholes!”
“Why are you spiraling like this? I just don’t get it. You were fine before they walked through that door,” she pushed. She was not going to let any of this go.
“Because he fucked her!” In my drunken haze, I thought Lyra should understand what that meant. But she only looked more pissed off. I expected sympathy, but all I could see was a face made of stone.
“I can’t believe you,” she said, shaking her head. “And what about your calls?”
“My what?” I asked incredulously.
Calls? What the hell was she talking about?
“Your work calls?” She put finger quotes around the word, and it pissed me off. Trupti used to do that all the time.
“What about them?” I used finger quotes right back at her, being overly dramatic, but I needed to make a point.
“I mean, come on, let’s just get real. You get these calls all the time. You never say what’s going on, you always sneak off somewhere to talk in private, usually outside the building so no one is in earshot. Why do you do that?”
“So I can hear better, so I can focus. Where the fuck is this coming from?”
She closed her eyes tight. “Craig told me you’re a player.”
“What?” I asked, feeling like I was going to lose my ever loving mind. “He said what?”
“Back in December he told me you cheated on Trupti all the time. And those calls, they just… I can’t shake what he said.”
“He’s a goddamn liar.” I spat the words, wishing I could punch Craig in the fucking head for lying to her. And I would enjoy it. Why he did it? I wasn’t sure. It could have been because he saw we were into each other at the resort and he was trying to paint himself in a better light, but I couldn’t be sure. All I knew was that he was a douche and he’d lied through his teeth. I’d never been a player in my entire life. If anything I was overly monogamous. And apparently, a cuckold or whatever that old-fashioned word was for a guy who’s woman cheats on him right under his fucking nose.
I bet Jane Austen would know the word. Fucking Jane.
“When you went outside, Trupti made it obvious that you work calls aren’t really work calls.”
“And that’s why you used those fucking finger quotes.”
“Yes.”
“And you believed her,” I deadpanned, unable to believe what I was hearing. She’d never met Trupti, but was playing into her head games instead of trusting me.
“I don’t know what I believe anymore.” Lyra threw her hands up in the air. “But you’re way too worked up over Trupti moving on. And you get these calls all the time. We run into your Tinder fuck buddies everywhere we go! Something’s gotta give, Dev!”
“So, let me get this straight. You think I’m hung up on Trupti, but you also think I fucked around on her.” I paused for dramatic effect. I was too pissed to play nice. “You think I’m getting booty calls every five minutes, but I’m also hung up on Trupti at the same time. I can’t keep my dick in my pants, but I’m pining over the girl that I dumped. Which is it, Lyra?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know anymore. The Dev I’ve been with for the last month would never be freaking out over his ex like this. And he wouldn’t be screaming at me in front of a bar because I dared to ask what happened.”
“He fucked my girlfriend, Lyra. My girlfriend! That’s what happened.”
“Your girlfriend,” she deadpanned, turning around and walking away. “Nice.”
“What?” I asked, not understanding the problem.
“Maybe this was a mistake. All of this,” she said, turning around, her face impassive.
“Oh really?” I asked, my anger was now covered in dread and misery as I imagined my life without Lyra. But that misery and dread combined with my anger created a heavy, suffocating darkness that I felt powerless to stop.
“Yeah,” she said, no tears on her face. No emotion, no kindness. She was made of stone, and it terrified me. She held my tiny little heart in the palm of her hand, and all she had to do was squeeze. I could feel her grip tightening as she stared through me.
“Actually, that sounds good to me.” I said, grabbing my phone. “Where’s the App Store? Ah, here it is.”
“What are you doing?”
“Downloading Tinder,” I said, pressing on the app to download it.
“Wow. You’ve officially reached a new level of asshole.”
“I mean, if you’re going to accuse me of getting my wick dipped, I may as well get something out of it, right?”
“You do that,” she said, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “And we can go back to how this was always meant to be.”
“And what is that?”
“Being forced together kicking and screaming. We’ll just pretend the last month never happened.”
“Ahh, I get it,” I said, testing her, hoping to coax some emotion from her, some softness. “Then maybe you and Professor Plum can give it another try.”
“What did you just say?” She glared, daggers in her eyes. But still, no softness, no vulnerability that I could cling to for dear life.
“You heard me,” I said, digging my heels into the darkness. My world was spinning out of control, literally and figuratively.
“I’m out,” Lyra said, shaking her head and walking passed me. “Call me when you sober up. Better yet, call me when you grow up.”
“Where are you going?”
“To get as far away from you as possible.”
I heard her cell phone ring as she walked away, her shoes clicking against the concrete. I wanted to call out to her, to tell her to take a cab, to not walk alone at night. But instead I yelled out, “Tell the professor I say hi.”