I yank open my door. “Hey! What are you doing?”
They just keep hauling shit out of the house like I’m not there. I get Lily out of the backseat and am about to freak out on the movers when Olly jogs across the street.
“You going somewhere without me, darling?” he asks.
“No. Here.” I hand him my daughter.
I find a guy with the clipboard. “That’s my house. Why are you taking shit out of it?”
He lifts an eyebrow. “According to this manifest”—he taps on the paper in front of him—“I’m only taking ‘shit’ that belongs to Miss Elizabeth.”
For a second, I’m so confused that I just stand there like an asshole.
Then it hits me. Elizabeth. As in Elizabeth Escalante. Sienna’s alter ego. I mean, I guess Sienna is the alter ego. Fuck, I don’t know.
“Why are you moving her stuff?” I ask as they haul out her vanity.
When he doesn’t say anything, I call Sienna, but it goes into voicemail again. Goddamn it. “She’s not answering.”
The mover rolls his eyes and pulls out his phone.
“I got a clinger here who doesn’t know when he’s been blocked.” He looks me over like I’m a pest. “Is someone going to come down and deal with this?” Whatever the person on the other line says, it seems to surprise Clipboard Guy.
When he hangs up, he smirks. “Mr. Melvin will be here shortly. And you’re on his shit list, so good luck with that.”
I stand there, not really seeing anyone after that. Just a blur of bodies in and out of the house.
“You okay, man?” Olly asks.
“No, I’m really not.” I can’t stop hearing Clipboard Guy’s words. She blocked me?
The movers close up the van and drive off down the street.
Did I think I felt betrayed by my family last night? It doesn’t come close to what I’m feeling right now.
“I think... I think Sienna just left me.”
51
BEN
I wander through the house. Sienna left all of her living room furniture. The flatscreen. Everything in the kitchen. Everything in my room. But her yoga studio and bedroom are empty.
“Damn. Sorry, man.” Olly bounces Lily on his hip.
“I just don’t understand why she wouldn’t talk to me first. Why would she suddenly move out? We promised each other—” I can’t bring myself to tell Olly how Sienna and I promised to always be friends first. To always talk if something bothered the other person. I know she was upset by how my family treated her and blindsided by Janelle—rightfully so—but the rational thing to do would be to discuss it. If she wanted to break up after that, I’d let her go. If she wanted me to move out, I’d do so. I wouldn’t be happy about those options, but that would make more sense than her ghosting me.
I do a double-take when I see a giant man standing in my doorway.
“I’m Melvin,” he says, his baritone booming in my small living room. He looks fierce, like one of our offensive linemen when we face UT.
“Are you here for the rest of her furniture?” I open my arms. “Almost everything still in this house belongs to Sienna.”
He glances at Olly and then back to me. “I came to give you her keys.”
“What the fuck, man? Why would she leave me like that? I fucking love her.”
It slams into me. How I’ve never said those words before.
The thought of never seeing Sienna’s beautiful smile first thing in the morning cracks something in my chest. She and I were a team. She’s my person. She’s not supposed to take off like this.
Why didn’t I tell her I loved her? Why was I holding back?
I drop onto the couch and hold my head in my hands. I’m sweating, and my heart is racing, and my throat feels thick, like I’m about to choke.
This feeling of dread is so familiar. When my parents died, when my sister left, all the times I freaked out when my aunt and uncle would come home late and I’d worry they’d been killed in a car crash.
Oh, fuck. I’m having a panic attack.
Black dots blur my vision. I try to breathe through it.
In the background, I hear Olly and Melvin talking. I lean back on the couch and close my eyes or maybe I pass out. I don’t know. Does it matter?
When I open them again, Olly is standing over me with a desperate expression on his face.
“Fucking thought you’d had a heart attack or something. Don’t do that shit again.”
I’m surprised to see Melvin on the couch next to me. He doesn’t look like he wants to murder me any longer.
“So you love my little sparrow, huh?” he asks, but it’s obvious from the tone of his voice that he doesn’t believe me.
I try to speak, but my throat is dry. I cough. “Look, man, I don’t know what Sienna told you or why she took off like her ass was on fire, but yeah, for the record, I love her. But obviously, that doesn’t mean shit. Who moves out after one argument? Things with my family might not have gone well, but who ghosts a man like that?”
He probably doesn’t even know what I’m talking about. It doesn’t matter. The only thing that matters is that she’s gone.
The devastation is starting to melt away, and I’m getting pissed.
As I get up, Melvin puts a beefy hand on my arm.
“If you care so much for her, why’d you do this?” He holds out his phone and scrolls through several photos.
At first, I don’t know what I’m looking at.
He reads the confusion on my face and, after a long, withering glare, explains that someone sent these photos to Sienna last night.
Oh, shit, is that me?
My stomach drops as I connect the dots.
Janelle sent Sienna these photos?
Jesus Christ. No.
Because it wasn’t enough that Janelle hopped in my bed naked without an invitation. Or tried to manipulate our families to believe her lies. Or trashed Sienna’s bedroom. Or lied about the paternity of my daughter for years.
No, she made it seem like I cheated on my girlfriend.
I press my palms against my eyes, wishing I could unsee what I know must’ve shredded Sienna.
That’s her hard limit. Cheating. Hell, it’s mine too. It would’ve torn me up if our roles were reversed.
As I think about her empty bedroom and the moving van that hauled away all of her stuff, I know the answer without asking the question.
It won’t matter what I say.
Sienna’s done with me.
52
SIENNA
“What do you mean, you moved me out?”
My father holds up a finger in the universal signal to wait. We’re sitting on the patio of the Four Seasons in Austin. His security cleared out this back area and are posted around like my father is a foreign diplomat. I hate how I can feel them watching me through their dark sunglasses.
I glance at all the empty tables. Who knows how much this impromptu Sunday meal is costing? Probably a small fortune since he’ll have to compensate the hotel for taking up the entire patio.
“Dad.”
He’s busy scanning whatever report Assistant Number Two dropped in front of him ten minutes ago.