Gravity may as well be an illusion. Up feels like down, down feels like up, and the room swims in front of my eyes for a few seconds until I pull myself together enough to acknowledge what I heard.
"You wanted to ask me to marry you," I repeat, each syllable sounding surreal. "But you left and didn't come back? I don't understand."
Adrenaline is kicking in now. Is it better or worse to know?
"The way we fought that day--" Phoenix stops, seeming to reconsider his words. "The way I lashed out that day, I mean. It was all me to blame and not you. It was never you. You were sobbing and heaving at one point because of me. Mostly, you were so sad, and everything you said to me that day was true. I loved you, but I did that to you and kept doing it, and it wasn't the first time. You deserved so much more than I could give you then. All you ever tried to do was save me from myself, and I was a selfish and insecure piece of crap who couldn't even make it out the door sober to buy a ring. When I left, I thought I would cool off and figure out how to pull myself out of the spiral I was in."
"But you didn't." It's a statement, not a question. Most of the Western world knows he didn't, thanks to the photos, videos, and stories splashed all over the tabloids. He was a train wreck.
"I got worse. I was toxic then, and I was aware of it. That's why I didn't answer your messages. I thought your life would be infinitely better without me dragging you down."
His lips move, and his words make it through to me, but it's like listening to him from somewhere underwater. I'm about to be caught in a riptide.
"I need a minute," I mumble, pushing myself up from the sofa. "Where's your bathroom?"
"Down the hallway, second door on the right."
I leave the room faster than I high-tailed it out of Nebula last weekend, before he can see the tears pooling in my eyes. Once I reach the hallway, I frantically scan the open doors. The first one reveals a room that must be in the midst of a remodel, with half of a hardwood floor laid down and new, unpainted drywall composing two of the walls. The second one is the bathroom, just as Phoenix said. I slip inside and shut the door behind me.
Focus on breathing. Don't cry.
I asked for the truth and I got it, but I wasn't expecting that. The woman in the bathroom mirror looks shell-shocked. As I gaze at my glassy-eyed reflection, the what-ifs and woulds start to collide in my mind. What if he'd gone through with buying a ring and proposing? What if we'd made it down the aisle? What if we'd had kids? Would he have continued self-destructing? Would we still be together now? What would my life be like?
A bright flash at the window pulls me back to the present. It's followed by a loud crash of thunder and a howling gust of wind. The rain is more frantic now.
"Del? I'm going to put the cars in the garage. It's getting bad out there, and I just got a weather alert about hail and flash floods." Phoenix sounds like he's a few steps away from the other side of the door.
"Okay. My keys are in my purse, in the living room." I struggle to keep my voice from wavering.
Lightning flashes again, and then there's another loud rumble. If rain here is rare, a thunderstorm is an anomaly. The hail and flash flood warnings are alarming, and are also signs I can't just leave if I become overwhelmed. Driving in this from here to LA before it eases up would be a stupid thing to do, knowing how the freeways and drivers get during storms.
I also don't want to run away. There's more to uncover, including what made Phoenix clean up his act after my attempts failed, but I need some time in between processing this and getting into that for my own sake. I take another minute or two to regain my composure and concentrate on breathing normally again. There isn't much I can do about the telltale red tinge of my eyeballs, which makes my irises almost comically luminous and green, but I can't hide out in here until that goes away.
The living room is empty when I return to it, and so I sit on the sofa and wait. My gaze flickers to the bookshelf, scanning the titles and colorful spines, and the framed photographs. I recognize a photo of Phoenix with his parents, and one of him with his older sister and nephew. Nothing I see offers clues into the years we were absent from one another's lives.
A door clicks shut somewhere in the house. Phoenix's footsteps approach the living room.
"Apparently it's an atmospheric river traveling through." He appears in the doorway. His hair is damp from the rain outside.
"Thanks for putting my car in the garage." My voice is steadier now, even if I don't feel that way as I watch him cross the room and take a seat beside me.
"Thanks for not climbing out the bathroom window and leaving."
"Thank the lightning for that." I try to smile so he knows I'm kidding. Wow, though. This is hard.
"What's going on out there is wilder than the monsoons in Vegas."
I can't let things regress to a weather chat again, even if I'm not ready to dive back into the deep end of what we just talked about. It's awkward and banal. I grasp on to the first non-breakup, non-meteorological, and non-heavy thought that flits through my brain, which might also give me a glimpse into the last few years of his life.
"Speaking of Vegas, how did you become friends with Nash?"
Phoenix blinks, surprise registering on his face. He probably expected another question to do with him and me. It's still coming, so I hope he doesn't think he's in the clear.
"We lost someone we were both close with," he says after a moment. "Our paths crossed once or twice before then, but losing Len brought us together."
So much for lighter topics. "I'm sorry. Did I know Len at all?" The name isn't familiar.
"No," he confirms. "We didn't meet until after you and I were together. Len saved me from getting my ass kicked by Torin, actually, and from other things."
"Was he a friend of Torin's, too?"
"I don't think so. She and I met at a bar Torin's old band had a gig at one night. I was there to drink reality awayâI didn't know about the show. It was before Torin and Nash met and started playing together, even though Nash knew Len then."
She. This registers with me at the same time as Phoenix's description of being close with her and meeting her at a bar does.
"Did you date her?"
I didn't mean to blurt that out. I don't even know why it matters, other than my mind's attempt to work through him being capable of a romantic relationship with someone else after his claim about spiraling too much to stay with me.
"Len became a good friend, but that's all. Losing her was the final wake-up call I needed to get my life together."
What does that mean? I want to ask him this, and why losing me wasn't enough, but I don't know how to do it without sounding jealous or petty about a friendship he had with someone who isn't alive now.
"She sounds like she was special to you," I say instead.
My heart aches for some reason. I wish I didn't understand why, but I do, as much as I want to pretend otherwise. Here I thought I was delaying the rest of a conversation that would trigger more of this feeling, but I've walked into a minefield full of it.
Phoenix has always been able to read me like a book, and now is no exception. He touches my arm. "Len knew how special you are to me, if that helps to know."
He covers my hand with his. Embarrassment and confusion waltz together at my core. It's clear he's dialed in to my emotions and what I haven't asked. My soul is on display, and all I want to do is hide because he knows. He's on to what I'm only beginning to admit to myself.
I still have love and a lot of other mixed-up feelings for him, and I'm not nearly as over him as I convinced myself I was.
"It does."
I swipe at my cheek with my free hand, wiping away the moisture that's there. Of all the damn times for my tear ducts to spring a leak, it has to be now, when I'm already vulnerable and have shown all the proverbial cards I meant to keep close to my chest.
Phoenix brings his hand up to my face. He gently strokes another teardrop away with his thumb. "I'm sorry this made you cry. I'm sorry for everything I've ever said or done that made you cry."
I gulp a couple of times, desperate to get back in control of myself. "Can we talk about something else for a while?"
His thumb lingers on my cheekbone, then retreats to my jawline, and lord, this isn't helping. "Of course."
The loudest cracking sound I've ever heard punctuates his reply, and then there's a bang. The wind howls outside, whistling through the trees and rattling the window next to us.
"What was that noise?" I ask.
Phoenix drops his hand and gets up from the sofa. He walks up to the window, where he cranes his neck to look at something outside. "I'm hoping it wasn't what I think. Give me a second."
He leaves the living room. I follow him, watching as he opens the front door and holds it steady against the gusting wind as he peers down the driveway. He grimaces after a moment, then takes a step back and closes the door again.
"There's a tree down on the road and it's completely blocking my driveway," he reports. "I'm going to call it in and find out how long it will take to send someone out here to remove it. You won't be able to get your car out of the driveway while it's there."
"How big is the tree?" I open the door this time and look out. He wasn't kidding. The driveway is blocked in. The thick trunk and tangles of branches everywhere are quite a sight. I stare at the mess until an icy patter redirects my attention. The forecasted hail is here.
I shut the door and backtrack to the living room, where Phoenix is on the phone, listening to something. He taps the screen after about a minute, then sets the device on an end table.
"There's a recorded message about trees being down on major streets. The estimated time to get to side streets is twelve to fifteen hours, as long as the storm doesn't get worse than it is now."
"Twelve to fifteen hours?" I echo. "That's the middle of the night."
He nods. "You could be stuck here until the morning."
༺â༻ ༺â༻ ༺â༻
So, uh, there's an unintended sleepover coming up next for Phoenix and Delaney...ð
(Oh, and that room under renovation Del saw when she was looking for the bathroom? She doesn't know it yet, but that's his guest room. No one is staying in there.ð)
What do you think so far? Do you believe what Phoenix said about only being friends with Len, or is there more to the story about that time of his life and Len that he hasn't owned up to? And what should Del do now that she's realized she still has feelings for Phoenix that he may also be aware of, especially since she's stuck at his house overnight?