The 18th Floor

Chapter Fifty

I spend Saturday and Sunday unable to move. Completely disconnected and numb from my body. Dad comes in every now and again to check in. Try to talk with me, reason with me. He won't tell me what to do, he didn't even give much away when I told him what happened.

That Lucien had known me prior. I've had to switch my phone off. He hasn't called excessively but a call or message comes in every now and again. From Simon too. Dad comes in and sits at the end of my bed.

"What does it change?", he asks.

I look at him, unable to find the strength to reply.

"What does it truly change? Ok I understand, he wasn't truthful in the beginning. But he hardly knew you before. If what he is saying is true then he can't know you from a few glances and conversations."

I watch my dad as he talks, voicing what I've had on repeat in my head.

"He hired you because he believed you were the right candidate and then you fell for each other, based on who you both are now. Not who were you years ago at 18 in your first years of uni. You have both changed since then."

"You don't say", I say sarcastically.

"Cyrene."

"Dad."

"Darling, I understand why you're upset but I also don't", he finally admits. He looks at me, waiting for a reply.

"I don't know", I say quietly. "One moment its smooth sailing, then the next it isn't. It's like everything crumbled. He knew me before and it shouldn't change anything but I feel like it does but I don't know what it changes", I start crying.

He comes over to lay down next to me and comfort me. "It's ok, it will be ok."

"Will it? Will my life ever be ok dad? If it isn't with Lucien and then it's with someone else. I need to go through it all with someone else. I thought he liked me for me. But he liked the idea of me when I was 18, when I was different and he kept onto that idea and then hired me. So, who does he like dad? Does he like me from 8 years ago or does he like me now?"

"I think you know the answer to that question already sweetheart but you're just too afraid to admit what you think isn't possible."

I cry harder at my dad's words. At the voices that eat me up every night that my dad has put so perfectly into a sentence out load.

"I'm scared", I admit to him quietly.

"I know darling, I know", he says as he kisses the top of my head. "I know we don't talk about your mother much."

The turn of conversation takes me by surprise.

"But she was the love of my life. She got up and left, but I can't sit here and admit she wasn't. I see the way Lucien is with you, how you are with him. How you both help each other and care for each other. I see the look on your faces when you're with each other or even when you talk about him. Love isn't easy, but what you two have, from the outside looks like it. It looks like pure love."

I keep sobbing.

"I don't know what to do dad."

"You'll figure it out. You always know what to do. You're stronger than you know Cyrene."

I message Simon Sunday evening saying I can work from home but I won't come in. He tells me Lucien has told him the same.

At least Lucien is talking to Simon. I won't lie and say I wasn't scared when I left his house. Leaving him there on the floor, when I know what he's like. When I know how his thoughts eat him up the same as they do mine. A little bit of relief floods me with the thought of Simon and Lucien still speaking regardless of the other night.

I consider going in if Lucien won't be there but I don't know how I'll muster the energy get up and on the train. The train which I haven't taken in months because he comes to pick me up and drop me home every day.

As I look absently at my room, my eye latches onto the polaroid of us both on my shelf. The day he came over to ask my dad if we could date. How he did things so perfectly and considerately from the beginning. The events that followed after us smiling in that photo. A ghost of a smile passes through my face.

What does it change? Why does it feel like it changes everything at once but also nothing at all?