Losing Everything

Chapter 4.3

Lucy looked at Erica, uncertainly. Erica seemed to be thinking.

“I’m really sorry,” Lucy said again.

Erica shrugged. “Nah,” she said. “Don’t be.”

“I am. And I’m really sorry that I’ve turned up again now too. That I’ve just appeared, without any warning, to bother you again. I should have just stayed away, and left you alone.”

“You aren’t…” Erica said, then stopped. She stared at the pan. She concentrated on it, poking at the eggs with a spoon as they cooked.

“What?” Lucy said.

Erica shook her head, as if she’d changed her mind about whatever she’d been about to say. She kept staring at the eggs, stirring them slowly. She seemed unsure, and a little preoccupied. As if, perhaps, she’d been thinking too, while Lucy was in the bathroom.

“Say it,” Lucy said.

“No.”

“Please?”

“Later,” Erica said. “Maybe.”

Lucy wondered what there could be that needed saying later. It could be anything really, she supposed. About Bitmo, or Erica’s lingering resentment about the past, or what had been wrong with the relationship they’d used to have.

“Is it bad?” Lucy said, nervously.

Erica looked up, apparently surprised. “What?”

“If you blame me for something,” Lucy said. “You may as well just say what it is.”

“Dude,” Erica said. “You seriously need to calm down. I’m not blaming you for anything.”

“You should be.”

“Well, I’m not.”

“Then what’s wrong? What were you going to say?”

Erica thought again, then shook her head. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. She stirred the eggs slowly, as they cooked, apparently concentrating on that. “I don’t mind you being here,” she said, after a moment. “If that’s what’s bothering you, I really don’t mind. So please stop worrying, and just leave the rest alone. Honestly, just leave it at that.”

Lucy nodded slowly. Something was wrong, and she wanted to know what, to keep asking almost compulsively until Erica told her, but she knew not to do that. She knew she ought to wait, as Erica had asked, mainly just because Erica had asked that. To stay quiet, and leave the topic alone until Erica was ready to talk.

It was hard, but Lucy made herself do it. She was still a bit too used to getting her own way.

She made herself stop asking, and apparently Erica hadn’t forgotten how she got. Erica waited a moment, as if making sure Lucy was staying quiet, and then she smiled. “Thank you,” she said.

Lucy didn’t answer.

“I mean it,” Erica said. “Thank you.”

“It’s fine.”

Erica grinned, and after a moment Lucy smiled back.

“And anyway,” Erica said. “It looks like they fucked you over too, in the end.”

Lucy nodded. “Yeah.”

“Just from what’s been in the news.”

“Yeah,” Lucy said. “Yeah, they did.”

“So I don’t mind helping you,” Erica said. “Because I kind of get how it is. Since they already did it to me.”

Suddenly, Lucy felt awful again. “I was part of they,” she said.

She felt like she ought to say that, to remind them both. She had picked Bitmo over Erica, like she always picked Bitmo over everything else, and in doing so she had hurt Erica. She had hurt them both. And worse, now she had nothing, so all the hurt was for nothing. And worst of all, now she was imposing herself on Erica yet again.

It really wasn’t fair. She had to stop doing this.

“I’m sorry,” Lucy said. She felt miserable. She felt like she’d made a terrible mistake, that she kept making mistakes, that she never should have come here. It just wasn’t fair to Erica. “I’m really sorry.”

“Nah, don’t be.”

“I picked them. I picked everyone else over you.”

Erica shrugged.

“I shouldn’t have,” Lucy said.

Erica looked at her for a moment. “Yeah, you kind of should. We were just a fling. We weren’t anything…”

“Not just a fling. Not only that.”

“I know. Of course. Not only. But still, a fling. Compared to whatever else it might have been one day. So when everything went wrong…”

“I still didn’t pick you.”

“You just did what you had to do.”

“Not really, I…” Lucy stopped. She had, but she hadn’t. She wasn’t completely sure herself. It was all impossibly complicated, and still complicated, and she still felt a bit too buzzy and vague to think clearly.

“You did what you had to,” Erica said. “And really, it’s fine. So now can we please stop talking about it, and just leave it at that?”

Lucy nodded.