are slow to come.
“What are you apologizing to this guy for, babe?” Zaid asks. This time his use of the diminutive enrages me.
“So now you’re my boyfriend? Now? According to you we already had our goodbye in Chicago. We went our separate ways, remember?”
Now Zaid is the one with his jaw on the floor. “I thought—”
Zaid is talking, but I can’t take my eyes off Alexandre, because even if he’s guilty of being clueless and a jerk, he’s the only one who was totally in the dark in this situation. I see a shadow of hurt pass over his face.
Zaid notices me looking at Alexandre. “Un-friggin’-believable. I flew all the way over here . . . for you . . . to tell you . . .” There’s a scratch in Zaid’s voice as he speaks. It’s not merely anger; it’s resignation.
“To tell me what?” I ask. “You can’t even say it. You came here because you were jealous of something happening between me and Alexandre—”
My eyes keep flitting from Alexandre, who stares off in the distance, to Zaid, who has this look on his face like a small animal that’s half in pain and half raging. All my synapses are on rapid fire, and I can almost feel my brain melting a little. I breathe. I think about homework. When I have a ton of homework, I usually start with my least favorite thing. The thing I know will be the worst so I can get it out of the way.
My gaze falls on Zaid.
“You don’t want to be with me, Zaid,” I say, the softness in my voice catching me by surprise. “You want me now because you can’t have me. You want the chase and not the quarry.”
“What the hell does that even mean?” Zaid shoots lasers at me with his eyes. “You know what? Save it. Seriously. Screw this, I’m out of here. I can’t believe you, Khayyam.” He’s usually a long-fuse, big-bang kind of person, and while I’m stuck in some kind of suspended animation in this moment, it seems like his fuse has burned down and a time bomb is about to explode in my tiny apartment.
Before I can de-stupefy myself and respond, Alexandre jumps in. “Don’t talk to her that way.” His voice is measured, but seething.
“Don’t tell me how to talk to her. I’ve known her for years. I’m part of her story. You’re a footnote,” Zaid spits.
“Shut up, both of you. Stop talking about me like I’m not here and can’t speak up for myself. And Zaid, what the hell? You don’t get to act all noble when you’ve been running around making out with half of Chicago. It’s out of sight, out of mind until someone else’s interest in me makes me the shiny new object again that gets your attention.”
Zaid clenches his jaw and strides toward the door—shoving past Alexandre with an unnecessarily hard body check. Alexandre staggers, catches himself, and shoves Zaid in the back. Zaid stumbles, rights himself, grabs his backpack, then spins around like he’s about to take a swing at Alexandre.
“Stop it!” I yell, stepping between them.
Zaid curbs the arc of his backpack, but not before it smacks into the small side table in the foyer, sending a blue-and-white porcelain teapot to the floor, where it shatters.
“That was my grandmother’s, asshole! Get out!” I yell at Zaid, who shuffles backward, twisting his hands around the strap of his backpack, a stunned expression on his face.
I sink to the floor and start crying—maybe more than a broken teapot warrants. Surveying the broken shards of everything. There are so many pieces. Too many. I force myself to take a few deep breaths, trying to slow my racing heart, calm my mind. I blink away my tears and look into Zaid’s wide eyes, my voice shaky but deliberate. “Maybe sometimes history is more important to me than the now. Maybe that’s my problem. But you were right about one thing—some things do need to be left in the past. And one of those things is us.”
Zaid opens his mouth, then clamps it shut and stomps out, slamming the door behind