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On Wednesday, day five, she finished her last exam and turned on her phone. When no messages from Rory appeared, she felt as though she was physically falling into the void. There was no repose in completing her tests, no sense of accomplishment or fulfilled purpose. Just emptiness. Finality. She wandered into a Little Waitrose around the corner from campus and stared at the bottles of chilled rosé. Her eyes were watery. She had nothing to lose, she decided. Hey, she texted. There’s a chance I’m being oversensitive and reading into things, as I’m wont to do, but it kind of feels like we slept
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Was she seeing someone? Sleeping with someone? Spending many of her waking hours in a hormone-fueled reverie that featured that someone? Absolutely. But that same someone had a habit of missing text messages and failing to make plans more than a day or two in advance, of stretching Adelaide’s patience like a petulant child. I have, like, a person I see? she said finally. If it were 2008, my Facebook status would say “It’s Complicated.” Mhm, Djibril said. He nodded knowingly. Tell me more. She explained that his name was Rory. That he was beautiful and maybe her soul mate and also that she kind
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It was normal to feel hurt when a boy you liked disappeared, Adelaide knew. She’d felt that before. But this was different; it sank into her bones. It was proof, she thought, that she really was damaged beyond repair. And as five days of silence turned into six, into seven, into eight, Adelaide plunged deeper into this belief.
This is how it ends. With a photo from Rory’s dating profile, the realization that he had been browsing for something better, prettier, smarter than Adelaide. It ends with her heart racing, aching. Her eyes filling with tears, her throat with sobs. With the reminder that no matter how fervently she’d fought for a place in his heart, how desperately she worked to win him over, it was never going to be enough. She was never going to be enough for Rory Hughes. Why wouldn’t he look for something better? she asked herself.
The only problem was, he didn’t love her. She was good, yes, and kind, and so cute it made his knees feel a little wobbly—her frame small and delicate, her smile bright. She was clever, too, he knew. Too clever sometimes. He liked her so much. But he didn’t love her. He never really wanted to. What he loved, truthfully, were the perks that came with dating a woman like Adelaide. The sex, the cupcakes, the little surprises she sent to his door—Adventures in the Screen Trade, takeaway dinners, a new wallet when his fell apart. He wanted her generosity, her caretaking. But he also wanted
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She’d started to do yoga, because what else does one do after a mental breakdown?
How frustrating, Adelaide thought. So many things that never should have belonged to him had become his: The scent of laundry detergent. The perfume she’d worn on their first date. The flavor of Colgate toothpaste she’d once tasted on his tongue. They were his now, wholly. And she wanted them back.
