They Left Me Out of Their Group So I'll Leave Them Out of My Life novel · Chapter 17 of 24

Chapter 17: Second Night

Keely left at six for a friend's spare room across town.

It was a real friend, from a real yoga group, and she cried again at my door before she went.

By eight I had cleaned my kitchen twice and not eaten.

The knock came at nine.

Two soft taps.

Nate stood in the hall with no bags this time, only his hands in his jacket pockets.

"Is this after hours?" he said.

"Yes."

"I'd hate to break a rule."

"You've already broken it," I said. "Come in."

He came in and looked at the bowl of apples on my little table by the door.

"Is that what I think it is?"

"My mother brought it. I haven't touched them."

"Good. Don't."

I almost laughed, and he didn't.

He stood in the middle of my kitchen with the light behind him, and I saw that he had not slept either.

"Say it," I said.

"Say what?"

"Whatever you walked up the stairs to say."

He took his hands out of his pockets.

"I've been awake since four. I keep seeing tomorrow. Your mother will cry, and your father will take her side because he's frightened, and your brother will freeze up. And at the end you'll look at the three of them, and you'll go home."

"Nate."

"I told you once that family's the one thing you don't get to quit. I took it back. I meant it. But you've driven to Hartman Street every Sunday for four years, Corina, I've watched you go. If they ask you, if they cry..."

"You think I'll go back."

"I think you're the most loyal person I have ever met." His voice dropped. "And I think I'd lose, to that."

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