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I smile to myself.
I give him my keys so he can open the door. He takes my hand, and we go up together in the elevator.
“What’s happened here?” he asks when he opens my apartment door and sees the mess.
“I was cleaning,” I say as I survey the shambles. “When I’m upset, it helps relax me.”
He chuckles, and then I hear the door close behind me. As soon as I put my shoulder bag down on the couch, I forget my pain and turn toward him.
“What are you doing here?”
“I was worried. You left without warning and ...”
“I left you a note. Let’s not forget, you were in good company.”
Eric looks at me. I can see the tension returning to his jaw.
“I don’t ever want to hear you repeat what you said yesterday, about being my whore. It’s humiliating. Of course you’re not my whore, Jude. For the love of God, you’ve never been and never will be. All right?”
I nod.
“But, Jude,” he continues, “don’t you understand that sex is a game to me, and you’re my most important piece?”
“Well, you said it: your ‘piece’!”
“What I mean by ‘piece’ ... what I mean is you’re the most important woman to me right now. Without you, the game loses its value. Goddamn it, I thought I’d made that clear.”
For a few minutes, neither of us says a word. The tension could be cut with a knife.
“Look, Eric, that’s not going to work. Let’s just be friends. I think we can still work together, but ...”
“Jude, I’ve never lied to you about anything.”
“I know,” I say, agreeing with him. “The problem here is me, not you. It’s that I don’t recognize myself in the game. I’m not a girl you move around like a piece on a game board. I can’t be. I won’t be. I think ... I think it’s best if we both go back to our lives and ...”
“I agree,” he says.
His concession throws me off.
I suddenly want to reconsider everything. I don’t want him to agree with me, at least not so quickly. Am I going crazy?
I see the pain and the anger in his eyes, but I try to underscore what I’ve just said and not hug him. My will vanishes whenever I’m near him, and I need to be strong.
My forearm suddenly pinches, and my face twists; I jerk from the pain and stand up.
“Fuck! It hurts!”
His face mirrors my pain, and he gets up too. He doesn’t know what to do as I continue stringing together complaints and profanities.
“How bad is it?”
“Bad, and I need to take something for it, or I swear I’m going to die.”
“Sit down,” he says. “I’m going to call a friend.”
“Who are you going to call?”
“A doctor friend who’ll look at your arm.”