Page 34 of Isolation

Milo’s business exploded over the last few years. Due to his schedule, Mia was often left alone at home during her school vacations.

Despite Uncle Reese’s presence, Milo saw the negative toll it took on Mia to be exposed to an on and off depressed Tessa around the clock. I was the only other adult he trusted with Mia, so he finally gave in.

“I didn’t ban them from seeing you.” Milo sounds infuriatingly unapologetic. “I gave you the choice to come to New York to visit them.”

“It wasn’t a choice,” I say evenly. “It was blackmail. You took away the only family I have ever known. But you still get to keep up this godlike façade in front of them. I can’t help but keep hoping that someone shreds this cool exterior of yours so you can be just as affected like the rest of us mortals,” I say under my breath, failing to keep the bitterness at bay. “I want you to also get kicked around in life the same way I did.”

“The last four years have beennothingbutmegetting kicked around in life,” Milo looks livid at my recount of his life. His frustrated voice vibrates with tension. “It was torture. It’s like everything good inside of me was eradicated, till nothing even remotely good existed anymore.”

“Stop exaggerating!”

“I’m not,” he says in a clipped voice. “I feel empty; soulless. It’s exhausting to slap on a smile and walk a void, empty body around,” he growls in a low voice. “It’s like living without hope. Food has no taste. Life has no meaning. It’s just hollow and nothingness.”

I tense at his brutal honesty and wait for him to continue.

Milo takes a few harsh breaths as if trying to calm himself down.

“I work all the time to support my family. But I also do it so I won’t have a moment to think about you,” he confesses in a quiet voice. “I avoid New York because this city feels empty without you. I don’t see my family because they remind me of you. I don’t stay at my condo because I bought it foryou.”

“You did what?” I ask before the last word even leaves his lips.

His eyes finally soften around the edges.

“I bought the condo because you used to tell me that Soho is the heart of New York, and the only good view of it is the one from above,” he says hoarsely. “You told me that your dream home would have high ceilings with chandeliers hanging down. I had hoped that someday this condo could be ours. That hope started killing me as the years went by, and you wouldn’t change your mind. I couldn’t look at it anymore.”

I blink.

Milo’s words are equivalent to a punch in the gut.

His pained expression, even worse.

This is so unfair.

He did me wrong. By textbook definition, by societal definition, and by the standards of the law, Milo is the villain. He belongs behind bars. He did unforgivable things. He can’t possibly be pinningmeas the villain. I look away from him to deflect the contradictory image.

“You can’t make me feel guilty foryourpoor decisions. You pushed me too far. It’s not my fault if you didn’t like the consequences.”

“You always needed a push before you could make a decision.”

“Pushing me has never got you what you wanted out of me,” I respond coolly. “Maybe it’s time for you to change your methods.”

Milo quietly absorbs my words. I see the wheels turning in his head as he reflects on the truth behind them. Minutes go by, though it feels like hours.

He finally says, “You are right.”

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Milo

She is right. Pushing her and forcing her has only driven her away from me. “You are right.”

Raven looks at me and waits for me to add more to my statement, but there is nothing else to it. She is right. That’s it, pure and simple.

“So...” I prod her gently. “How do we move forward? We do still have to live together.”

I want us to progress this discussion. This is the most I have ever been able to dig out of her.

Raven is not an emotional person. But right now, she is actually stating her needs and voicing her thoughts. I need to hear them before she shuts down.