Page 63 of Mr. Hotshot CEO

“Wow,” she says. “Wow. This is actually happening tomyfriend. When do I get to meet this man of yours? And does he have any hot friends?”

“He has a brother who made a fortune selling his tech start-up, but last time I checked, you were still married.”

“Details, details.” Bethany waves this off as though it’s not important, and we laugh. “What’s going to happen when the two weeks are over?”

“It’s just a fling. When the two weeks are over, it’s over.”

She raises her eyebrows. “Is it?”

“Yes,” I say. “It is.”

* * *

Iwake up at four inthe morning, Julian asleep beside me. This is my third night in his bed. The past two nights, I didn’t think about the future at all. I just focused on the present, on having great sex for the first time in years.

Now, perhaps because of my conversation with Bethany, I think about what will happen at the end of next weekend. I told myself I deserve some fun, which is true, but I also told myself it would be easy to get over him, even if there were pesky feelings involved.

I climb out of bed and head to his en suite washroom, where we’ve already had sex twice. When I make my way back through the dark bedroom, I trip on something and fall to the floor.

“Ow,” I groan, but quietly, so I don’t wake Julian.

I hurt my right foot on a piece of furniture; no big deal. Since it’s only my third night here, I don’t have the layout of the room perfectly memorized.

I stay on the floor, wrap my hands around my foot, and rock back and forth. I’ll be okay. A minute or two, and the pain will subside.

When I feel better, I hobble to the bed and get under the covers.

It’s okay, I tell myself.You’ll be just fine.

But I’m wide awake now.

Twenty minutes later, I get up and head to the window. I look out at the cityscape before me. So many bright lights, so many people, and I’m all the way up here, with just my thoughts to keep me company.

There’s a lump in my throat, and it’s suddenly painful to swallow. The view before me is pretty and I loved it when I first saw it, but in a way, it’s so, so sad. In a city of millions of people, there are so many of us who are alone. Although I’m not alone tonight, this is just a temporary break from reality.

A few tears slide silently down my cheeks.

As the years go by, I’ll watch things happen to those around me but stay apart from it all. I know this is how it has to be. I’ve known for a while; it’s nothing new. But I can’t lie to myself. Sometimes I fantasize that Julian and I could have more than a couple weeks together.

Impossible fantasies.

I can’t keep waking up in his bed and cuddling with him before I start my day. I need to preserve a little distance so those feelings don’t become more than they already are.

I take one more look at Julian before walking back to the guest room and climbing into the bed I haven’t used for a few nights.

I can’t have the same things as other people.

Sure, I can have a job, I can enjoy gingerbread lattes, and I can be a decent friend—as long as I don’t subject my friends to the darkness inside me—but...

God, why do I have to be sostupid?

I couldn’t finish university on the first try.

And will I really be able to hold onto this job, or am I destined to fuck that up, too?

I can see the next year laid out clearly before me. I see the lows I will reach...except I don’t see the bottom of them, don’t know exactly how low I will go. It’s fucking terrifying.

I know I’ll lose interest in the world around me, including my research. But I can’t see exactly how much gray fog I’ll be pushing through, or how dead I’ll feel inside, or how impossibly heavy my chest will feel when I try to breathe.