◆◆◆ Chapter 4 ◆◆◆
Later that week, Ryan had moved into Dominic’s guest room. Temporarily, he kept saying, like a guest who’d overstayed a weekend and now had mail forwarded to the new address. Dominic played the gracious host: stocked the fridge with Ryan’s favorite beer, left spare keys on the counter, even offered to help him look for apartments when he was ready. Ryan clung to the routine like a lifeline, and I played my part by checking in, bringing coffee, and listening to the same loops of hurt and self-recrimination.
But every night after Ryan went to bed, I stared at my phone, Dominic’s last text glowing in the dark:
Come over. Door’s unlocked.
I lasted four nights.
On the fifth, I waited until 1:17 a.m., long past when Ryan usually crashed. I drove over in leggings and an ove
