The next day, I stand in my rented flat near the Thames, soaking myself under the shower until the hot water runs cold, letting it wash away today’s training and the physical evidence of today's punishment if not the mental weight. London was supposed to be my escape, my return to normalcy. Instead, I've brought all my ghosts with me across the ocean.
My phone pings with Brè's incoming video call just as I'm wrapping myself in a towel. I consider ignoring it, but after weeks of dodging her questions, I owe her at least a conversation.
“Well, don't you look like sunshine and rainbows,” she quips when I answer, her face filling my screen, Manhattan apartment visible in the background.
“Thanks. I feel like it too.” I plop onto my bed, hair dripping onto the duvet.
“That bad, huh? I thought the great Dr. Mikhailov was supposed to transform you into some kind of swimming goddess.”
“He's trying. I'm just...” I wave my hand vaguely.
“Pining?”
“Training,” I correct sharply. “Intensely, plus I think I’ve got a nasty bout of seasonal depression going on.” I shrug.
Brè gives me her patented bullshit-detector stare. “Oh honey this ain’t no seasonal depression—it’s a Taylor deficiency.” She says matter of fact.
All I can do is blink at her.
She flips her fiery red hair over her shoulder and stares me down through the screen. “Spill it, Bonney. You've been avoiding real conversation for weeks now and I’ve been giving you the space to work through it. So, come on baby girl. How are you actually doing?”
At her words and the look of concern on her face, something in me cracks—maybe it's the familiar way she uses my last name, or maybe I'm just tired of pretending.
“I…I can't stop thinking about him, Brè,” I admit, my voice cracks and the words rush out like water breaking through a dam, fast and breathless, too much to hold back. “My chest physically hurts and I check rodeo scores compulsively.” I sniff. “I've reread his texts so many times I have them memorized. And I—I dream about him. About that stupid river, and the way he looked at me like I was something he'd never expected... but couldn’t bear to lose.”
My throat tightens. My voice shaky as my vision gets blurry with unshed tears.
I press the heel of my hand hard against my forehead like I can somehow push the ache away. “What the hell is wrong with me Brè? This was supposed to be my dream opportunity. Travel, write, swim, move on. And now I’m here, crying about a cowboy who doesn’t even text me anymore.”
Brè doesn’t gloat. She doesn’t smirk or pull out a triumphantI told you so. She doesn’t cut in.There’s silence on the line. When she finally speaks, her voice softer than I’ve ever heard it.
“Nothing’s wrong with you,” she says gently, her voice like a balm. “You just… fell in love.”
The words don’t just land. The words crashes into me. They shatter something.
Love.
I suck in a breath and hold it. I stare at the wall like it might give me answers. It doesn’t.
“Love?” I echo, my voice cracking in the middle. “That can’t be what this is. I don’t fall in love. I don’t even believe in that kind of stuff. YouknowI don’t.”
“You didn’t,” she says gently. “Until now.”
It shouldn’t feel like a punch to the chest. It shouldn’t make the air disappear from the room. But it does. It absolutely does.
I blink. Once. Twice. And then the tears come hot and fast, burning their way down my cheeks before I can pretend to be fine. My shoulders hitch. I try to hold back the sob, but it slips out anyway—a sharp little sound that sounds like it came from someone else entirely.
I press the sleeve of my sweatshirt to my face and sniff hard. “Well, it sucks,” I croak, snotty and wrecked. “It sucks so bad, Brè. I feel completely… out of control.”
“Of course it sucks,” she says, shifting closer on the couch and tucking her feet under her. “Feelings are messy. Love is the messiest one of all.”
She’s too calm, and it makes me spiral faster.
“I don’tdothis. I don’t fall in love. I don’tfeellike this. I don’t sit around hoping some guy will message me like I’m sixteen and hormonal. I’m not this girl!”
“You are,” she says, not unkindly. “You just didn’t know it yet.”
“Has he reached out at all?”
