Page 70 of All That We Are Together
“Yeah. You’re honest. Transparent.”
He smiled and squeezed my hand tighter.
“I love you a lot. You know that, right?”
“I love you too. Always.”
The wind shook the treetops and swept away a couple of leaves that had fallen to the ground.
“Oliver?”
“What?”
“What did you do with all our things?”
“I grabbed what I could.” He looked away. “The Nguyens helped me. I have a few boxes; they kept the others. I donated a couple of Dad’s paintings to a gallery that wanted them, and the rest…”
“What about the rest?”
“I left them there.”
“In the house? Do you think they threw them all out?”
“I don’t know, and I’d rather not think about it. We should go back, Leah. It’s getting late; we need to drop you in Brisbane. It won’t be long before our flight leaves.”
As we returned to the hotel, I tried to clear my mind of all I was thinking. I wish I could say I succeeded. But I didn’t.
February
_____
(SUMMER, AUSTRALIA)
57
Leah
I went back to Brisbane. To my routine. To painting.
Since I didn’t have to go to class, the days just slipped past. I spent hours in the attic, went out now and then for a drink with friends in the evening, had dinner at Landon’s some nights, and slept curled up by his side.
But there was a crack in that monotony.
And that crack was named Axel.
58
Leah
“An art fair, huh,” Landon said while he helped me take a shell out of a cabinet over my head. I’d just told him I’d be going away that weekend with Axel and exhibiting five pieces. “Will you sleep here?”
“Yeah, it’s just an hour away by car. You want to come?” I looked at him doubtfully, knowing that if he said yes, the situation would be weird, but at the same time, I desperately needed everything to be normal. For now, I was far from achieving that.
Landon shook his head.
“I can’t, I’ve got things to do.”
I admired Landon’s serenity. Maybe because that was the opposite of me; I was pure nerve and impulsivity. I let my emotions carry me away. I could cry over something silly; I could laugh until my stomach hurt, go from black to white in the blink of an eye, and turn things over and over in my mind till it felt like a centrifuge.