From K7...
With the words "last night," she tripped into sobbing again, and Danny leaned into the glass front of his cold building and listened as she cried. He was grateful she was crying so hard so he wouldn't have to answer her. Yes, he'd sent a broken-hearted Roddy away.
"Listen, Becca," he started, and then followed along, incredulous, as he spoke the words. "We weren't fighting. Everything was," he choked, "fine." Tears felt like ice on his eyelashes and cheeks. What was he doing? Why lie? Why this lie?? "Maybe he was, I know he was, worried about work?"
Becca sighed into the phone. "You're right. I know." He didn't say anything, exactly, but he just sounded so blue." She took a huge, shuddering breath. "And now he's gone." Her voice swooped and shook. "Danny, Roddy's gone."
And I'm a chicken-shit, Danny thought. He felt like his heart was swollen and chapped. Like his something was scratching inside his chest trying to find its way out. "Becca. Listen, Becca, I - I'm at work. When's the - what are the plans? I can't talk right now. I have to go."
"Um, we don't know the details yet, I'll-"
"Just call me when you know something," he squeaked into the phone. "I really really have to go."
Danny pressed the off button on his phone until the power went off, and then he stared at the black, empty screen for a while. Roddy was dead. A car accident. Roddy was gone. A freezing gust of wind hit his neck and ears, and he hunched himself against the side of the building, twisting his neck to look up and down the street. What am I doing here, he wondered? Why am I even alive?
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