Off Script

The problem with pretending to be someone else for six months is that sometimes you forget which version of yourself you're supposed to be performing, and right now, sitting in Griffin's kitchen while he makes me coffee at seven in the morning, I can't for the life of me remember why I started rambling about Tessa's anatomy textbooks.

"So the circulatory system chapter has all these diagrams that look like subway maps," I'm saying, gesturing with my hands like I'm conducting an orchestra of medical knowledge, "and she's got highlighters everywhere, color coding arteries versus veins, and I swear the kitchen table looks like a rainbow exploded all over Gray's Anatomy."

Griffin's standing at his fancy espresso machine, the kind that probably costs more than most people's cars, and he's programming buttons while I babble. He's wearing yesterday's dress shirt, wrinkled and unbuttoned at the collar, sleeves rolled up because that's just what he does, and his hair is sticking up in seventeen different directions because we didn't exactly get much sleep.

That should make me feel victorious. Accomplished. One step closer to moving in, to joint bank accounts, to the kind of financial security I've been chasing my whole adult life.

Instead, panic is crawling up my throat like acid.

"She's thinking about specializing in pediatrics," I continue, because apparently my mouth has disconnected from my brain. "Says she wants to work with kids because they heal faster, bounce back quicker than adults. Though honestly, I think she just likes the idea of tiny hospital gowns."

Griffin turns around, two perfect cappuccinos in his hands, foam art and everything. Heart shapes in the milk. Because of course he can do latte art.

"She sounds amazing," he says, settling into the chair across from me. "How long has she been in the program?"

"Two years. She's got another year and a half before she graduates." I take a sip of the coffee and it's perfect. Not just good, perfect. The exact temperature I like, the exact ratio of espresso to milk that I prefer, which is weird because I never told him how I take my coffee.

"You must be proud of her."

"I am." And that's the truth, maybe the only completely honest thing I've said in months. "She's brilliant. Always has been. Even when we were kids, she was the one reading medical journals for fun while I was, "

I catch myself before I say 'while I was learning how to spot expensive watches and memorize divorce records.'

"While you were what?"

"Reading romance novels," I lie smoothly. "Much less noble."

Griffin laughs, and the sound does something to my chest that I don't want to examine too closely. "Nothing wrong with romance novels. Some of the best stories are about people finding each other."

The way he's looking at me when he says it makes my stomach flip in ways that have nothing to do with caffeine.

"Speaking of finding things," he says, reaching into his pocket, "I got you something."

Oh shit. Here it comes. The expensive jewelry, the designer handbag, the key to his heart wrapped in Tiffany blue. This is what I've been working toward, what I'm supposed to want.

He slides a small silver key across the table.

Not metaphorical. Actual key.

"It's to the apartment," he says, and there's something almost shy in his voice. "I know we haven't talked about it officially, but you're here most nights anyway, and I thought, " He runs his hand through his hair. "I thought maybe you'd like to have one. For when I'm traveling or working late or whatever."

I stare at the key like it might bite me.

This is too fast. Too real. Keys mean expectations, mean explanations about where I go during the day and why I don't have a job and who keeps texting me about nursing school tuition payments.

"Griffin," I start, but he's already talking.

"I know it's a lot. I know we're still figuring things out, and I don't want to pressure you into anything you're not ready for. But Kendra, the thing is, " He stops, takes a breath. "I've been putting aside money for when we move in together someday. Because I want a someday with you. I want a lot of somedays."

Shame burns through me like I've swallowed lighter fluid. He's talking about our future like it's this beautiful thing he's building, and I'm sitting here calculating how much money he's probably got in savings and whether his mother's jewelry is kept in a safe deposit box or just a bedroom safe.

"You don't know me," I say, and it comes out harsher than I meant it to.

"I know you stay up reading until three in the morning when you think I'm asleep. I know you cry at dog videos but pretend it's allergies. I know you alphabetize things when you're nervous, and you hate small talk, and you think most modern art is pretentious garbage but you've got this way of looking at paintings that makes me want to see them through your eyes."

My hands are shaking. Actually shaking, like I'm coming off something instead of just sitting in a beautiful kitchen with a man who thinks I alphabetize things when I'm nervous, which I do, fuck, I do do that.

"I know you're hiding something," he says quietly. "And I don't care what it is. Whatever brought you to that gala, whatever made you think you needed to perform for me, it doesn't matter. I see you, Kendra. The real you. And I like her a hell of a lot."

The words hit me like a physical blow. He sees me. He likes me. The real me, which doesn't exist, which is just a collection of survival mechanisms wrapped in borrowed dresses and carefully practiced smiles.

I need to get out of here. Need to put distance between us before I do something monumentally stupid like start crying or tell him the truth or reach across this table and,

"I should go," I say, standing up so fast my chair scrapes against the floor. "I have things to do today. Errands."

Griffin's face falls, but he doesn't argue. "Okay. Will I see you later?"

"Maybe. I don't know. I might be busy."

It's a shit answer, and we both know it. Griffin nods anyway, like he's not disappointed, like he doesn't notice that I'm practically running for the door.

"Kendra," he calls when I'm halfway to the elevator. "The key. You forgot, "

"Keep it," I say without turning around. "I don't need it."

The lie tastes like metal in my mouth.

Three hours later, I'm sitting in a diner in Queens that smells like grease and broken dreams, across from my sister who's surrounded by medical textbooks and empty coffee cups. Tessa looks exhausted, dark circles under her eyes, blonde hair pulled back in a messy ponytail that makes her look younger than twenty two.

"You look like hell," I tell her, because that's what big sisters do.

"Thanks. You look expensive." She eyes my outfit, yesterday's designer blouse and skirt that I forgot to change out of. "New boyfriend treating you well?"

If she only knew. "Something like that."

Tessa opens her pharmacology textbook and immediately starts highlighting things in yellow. "I've got an exam tomorrow. Cardiac drugs. Want to quiz me on ACE inhibitors?"

"I don't know what those are."

"Medications that help with high blood pressure and heart failure. They block this enzyme that, " She stops, looks at me. "Never mind. You don't care about medical stuff."

But the thing is, I do care. I care about everything Tessa does, everything she learns, every step closer she gets to becoming the doctor she's dreamed of being since she was twelve years old and our neighbor had a heart attack on our front steps.

"Try me," I say.

For the next hour, Tessa explains drug interactions and side effects while I pretend I understand half of what she's saying. She's animated when she talks about medicine, the same way she used to get excited about science fair projects and National Geographic documentaries. Watching her talk about saving lives makes my chest ache in ways I can't name.

"The crazy thing is," she says, taking a break to demolish a piece of apple pie, "I never thought I'd actually make it this far. You know? When I was applying to nursing school, it felt like this impossible dream. Too expensive, too competitive, too everything."

I know exactly how much her tuition costs. I know because I've been paying it for two years.

"But you did make it."

"Because you believed in me." She reaches across the table and squeezes my hand. "I know things have been tight for you, and I know you've been taking on extra work to help with school expenses. I don't know what I would have done without you, Ken."

Extra work. If she only knew what my extra work actually involved.

"It's nothing," I say, which is true and not true at the same time.

"It's everything to me." Tessa's eyes are bright, and I can see the little girl who used to bandage her dolls and perform surgery on stuffed animals. "I'm going to pay you back, you know. Once I graduate, once I get a job, I'm going to pay back every penny."

The guilt sits in my stomach like a stone. She thinks I'm working extra shifts at some imaginary job, picking up freelance projects, maybe asking friends for loans. She has no idea that her education is being funded by my ability to spot lonely millionaires at charity events.

"You don't need to pay me back."

"I want to. I want to take care of you the way you've taken care of me." She grins. "Maybe I'll become a nurse practitioner, make the big bucks, buy you a house with a library in it. You always wanted a library."

My throat closes up. I did always want a library. Still do, if I'm being honest, which I never am anymore.

"That sounds nice," I manage.

Tessa goes back to her textbooks, and I sit there watching her study, thinking about Griffin programming my coffee preferences into his machine without me ever telling him what they were. Thinking about the way he said he wanted a someday with me. Thinking about the key I left on his kitchen counter.

Thinking about the fact that someday, Tessa's going to find out exactly how I've been paying for her somedays.

My phone buzzes. Text from Griffin.

'Hope your errands went well. Made too much pasta for dinner if you want to come over. No pressure.'

I stare at the message for a long time. No pressure. Like he means it. Like he's not expecting anything from me except whatever I'm willing to give.

"Is that your boyfriend?" Tessa asks without looking up from her drug interaction charts.

"Maybe."

"You should go. You look miserable, and miserable people make terrible study partners."

She's not wrong. I am miserable. Miserable in ways I didn't even know existed six months ago, when life was simpler and I knew exactly who I was and what I wanted.

"Tess," I say suddenly. "What if I told you I did something terrible? Something that hurt people?"

She looks up from her textbook. "Did you kill someone?"

"No."

"Did you hurt a kid or an animal?"

"No."

"Then it's probably not as terrible as you think." She goes back to highlighting. "Besides, you're asking hypothetically, which means you feel guilty about it. People who do genuinely terrible things don't usually feel guilty."

I want to tell her she's wrong. Want to explain that some people get very good at feeling guilty while continuing to do terrible things anyway. But Tessa believes in people the way she believes in medicine, that most problems have solutions if you just know the right treatment.

"I should let you study."

"Yeah, probably." She grins at me. "But Ken? Whatever you did, whatever's eating at you, just fix it. You're one of the good ones. Act like it."

One of the good ones. Christ.

I'm halfway back to Manhattan before I realize I'm not going home to my studio apartment with its broken air conditioner and neighbors who blast music until three in the morning. I'm going back to Griffin's place, where he's making too much pasta and probably leaving space for me at his dinner table without even thinking about it.

I'm using my key to get into his building, the one he gave me three months ago that I've been carrying around like evidence of a crime I haven't committed yet.

The elevator ride to his floor feels endless.

Griffin opens the door before I can knock, like he's been waiting by the window watching for me. He's changed into jeans and a t shirt, and his hair is even messier than this morning, and he smiles when he sees me like I'm the best thing that's happened to him all day.

"Hey," he says.

"Hey."

"Hungry?"

I should say no. Should make up some excuse about eating already, about being tired, about needing to go home and do laundry or call my mother or any of the thousand lies I've perfected over the years.

Instead, I find myself saying, "Starving."

The pasta is good. Better than good. Griffin tells me about his day, about some coding problem he's been trying to solve, about a meeting that ran long because his business partner couldn't stop making jokes about user interface design.

I tell him about Tessa's exam, about cardiac drugs and drug interactions and how proud I am of her. I don't mention the diner or the tuition payments or the way she called me one of the good ones like it was an indisputable fact.

"She sounds incredible," Griffin says. "I'd love to meet her sometime."

The metallic taste of guilt floods my mouth. "She's really busy with school."

"Of course. Maybe over winter break, when things calm down?"

Winter break. Like we'll still be together in six months. Like this thing between us has that kind of staying power.

Like I'm not planning to disappear with a chunk of his money long before then.

"Maybe," I say, which we both know means no.

Griffin doesn't push. He never pushes, which somehow makes everything worse.

After dinner, we end up on his couch, some Netflix show playing that neither of us is really watching. Griffin's reading something on his tablet, occasionally showing me funny passages or interesting facts. I'm curled up against his side, listening to him breathe, trying not to think about how right this feels.

"Kendra," he says during a lull in conversation.

"Yeah?"

"That thing you want to tell me but keep not telling me? Whenever you're ready, I'm here."

My heart stops. "What thing?"

"Whatever's been eating at you for weeks. Whatever made you practically run out of here this morning." He sets down his tablet, turns to face me properly. "You don't have to tell me. But if you want to, I'm not going anywhere."

The words are right there, crowding against my teeth. The truth about who I am, what I do, why I'm here. About Tessa's tuition and my own student loans that defaulted years ago and the fact that I've been living a lie so long I barely remember what honesty feels like.

"I love you," I say instead.

The words fall out of my mouth like they've been waiting there for months, and maybe they have. Maybe I've been swallowing them back every morning when he makes me coffee and every night when he reads to me and every time he looks at me like I'm something precious instead of something dangerous.

Griffin goes very still. "What?"

"I love you." The words come easier the second time, like a dam breaking. "I love the way you hum off key when you're cooking. I love that you remember things I tell you about my sister. I love that you see through all my bullshit and still want to have breakfast with me."

Griffin's eyes go soft behind his glasses. "Kendra, "

"I love that you gave me a key and didn't make it a big deal. I love that you program my coffee into your machine without asking what I like because you pay attention. I love that you, " My voice cracks. "I love you, and I don't know what to do about it."

Because loving him changes everything. Makes this real instead of just a job. Makes leaving him feel like tearing out pieces of my own heart.

Griffin reaches up, touches my face with those careful hands. "You don't have to do anything about it. Just feel it."

"It's not that simple."

"Isn't it?" He leans closer, and I can see flecks of gold in his green eyes. "I love you too, Kendra. I've been in love with you for months. Since that first night when you told me the art auction was garbage and meant it."

He loves me. He loves me, and I'm the worst person in the world.

Griffin kisses me then, soft and careful like he's afraid I might break. And maybe I am breaking, have been breaking for weeks without realizing it, all my carefully constructed walls crumbling under the weight of his genuine affection.

When we break apart, I can see our whole future laid out in his eyes. Moving in together, meeting each other's families, building something real and lasting and honest.

Everything I can never have.

"Griffin," I start.

"I know," he says quietly. "Whatever you're afraid of, we'll figure it out. Together."

Together. Like we're a team. Like I'm not planning to destroy him.

I curl closer to him, memorizing the way he feels, the way he smells, the sound of his heartbeat under my ear. Tomorrow I'll figure out how to end this before it ends me. Tomorrow I'll remember why I can't keep him.

Tonight, I let myself pretend we're just two people who found each other and fell in love. Tonight, I let myself believe in someday.

Even though I know better.

Even though I know this has to end.

Even though loving him might be the most selfish thing I've ever done.