He shrugged, looking down at his hands. There was an IV taped to one arm and his nails were short and chewed. “I don’t know. I’m always home in the daytime—homeschooling, you know—and you mentioned you were working from home. So I said I was, too.” His mouth crooked in a half smile. “Didn’t imagine you’d show up here.”
“How could I not?” she snapped, her temper getting the better of her. “You’ve harassed me every day for the last year and a half, insisting I get online. You stalk my Facebook profile. You send me flowers. You tell me you love me and then you try to kill yourself when you find out I’m engaged! What the hell, Sig? How can I not feel responsible for this? You’ve spent the last eighteen months telling me you’re going to hurt yourself if I don’t spend time with you, and the one weekend I’m away, you try this?”
He stared at his hands, silent.
She sighed and rubbed her face. “I’m sorry. I’m just . . . tired. It’s been a shitty week.”
“Mine, too.”
A small, horrified laugh escaped her, and it turned into a sob. “You can’t do this to yourself, okay? You can’t do this to yourself, and to me. It’s not healthy for either of us.”
“I know. Don’t cry.” He picked up the box of Kleenex on the table next to him and offered it to her. “Mom’s been filling my ears for two days now. I didn’t think she’d care, but I guess she does.”
“Why wouldn’t she care?” Taylor grabbed the tissue and dabbed at her face.
He shrugged. “She just works all the time. When she comes home, she’s too tired to talk to me. You’re all I’ve got.”
“What about your dad?”
“Never been in the picture.” He picked at his blanket. “You and the guild are all I have.”
“Sig,” she said softly, and reached out to squeeze his hand. “I’m just a character in a game. That’s not real life. That’s us hiding behind our screens and escaping. You and me both. And it needs to stop.”
He narrowed his eyes at her, but his thin fingers curled around hers. “What are you hiding from?”
“You name it. Bills? Student loans? A shitty job? The fact that I’m an abject failure in my career that I paid way too much for?” She shrugged. “Sometimes it’s easier to just turn on the computer and be someone else, but over the last few weeks, I’ve realized that I’m missing out on a lot.”
Sig made a face. “Because of him. Brunhilde.”
“Loch,” she agreed, and had to blink hard to stop from crying again. “He . . . he turned out to be a bit of a dud.” She tried to smile, failed, and decided to keep talking. “But I learned something really important when I was out with him. I didn’t have time to be on the computer and I felt . . . alive. I met with friends. I went to dinner. I went to the Excelsior con. I even went rock climbing one day. And I don’t know . . . I’ve felt more alive in the past few weeks than I have in the last eighteen months.” She shrugged and gave his hand another squeeze. “Playing Excelsior so much made me lose track of life, and while that was good for a while, I’m ready to stop hiding.”
“Are you quitting?”
“Probably.” She gave him a weak smile. “I made Madrigal the new guild leader.”
He rolled his eyes. “That guy? Seriously?”
“He’s really good with newbies. And someone needs to take over while I’m gone.” She gave his hand an affectionate little shake. “I think you should quit, too.”
The bleak look returned to his face. “And do what? Stare at the TV?”
“Do something. Get out of the house. Join a club. Go to a support group. Get a part-time job. Something. Anything. It’s just . . . you can’t let online people control your life, Sig. And I can’t, either.” She bit her lip. “I was pretending online, too, you know. Pretending I had everything under control. That I could handle being there for you all the time and juggling my job and still managing to get by. And you know what happened?”
“You got fired?” he guessed.
She nodded.
“You did miss a lot of work.”
“Someone was emotionally blackmailing me to be online with him.”
He gave a rueful nod of his head. “Yeah, guess I was. I’m sorry, Tay.” He squeezed her hand again. “You’re my best friend, you know.”
She smiled. “We can still be friends. Just friends. But I’m not going to be playing as much as I used to, so we’ll have to limit it to texts.”
Sig gave a heavy sigh. “If it makes you feel any better, my mom already said I can’t have my laptop back for three months and until the doctors are sure my depression meds have me leveled out.”
“Your mom’s a smart cookie.”
He hesitated. “I’m sorry I made you lose your job.”
“I’m sorry I let things go on for so long.” She gave him a searching look. “Do you . . . do you really want to die?”
His mouth crumpled a little, and she passed the Kleenex back to him. “I just . . . I get so down, and then there’s no one there for me.”
“Well, you’re getting help now. I can’t promise that every day will be awesome, but you’re going to have the right medication to help you, and your mom is there for you, and I’m still your friend, no matter what. All right?”
He nodded again, and put his hand back on hers. Then he turned it over slowly. “No ring?”