I don’t want to talk to him.

I don’t want to talk to anyone—I’d even rejected a call from Mom on the walk home, because I hadn’t decided yet whether to tell her about the Maryland job or not. I told myself I didn’t want to get her hopes up, but the truth is, I don’t want to get mine any higher than they already are.

I just need to get through the interview and the Read-a-thon, and see how everything shakes out.

I send Dad’s call to voice mail and pull up my Read-a-thon checklist, desperate for a distraction, and scan the list of supplies we still need.

Then I start dragging the remaining wedding stuff out of the closet, sorting out what I can repurpose for the fundraiser—napkins, plates, flameless tea lights—and what I should just donate. The rest—the dress and everything else sellable—is still at Ashleigh’s, one more problem I can’t think about right now.

I take a quick break to order dinner, then dive back into sorting and packing until I hear a pounding at the door, the dinner I have no appetite for.

“You can leave it there!” I shout, jumping up and sprinting down the hallway. I look around for a sweater I can pull on over my sports bra. “I already paid and tipped when I ordered!”

No answer.

Then the scrape of a throat being cleared.

“It’s Peter.”

I honestly almost blurt out Peter who? while pulling my cardigan off the coat hook and onto my body.

Then it clicks, like a bullet into a barrel.

Peter.

I open the door, half expecting to have my only workable theory disproven. There’s no way Peter Collins is here, on my doorstep.

Except he is.

“Hi, Daphne,” he says, with a woeful smile. “Can I come in?”

“Um . . .”

“Just for a minute,” he promises, his green eyes glossy and brow furrowed in that contrite-yet-hurt way that used to make my kneecaps melt. Not that he had much occasion to use it.

Peter had always been reliable. I always knew where he was, when to expect him. Between our synced calendars, our phones’ location sharing, our rigid schedule, our unspoken agreement to send the Leaving the bar now, see you soon and Ran to the store for more milk while you were in the shower text messages, there wasn’t much space for fights.

I never had to ask, When are you coming home? I never had to worry he wouldn’t.

Until, of course, he didn’t.

I’m too shocked to argue. I widen the door and he steps inside, looking around with abject wonder, like I’m leading him into an accursed ancient pyramid and not a small, eclectically decorated apartment inside a renovated meatpacking facility.

“It looks different,” he says, “from the last time I was here.”

I shoot him a look over my shoulder. Bold move, mentioning the last time he was here. To see his then-best-friend-now-fiancée.

I make a noncommittal sound and lead him to the living room.

The whole time, I’m kind of wishing I’d just started laughing in his face, refused to say a single word, and just kept laughing until he slunk away.

I gesture toward the less comfortable of our two chairs and he sits, waits for me to do the same. I don’t.

His eyes wander over the trail of wedding detritus. “You still have so much stuff.”

“Taking another load to the thrift store tomorrow,” I lie.

He winces. I stare.

After several awkward seconds, he says, “You look great, Daph.”

I do not. “I’m pretty busy, Peter.”

The corners of his mouth twist. I see a question forming on his lips, but he shakes his head, apparently deciding to let it go.

Another few awkward seconds pass. His gaze meets mine, holds, smolders.

I turn to refold a couple of tablecloths. “I’m going to keep packing while you talk.”

“I’m sorry, Daphne,” he says.

“Yeah, you told me that,” I say.

“No, I mean, I’m sorry.”

The chair scrapes back. I turn to find him marching toward me. I still have an ivory table runner gripped in my hands when he grabs them and holds them between us. “I’m so sorry,” he says. “I was stupid and shortsighted. It was all just about chasing a rush, and honestly . . . I think I was afraid of the commitment. Of marriage.”

I half laugh. “So you got engaged to someone else?”

He shakes his head. “We’re not together. We called it off.”

For a moment, I’m speechless.

It feels a little like a low-grade earthquake just rumbled through the room.

“She called it off,” I say.

He huffs. “It was mutual. We both realized how stupid we’d been. I think I knew within a week, honestly, but I’d already made such a wreck of things, I figured I needed to see it through.”

Blood rushes through my ears, dimming his voice.

I feel dizzy. Plenty of physical sensations, but hardly any emotional ones.

“So you knew it was a mistake,” I say, gathering my wits, “and you were going to . . . what? Just marry her anyway? You ripped up my life and then you were going to destroy hers too? For . . . for fucking pride?”

His jaw drops, hurt flooding his features. I’ve never talked to him like this. It’s close to things I’ve screamed, in my darkest late-night fantasy speeches, but it doesn’t actually feel good to say.

It doesn’t feel good to hurt him.

Because truthfully, I don’t feel hurt by him right now.

Wronged? Sure. Hurt? No. He’s not capable of that anymore.

I step back. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to be mean to you.”

He shakes his head. “I deserve it.”

“You do,” I say. “But still, I don’t want to treat you like that. I just . . . It’s hard to take any of this seriously. It’s hard to trust what you say now, after all the lying.”

“Lying?” His brow scrunches. “I told you as soon as anything happened with Petra. I know I acted like scum, but I never lied.”

“You told me there was nothing between you,” I say. “For years. You insisted she was totally wrong for you—”

“She was,” he cuts in. “That’s my point.”

“—and that you could never be with her,” I go on.

“Daphne, that’s what I’m saying,” he counters. “I couldn’t. I can’t.”

“And that you’d never seen her like that,” I finish.

“I hadn’t,” he insists. “Not really. When I said all of that to you, I meant it. Every word. And now I know it’s true. It’s just . . . we were barreling toward our wedding, Daph. And I freaked out. And Petra freaked out too, because she knew the relationship between her and me was probably going to change. We got confused. And I know it makes no sense, because I was ready to marry you, so the time for that kind of confusion should have been way past. You have no idea how sorry I am. I’ll spend my whole life making it up to you. Trying to get back to how perfect we were together.”

“Peter, stop,” I say. “We weren’t perfect. Obviously. Or this couldn’t have happened.”

“Fine,” he says. “Maybe we weren’t. But you were. You were perfect for me, and I threw it away. I miss your cute little giggle, and I miss going to visit Cooper and Sadie with you and getting brunch at Hearth, and going to the gym together, and having dinner with my family. God, my family, Daphne. They miss you too.

“I was so deluded, I thought they’d be on board with the whole Petra thing. And her parents were thrilled, but mine . . . they know me better than all this. They knew it was a mistake right away. You’re part of my family, Daphne. You belong with me.”

As he’s saying it, I feel the telltale prickle behind my nose, the heat coursing into my cheeks. Tears are surfacing and I can’t stop them.

Taking this as encouragement, he moves closer. “We can get our life back,” he whispers. “It’s not too late.”

I can’t help but laugh a little as I dab my eyes with the table runner.

It is too late.

The life he’s describing—it isn’t one I want.