It was a Wednesday afternoon when I stood outside Kimberly’s shower with a towel wrapped around myself. The heating in her apartment was spotty. Some days it was turned up to the point that we were sweating in November and some days we were left shivering as it snowed outside. I knew that to escape the frigid chill that sent goosebumps through the length of my body, I needed to get dressed in record time. I should have been jumping into my pants and hastily drying my hair that curved into loose, inky tendrils. Instead, I found myself under the spell of my shower thoughts. I was too enraptured in them to be concerned about how the temperature made me shiver. I sat on the edge of the toilet seat as drops of water from my hair dripped down my shoulders and remembered what Adonis and Nancy were like.

It had perplexed me to hear that Nancy thought Adonis wasn’t satisfied with her. Even apart from her suspicions about my relationship to Adonis, she said she felt as though she wasn’t enough for him. Even if he hadn’t loved Nancy as much as he should have, it wouldn’t have warranted her cheating. I had developed a morbid curiosity about the perils of their relationship as of recently. Had there been signs that they weren’t truly happy? That even without rumors of an affair floating in their heads, they weren’t right for each other?

The picture that had been turned over on my family mantle the last time I was home had made a lasting impression on me. It was my family and Adonis in front of the lake we visited early that summer. All of our smiles were big, all except for Adonis's. I searched deep inside my memories of that day, taking hold of every fragment that remained and tearing it open to dissect the miniscule pieces. Inside one of those flecks of the past was a scene I had almost forgotten. If it wasn’t for the picture frame, I would have probably never recalled it.

My back was to the lake as I hiked up the grass. Water rolled down my legs and dripped off my hair. My bathing suit felt heavy on my body from being soaked and the weightless feeling of floating in the water had left me. The sun was beaming down from its spot directly over my head and I found myself hurrying towards the shade where all of our stuff was sitting. As I grabbed my towel from Darren and I’s bag, he called out to me from the water where he had just been engrossed in a swimming race with Julio.

“The bathrooms are all the way down the hill!” he said, feeling comfortable enough to yell since all the other visiting families were on the other side of the lake. I was thankful that it wasn’t crowded when he continued. “You’re going to have to find a tree and pop a squat. You’ll be fine, just don’t wipe with poison ivy!”

I rolled my eyes as I stepped into my red striped flip flops. “How are you so sure I didn’t relieve myself while I was swimming with you?”

Darren’s eyebrows shot up the way they did whenever I surprised him by competing with his playful teasing. He recovered quickly, wrinkling his nose in disgust. “Is that why this spot's so warm?”

I used the towel as a shield to the sun as I walked into the woods that surrounded the lake. The sound of Nancy talking with Tìa about the kinds of foods she wanted to serve at her wedding faded as I got deeper into the dense set of greenery. The leaves began to act as a canopy and the shade revealed that the sunscreen I had smothered on earlier had not done a good job of preventing the sunburn forming on my shoulders.

It was not until I heard the sound of shuffling and saw dirt being kicked into the air that I remembered Adonis had ventured into the forest to use the bathroom just a few minutes ahead of me. Immediately, I thought about turning back and waiting until I saw him come out of the woods to be safe but then it was too late. I spotted his mop of long hair and dark skin, his outline delicate and soft. He was sitting with his back against a tree trunk, his shirt and trunks still clutching his skin from being submerged in the lake.

I recalled how rude Darren had been when Adonis didn’t take off his shirt to go swimming. It was so easy for someone who was effortlessly the epitome of American beauty standards to make fun of someone who wasn’t as confident in their body. I had told Darren to knock it off but Adonis didn’t seem like he had even heard him. He had been distant the whole drive to the lake and floated around like a piece of driftwood while in the water.

I only inched closer because it was clear that the moisture on his cheeks wasn’t from the lake but sprung freshly out of his eyes.

“Are you hurt?” I asked, concerned he might have twisted his ankle or fallen on his way back to us.

Adonis startled. He shook as if he had gotten a violent form of goosebumps and then appeared mortified that I had found him. He began to smile like he was going to try and cover up how obviously distraught he was but then he dropped the mask. He collapsed against the trunk once more and let out a shaky breath.

“No, no. I just needed some space,” he said, pressing his lips together. A tear ran down the side of his face and rather than make a move to wipe it away, he let it fall onto the dirt. “Not that you need to leave. I don’t mind you having found me.”

He sniffled and I felt my heart drop. His voice was dripping in the fragility that came with having cried for a long time. I found myself trying to recall how long he had been gone and questioned how no one had gone out to look for him or at the very least wondered out loud about where he went. 

I walked over and sat so I wouldn’t be looming over him. I wanted to know what was bothering him, what had troubled him so severely that he had to seek refuge in the trees and release the emotions that had been fighting to get out, but I didn’t want to scare him into silence. I opted to sit beside him and ignore my nagging blatter. After a few moments, he took a shallow breath and spoke.

“Do you ever feel like the whole world is falling apart and there’s nothing you can do but slowly suffocate in the rubble?”

I glanced at him but before I could respond he continued.

“Sometimes I look around and wonder if I made the wrong decisions.”  His chest rose and fell in unsteady bursts. Suddenly, he appeared tired and pale. He hugged his knees to himself, partially burying his face in his arms like he wanted to shrink into himself. “I wonder where I would be if I took a slightly different turn, if I would be happier.”

“What do you mean? What decisions?” He turned his head from me to act as if he had taken an interest in the nature around us but I knew better. “Let me help you. What’s wrong?”

Adonis turned back to me and slowly he broke out into a thousand watt smile. “You’ve always been kind to me.” He appraised me for a moment and then the smile faltered as storm clouds moved into his raven black eyes. “You don’t deserve this,” he mumbled.

I leaned in closer hoping that I could drag something more out of him. When I placed a hand on his upper back to give a comforting pat, he flinched away with a wince.

“Are you okay?”

He nodded but his teeth were still gritted. “Yeah, I think I’m sunburnt.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. He was getting up, dusting the dirt off his shorts and clearing his throat. I had never seen Adonis attempt to lie but if this was how he did all the time, then he wasn’t good at it. People didn’t get sunburnt through their clothing. His shirt was definitely covering his back. I was jealous of it actually, since my skin was beginning to sting.

“You’ve had your shirt on this whole time.”

He did nothing but gesture to where the lake was with a solemn frown. “People will start to wonder where I am.”

I let him go only because my bladder was about to burst. When we were all packing to go back home from the trip, I followed Adonis to the trunk of Nancy’s car to help him lift the cooler filled with leftover sandwiches and drinks. As he bent to pick up his side, his shirt slid down to the center of his back. In the evening glow of the sun, I could make out a purple and blue tint. My stare lingered after we had set the cooler inside. He watched me as I wordlessly gestured to his back. He shook his head as if to say, “Don’t ask.” The nauseating feeling of impending doom was encircling me but before I could work out what he could have been trying to hide, Darren captured me in his arms. He spun me around until Nancy complained that I’d get dizzy and throw up once I was in her car.

“Next time,” Darren said, flushed and out of breath, “you and I are coming here alone. I want you all to myself.”

I was ashamed of how quickly I had forgotten about Adonis’s bruised back. It was as if after that moment, the memory had temporarily evaporated. I had let myself get distracted and never checked back in with Adonis. If I had, maybe he would have told me how he had gotten hurt and if it was related to his vague statements about doubting the decisions he made or feeling stuck. It could have been nothing but if it had been nothing, then why had he tried to hide it? A disturbing thought crossed my mind. Nancy wouldn’t have ever hit Adonis, would she? No matter how upset or what she thought he did to her, she wouldn’t lay a hand on him. I had never seen her do something like that before. Sure, she had pulled my hair and yanked me a couple of times but wasn’t that what sisters did? Things like a small slap on the back of the head were different than leaving bruises on a partner.

Either way, I didn’t like it. I didn’t like that I had never asked Adonis about it again. He had said I had always been kind to him but if I was truly kind, I would have remembered to check in on him. He might have needed help and I hadn’t been there for him. What if he had been giving signs all along? What if the note he slipped into my purse at the wedding was the hundredth time he tried to reach out to me?

My phone rang as I was detangling my hair. I almost didn’t check to see who it was, certain that it was Darren again. However, a nagging itch probed me to check. When the unknown caller ID stared back at me, I was convinced that the itch had been a premonition. Everytime I thought the person would never call again, they called.

I listened carefully for a second to make sure Kimberly hadn’t arrived home yet. The apartment was silent. I answered.

“Hello?”

I received no greeting in return. The voice was as distorted as usual but the level of coldness was higher this time. “Detective Vincent Pham from Nestleton Police Station. Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to Linda and Cuong Pham. Drives a silver sedan. Should I go on?”

My blood ran cold. I gripped the side of Kimberly's dresser for balance. The mirror that hung above it reflected a doe eyed woman with hair sticking to the sides of her face.

“What are you saying?” I asked, trying to feign confusion. I was confused but not in the manner that meant I was innocent. I had known that the anonymous caller had been suspicious of Vincent as my coworker. Perhaps they had watched as I climbed into his car over the last few weeks. Perhaps they had followed him to the station or even seen me sprint to it after Nancy told me about her and Darren.

“You know what I am saying.” The person huffed and their tone took on an air of disgust. “Why would you ever work with the police? They can’t protect you like I can.”

“I don’t know you!” I shouted and the person on the other line seemed to pause. “I can’t trust you if I don’t even know who you are or what your actual voice sounds like. Do you blame me for trusting the law enforcement over a creepy, anonymous caller?”

“We’re done here. I mean it. I can’t communicate with you or protect you anymore now.”

If that was the worst thing that would come out of this, then I was fine with it. As long as Vincent didn’t get hurt because of his status as a detective, I could deal with the repercussions. I anticipated that those included that whoever had hired this protection for me would be informed that I was working with a detective. They would know we were on to them.

“Fine,” I said.

I heard the person on the other line groan in frustration. Then, just before the line died, I heard a faint mumble.

“You don’t deserve this.”

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