Page 23 of The KING Review

Chapter Eight

The Emotionally Volatile One

Grant

Ihaven’t stopped thinking about it all evening. The look on her face, the way her body seized up like I hit her with a cattle prod, and the way she totally shut down afterward. I don’t know exactly what set her off, but I can make an educated guess.

I know, because Fia has told me, that she and Neve are routinely compared—most of all by their parents. Fia is always told she’s too cold, not emotionally articulate or expressive enough, so Neve ends up being the one who’s too emotional.

She even told me before the session, when she texted me, that she’s the “emotionally volatile one.” I shake my head, annoyed with myself. I didn’t say it in so many words, but I basically told her she was too much. I’m a fucking idiot.

It’s eating me alive.

God, I can’t believe I’m about to do this.

I grab my phone from my pocket almost vengefully, swallowing hard as I tap into our text thread, then hit the record button for a voice note.

I clear my throat. “Hey… uh, I just wanted to say sorry about what happened earlier. I don’t exactly know what it was that set you off, but⁠—”

I cut myself off, wanting to scrub the message, but I think that if there’s anything Neve Hart might appreciate, it’s candor. Still, the last thing I want to do is accuse her of being ‘set off,’ especially given the context.

I try again, continuing, “Fuck. Sorry, again, I don’t mean set you off—you weren’t… You didn’t do anything unreasonable, Neve. But… I guess it was when I said ‘too much’? I’m speculating here, but that’s when you shut down. Your whole posture changed, like you were trying to check out. I didn’t mean to upset you, but I’m sorry I did, and you’re entitled to feel whatever you felt. I just don’t know why you felt it, so… if you want, will you explain it to me?” I clear my throat again. “So, I can be better… next time.”

I keep my thumb on the screen, contemplating deleting the whole message, but then I release it and let it send.

I wait ten minutes, trying and failing to read a new literature review while periodically flipping my phone over to see if she’s messaged back yet, but every time I check, there’s nothing.

Eventually, I shut my phone in a drawer in my bedroom. With Sera not here, I have nothing to occupy my time, so I lock the phone away and try to go about my usual routine.

I choose my go-to, for when I’m trying to get my mind off a spiral—cooking.

I opt for something simple, but with multiple steps that require me to focus on timing and order. Broiled garlic asparagus. Black rice. A fresh salad with blackberries, goat’s cheese, arugula, and pistachios.

I work through everything methodically.

The black rice comes first, since it takes so long to cook properly, but I like it better than wild rice—which is apparently a grass, not a rice, so maybe that’s why I don’t like it—and I put it on the stovetop in my black rice pan, which I use only for black rice because it stains everything a faint purple color no matter how hard I scrub it. I add a little salt and some vegetable stock, then set it boiling, covered with a glass lid so I can keep an eye on it.

Standing at the island, I break the woody stalks off the ends of the asparagus, dropping them into the trash can nearby. The asparagus spears get tossed with oil, salt, pepper, and garlic, and I throw them on an enamel tray and push them into the oven to roast.

I check on the rice, which is maybe halfway through cooking, then get to work on the salad. The arugula is fresh this week from the greengrocer in the city market, and I wash it in the salad spinner my folks got me for my birthday a few years back. The top of the bowl is a little cracked, and the edge of it is melted where it accidentally touched my air fryer when it was hot, but it still seals and works fine, so I haven’t bothered to replace it.

I picked up the blackberries yesterday, and I drop those into the spinner to wash them with the arugula too. After that, I’m dropping them into a bowl and setting to work shelling pistachios.

The rice still has about ten minutes to go, if I had to guess, which is the perfect amount of time to shell the pistachios, dice up the goat’s cheese, and make a quick vinaigrette from olive oil, mayonnaise, English wholegrain mustard, and balsamic vinegar, shaken in a jar with the lid on to emulsify it all.

By the time I toss the salad, the rice is done cooking, and the asparagus is fully roasted. I turn off the oven and empty the rice pan into the metal farmhouse sink, leaning into the billowing steam that rises up.

I settle at the table with a glass of red wine and my dinner, with the Maya Mercy book I’ve been trying to read on and off when I haven’t been distracted by Neve Hart. I haven’t gone to get my phone from the drawer yet.

I press Right Where You Left Us open on the table beside my plate, spine cracking, and now I’m wondering whether Neve is a spine-cracker or not. I know her sister is, and Cade is an absolute barbarian with his books.

I like a book to look well loved. I glance up to my shelf, stacked with all the romance books I’ve read over the last three or four years. I never would have had them out in the open like this when I was with Marie. She still doesn’t know that I read them—not that it’s any of her business—and I know she would roast me for it if she did.

I guess it’s not “manly” to read romance, or some bullshit.

I enjoy my unmanly book with my dinner regardless, savoring every bite of the meal I made myself and enjoying my glass of red wine, one Fia recommended to me. By the time I’ve finished it, I’m practically vibrating in my chair.

I dogear the page and drop the book on the counter as I ferry my plate and glass into the kitchen, loading them into the dishwasher. I don’t know how long I’m going to be able to hold off checking my phone, and it’s not like I’m trying to play games—I’m not trying to leave it a long time so that it tortures her in some kind of weird way… I’m just trying not to torture myself if she’s not responded yet.