Page 157 of Gamebreaker

Silence.

Silence, and then the sound of someone trying to breathe around tears she'd been crying for a long time before she called. Shaky. Wet. Close to the phone, like she was curled around it.

"Harper."

There was a very long pause. I could hear her trying to find her voice and finding it in pieces.

"I'm so proud of you." It came out barely above a whisper, broken at the edges. "I'm so... Cam. I'm so proud of you."

I closed my eyes. I had to put my hand on the counter.

"I saw it, and I couldn't not call. I know I probably shouldn't have. I know we're still..." She stopped, and then tried again. "I'm proud of you. I needed to say it out loud. I needed you to hear somebody say it who..."

She didn't finish. She didn't have to.

"I'm glad you called." My voice came out raw, and I didn't care what it sounded like anymore. "Are you okay?"

A sound emerged that was almost a laugh. "I've been crying for an hour, so, like, define okay."

"Where are you?"

"On my couch. In the dark." A wet sniff. "I cried all my mascara off an hour ago. I look like a raccoon who got dumped."

Even at a time like this, she was so close to making me laugh. "I'm sure you don't."

"I keep reading it," she said. "Over and over. I've read it maybe forty times. You did it. You actually did it."

"I did it."

"How do you feel?" she asked. And under the tears, under the careful way she was holding herself together, she actually wanted to know. Not a test. Not an opening for a bigger conversation. She just wanted to know how I was.

Three weeks ago, she'd stood in my doorway, breaking, and told me to eat real meals. She was still doing it.

"Terrified," I said. "And lighter than I've been in twelve years. Both at once. I don't know what to do with it."

She let out a long, shaky breath. "Yeah. That tracks."

"Harper, there's more I need to say."

A brief silence passed. "Okay."

"I spent twelve years calculating what coming out would cost me. Endorsements. The narrative. How people would see my career. I ran those numbers every time the idea came up. I was so busy counting the cost of saying it that I never once counted what staying quiet was taking." I was holding the edge of the counter too hard, but I didn't even truly feel it. "The people I could have had in my life. The years I spent performing as a person who was only half true."

She didn't say anything. I could hear her listening.

"You," I said. "The cost was you. I'm not asking you to do anything with that. I just need you to know that when I posted it, I knew exactly what I was finally ending. I should have ended it a long time ago. Before you ever had to walk out my door."

Another long silence hovered between us.

When she spoke again, her voice was thick. "Cam, I..."

"The last line," I said. "I need to make sure..."

"I know." A whisper. "I know it's about me. I saw the post within about four seconds, which probably tells you everything about how my week has gone, and I got to the last line and I just..."

Her breath hitched and broke.

"It's about you," I said. "Every word of it is about you."