"Both."
The answer came too quickly. Sarah stepped closer.
"We can fix this."
I felt the old reflex activate immediately. Fix. My favorite word.
Give me a broken structure and I will find the load-bearing problem. Give me a budget and I will rebalance it. Give me a relationship crisis and apparently I will finance one person's dream until both people resent the invoice.
"I miss you," she said.
I looked at her.
"What do you miss?"
"You."
"What about me?"
"Mark, don't do this."
"I'm asking."
She wiped at her cheek.
"I miss waking up next to you. I miss talking to you. I miss our place. I miss feeling safe."
There it was again. Safe. Home. Infrastructure. Maybe love was mixed into it.
I am not arrogant enough to claim it was not. People can love someone and still use them. Those truths are not mutually exclusive. Sarah reached for my sleeve.
"Please. Just let me stay wherever you're staying for a few nights. I need time to get on my feet. Jessica's place is tiny. I can't sleep. My parents won't let me come home unless I agree to all these humiliating conditions."
"What conditions?"
"Get a job. Stop the influencer thing. Pay them rent after thirty days. Let my dad look at my debt."
I almost smiled because her father's conditions sounded remarkably reasonable.
"Maybe you should consider them."
"I can't go back there."
"Why?"
"Because they were right."
That was the first completely honest sentence she said all evening. We stood in silence. Then she whispered, "Please, Mark." I looked at her hand on my sleeve. Gently removed it.
"No."
She stared at me.
"You really don't care what happens to me."
"That's not true."
"Then help me."
"Those are not the same thing anymore."