4338.204 · July 23, 2018 AD
The Long Way Home
Jamie's shift ended hours ago. The lie he told Luke should have bought him time, but time is exactly what he doesn't want—hours alone with the memory of what he's done, the phantom weight of hands that weren't his partner's. So he drives. Bottle shops. Car parks. The long way around a bridge he's crossed a thousand times but never like this. Never carrying something this heavy home.
There's no traffic jam quite as effective as the one you create yourself when you're terrified of where the road ends.
Jamie Greyson should be home by now. His shift ended hours ago. But the lie he told Luke—Mr Gangley had another fall, don't wait up—has become a cage with a very specific shape. He can't walk through his own front door at half past five. Can't let the fiction collapse before he's ready to face what's underneath it.
So he drives. The eastern shore unspools in grey winter light—Rosny, Bellerive, the waterfront car park where he sits watching the Derwent do nothing while his mind replays an afternoon he can't undo. Bottle shops offer fifteen-minute reprieves. Car parks full of ordinary people doing ordinary things remind him what normal used to feel like.
Luke's texts glow on his phone. Love you. Two words Jamie can't return. Not in text. Not in person. Not with Ben still on his skin and the taste of betrayal fresh in his throat.
When he finally crosses the Tasman Bridge, the clock reads what it needs to read.
Late enough to be believable. Early enough to fall apart.
