You Still Owe Me

Seventeen days into our silent standoff, I heard my boyfriend of eight years had slept with a girl he grew up with. He was telling people we’d already broken up. When I called, he asked if I had anything to say. I did:” When are you going to pay me back the forty-five thousand dollars you owed me?”

————

“Did you and Ethan break up?”

That was how I found out my boyfriend had apparently spent the night with Vivian Shaw, the woman he’d known since childhood. Someone had seen them leaving the same hotel suite that morning. When asked what the hell he was doing, Ethan Whitmore had said we’d broken up ages ago.

News to me. We hadn’t spoken in seventeen days, but I’d been very careful not to use that particular word.

I called him from my condo.

“Did we break up?”

“Isn’t that what you wanted?” His voice was flat.

I thought about it.

“Fine. When are you going to pay me back?”

Silence.

I sat up. “What does that mean?”

He didn’t answer.

“Ethan. You’re not planning to keep my money, are you?”

Forty-five thousand dollars. He owed me forty-five thousand dollars, and he’d said he’d pay me back. For seventeen days, I’d waited. I hadn’t dared push for the breakup because I was afraid he’d decide he didn’t owe me anything after all.

Now he’d announced it himself. Surely we could settle up before he moved on to the next woman.

“I gave you time,” I said. “You promised. If you don’t pay me back, I’ll sue you.”

My voice turned shrill on the last word. So much for handling this with dignity. I was on my feet, phone clamped to my ear, halfway to the door without any clear idea of what I’d do when I got outside.

“Is that all you want to say to me?” he asked.

I stopped.

“Clara. You have nothing else to say?”

My hand was shaking. I was close to crying, and he wanted a different conversation.

“Pay me back.”