She was quiet. Then she said: “I’m sorry, Erin. I am sorry. I know you don’t have to believe that.”
I said: “I don’t know if I do yet. I’m going to need more time to figure out what our relationship looks like from here.”
She said: “What does that mean?”
I said: “It means I’m not going to pretend this didn’t happen. It means I’m going to be careful about the information I share with you. It means I’m going to keep the distance I need while I figure out what trust looks like between us now, if it’s possible.”
She said: “I don’t want to lose you.”
I said: “I know. I don’t want to lose you either. But I’m not willing to go back to the version of us where I absorbed things and didn’t say anything, and this particular thing is the clearest possible evidence of where that led.”
There was a long silence. Then she said: “Can I ask you something?”
I said yes.
She said: “Are you okay?”
I said: “I’m getting there.”
We talked for a few more minutes about nothing important — she mentioned Luke had come by, I mentioned the new apartment, she said she was glad I had the space. It was surface conversation and we both knew it. It was also, in some way, a continuation — the thin thread of contact that neither of us had entirely cut, that might or might not become something stronger over time, that I was not ready to assess yet.