Impossible

“Something terrible must have happened. Did you ask her?”

“She won't talk.”

They both agreed, she looked worse, much worse, than when Arthur died. But it was over two years later, and it was the second major loss she had sustained, which compounded the impact. It had just become two giant losses rolled into one. It brought back everything she had lived through when Arthur died, and in addition now there was the loss of Liam as well. This time forever. There would be no reprieve this time, and she knew it. He was never coming back. In her life anyway, he might as well have died.

Neither woman solved the mystery, and Sasha said nothing to them all day. She didn't eat. She didn't drink. She didn't move, she just sat there shuffling papers on her desk. She thought of killing herself, but knew she couldn't do that to Xavier and Tatianna. She had been condemned to live, which in her case now seemed far worse than being condemned to death. She had been sentenced to an eternity without him.

Driving to Vermont, he felt the same way. But he didn't call her. He knew he never could again. He had to trust her to the hands of fate, which was where he had put himself. All he could do from now on was know that there was a woman he would never see again, and whom he had once loved with his entire being.

Sasha told Marcie that afternoon that she was leaving for Paris the next morning, and asked her to make the reservations for her. Marcie said she would, and then stopped to talk to Sasha again.

“Are you sure you're okay?” Sasha nodded, and Marcie wondered if something had happened with Liam. Maybe they'd had a fight and broken up again. “Where's Liam?” was all she asked her. Sasha said he was in Vermont, and he was fine. She knew it would be months or years before she could tell anyone what had happened. The hole he had left in her was filled with too much pain. Marcie left her then and made the reservations. And then she did something she had never done, even when Arthur died. She called Xavier and told him she was worried about her. He said she had sounded strange to him too when he called her on Christmas. “She looks terrible,” Marcie admitted, hating to worry him, but she didn't know who else to call. Tatianna was away, and Marcie had no idea where she was, and neither did he.

“Maybe I'll fly to Paris to see her this weekend,” he said, thinking about it. He wasn't crazy about the plan, since it was New Year's Eve, but he was worried about her. Something had happened, and whatever it was, she wasn't talking about it, to anyone.

Xavier called her at home that night, and she didn't answer the phone. She was lying in the dark, on her bed, thinking of Liam, wondering what he was doing, how Charlotte was, and what he had said to Beth. She didn't even know if Beth knew about her. Overnight she had become the forgotten woman. She felt invisible, untouchable, unlovable, and completely isolated from the world. She had barely said good-bye to Marcie and Karen when she left. She just said goodnight to them, as she always did, and drifted out to the street. She walked home, and was halfway there before she even noticed it was raining. When she got home, she was soaked to the skin. It didn't matter anymore. Nothing did.

She took the flight to Paris the next day, spoke to no one on the plane, didn't eat, didn't watch a movie, and slept finally. It was a relatively short flight, and when she got home, she realized she hadn't eaten in days. She didn't care about that either.

When Xavier got to Paris on Saturday, he was shocked when he saw her. She had lost weight, her eyes were glazed, and her skin was almost gray. He managed to get some food into her, and had brought his current girlfriend with him. When he asked his mother about Liam, she was pleasant and vague. All she said was that he was with Beth and his children in Vermont.

A week later, wondering how things were going for him, Xavier called him on his cell phone. He didn't mention the state his mother was in, so as not to worry him. Liam had enough on his plate with Charlotte. Xavier asked him casually when he was coming back to London.

“I'm not,” Liam said quietly. There was a somber tone in his voice that worried Xavier. It was not unlike the flat tone he'd heard recently whenever he called Sasha.

“What do you mean?” Xavier sounded confused. “Are you going to be stuck in Vermont for a long time?”

“Forever, I guess,” Liam said cryptically. “I'll have to come back to London at some point to close my studio.” He said that Charlotte was going to be in the hospital for months, and possibly in rehab after that.