I gnawed on the inside of my cheek, trying to hold back the hot prickle of tears threatening to spring from my eyes. The thought that I was the cause of keeping Cal in any sort of misery was difficult to handle, but the sentence of living a life without him was much worse. “If he can’t bear to be here he would have already gone.”

“He only stays because of you,” Rosie said softly.

“And would you go with him to California if he decided to go?”

“I would follow him anywhere,” Rosie answered simply. It wasn’t as pointed as it felt, but I hated his guts for saying it.

“So you blame me, then?” I bristled. “For the sadness he feels here?”

“I blame them,” Rosie corrected, gesturing to the paper. “I don’t understand why they’re doing this to us.”

I shrugged, not wanting to hear another word from his rosebud mouth.

He must have felt the chill between us because he stood quickly and muttered, “I’ve said too much,” scurrying toward the door, where I assumed he put on his coat. As he turned the knob he turned and said, “I’m sorry I made a mess.”

Picking my head up from the cushion, I glanced around the room, looking for evidence of the mess he’d referenced. I saw nothing but Cal’s usual piles of whatever it was he’d become invested in at the time. Realizing Rosie was speaking figuratively, I settled back into the sofa and tried to purge his words and face from my mind. I needed to remember to avoid being in the apartment alone with him at any length. Though it would be ideal to tell him he needed to find a new place to live rather than tiptoeing around my home, I knew it would not go over well with Cal. To take his dreams of San Francisco and his best friend away from him would be too much. Everyone had their breaking point and I didn’t want to push my lover to his. Although, if Rosie was right, Cal may have already been cracking.

25

April 1936

I hadn’t considered asking Cal to come with me to opening day when maybe I should have. We’d gone to a good amount of games together before, so it wasn’t out of left field that he wanted to go. The problem was, I had already made plans with Maks. Studying Cal’s face when I told him, I felt like the shittiest person to walk the face of the Earth. Fuck, he’d looked sad. Hurting him was painful for me, my gashes on his cheeks, and I did it far more often than I wanted to. I ignored the subject until late one night when we were lost in the throes of passion.