I spend an exorbitant amount of money to click through these stories. One part of it is the price I pay to get through paywalls, to make sure I don’t reach an article-per-month limit on any major news site I visit. But the other, more outrageous price is the fare for a sweltering, stale-cigarette-smelling cab ride all the way back to Brooklyn, because I am not losing cell service for any length of time during a subway ride. I sit in the back, sweating from the heat and the panic, barely noticing the traded honks of frustration as we crawl through Manhattan, hardly registering when we break free of the worst of the snarls, finally crossing the Bridge. I pause in my reading over and over, sending Reid messages I can sense already he won’t be able to respond to.

By the time the cab pulls up at the curb outside of my building, my battery is getting low and my once-polished presentation outfit is crumpled and damp. I barely think about my portfolio of sketches as I pull them from the back of the cab, barely remember the disappointment I felt at the Make It Happyn committee’s response. I’m sure it’ll come roaring back soon, but for now my head is spinning. I think, fleetingly, of all the things Reid has been hiding from me, all the conversations we’ll have to re-do. But mostly I focus on all he must be facing, the desperation and pressure he must have been feeling.

Not just today.

But for the whole time I’ve known him.

When I stumble into my apartment, dropping everything I’m holding haphazardly, I realize I have never been more grateful to be living alone. I’m ruthlessly sloppy as I tear through it, grateful that I don’t have to explain this to anyone, because right now, I can’t explain it, not without more information from Reid. I change into jeans and a T-shirt, pull my humidity-ruined hair into what I am sure is an appallingly messy bun. I shove clothes into a backpack, because it’s the only thing I can think to do—to use my key, to wait for Reid at his apartment. They’ve taken his phone, apparently, but certainly he’ll be allowed to go back to his apartment? After all, it’s not him who’s done something wrong.

My phone rings inside my bag, and I curse its roomy depths as I try to unearth it. It has to be him, I’m telling myself, trying to force a sense of relief I don’t feel.

But it’s not him.

“Hey, Cecelia,” I say when I pick up, my voice sounding reedy to my own ears. I need to get some water before I leave; I’m probably dehydrated.