After what feels like hours I hear a knock on the front door. “Follow me,” I say. “I don’t trust you alone in my living room.” I open the door and find Claire standing there, her hands cupping the sides of her waist, her weight shifted to one side. Her hip juts out from a turtleneck dress, like a finger beckoning from her body. The two of us take a moment to examine each other. I can’t reconcile how different we look—Claire is about a foot taller than me, blond, and very angular. It seems strange that the same man would be attracted to both of us. We exchange polite smiles. “Come in,” I say. She follows me through the corridor, walking past Matías without glancing in his direction, and into the living room. She sits down on the couch, and suddenly I feel this may be the worst idea ever. Once we’re all seated, she crosses her arms and looks up at him.

“You disgust me,” she says.

He doesn’t answer. Instead he turns toward me. “Can I please tell you something?”

“Get out,” I say, with difficulty.

“No,” he says. “I won’t.”

His defiance makes it less difficult to insist. “I will literally call the police right now,” I tell him. At this, he nods solemnly, and leaves.

Claire and I sit silently as the air thickens and then thins. I’m the first to puncture the silence. “Want some tea?”

She nods, and I get up to boil water. “I have mint, chamomile, and—”

“I ended a three-year relationship for him,” Claire interrupts. “He was making all kinds of promises. And the sex …”

“Yes,” I say. “I know.”

I had never been able to escape the hollowness. Always, in the moments immediately after coming, I felt a sharp and excruciating emptiness. Within moments it was gone, but for those first few seconds, as my muscles relaxed and my breathing slowed, I would experience a despair that I’d come to dread. With Matías, though, the emptiness was replaced by something. Not so much a significance, but a barrier that kept me from descending into unbearable sadness. I’d interpreted this as a sign that our relationship was somehow meaningful, that it might carry me away from my past and allow me to untether from it.

“Well,” Claire says. “I’m glad we found out. At least we won’t romanticize him anymore. And we certainly won’t be sad when he’s gone.”

Before she leaves we agree to keep in close contact. “Call me whenever you’re tempted to call him,” she says, “and I’ll do the same.”

“Thanks,” I say. “Though I’m sure it won’t be long before one of us runs into him. Definitely at the visiting writers’ farewell party.”