I covered my mouth on another yawn and rubbed my eyes. The bell above the door dinged and I cringed, wishing Jeb would get it fixed already.

I felt the presence of someone standing on the other side of the counter and rolled my eyes. I was not in a help the customers kind of mood so I didn’t even bother to lift my head.

“Can I help you?” I asked snidely, yawning again.

“I hope so,” a voice said and I froze. My head jerked up and I met a pair of green eyes I hadn’t seen in almost two months.

Flynn, wearing his typical khakis and crisp, long-sleeved button down shirt. His brown hair was in a perfect mess and my fingers itched to touch him. To brush the strands back from his forehead.

What was he doing here?

My heart sped up the longer I sat there, looking at him. My tongue was ice in my mouth and my lips couldn’t form words. My eyes drank in the sight of him, dizzy on the rush of being in his presence again after all this time.

It felt like forever since we had gone to the beach together, but I had thought about it every night as I tried to go to sleep. The bittersweet memory was the only thing to put a smile on my face anymore. So much had changed that it felt like those smiles and memories belonged to another person in another life.

Flynn was staring at the counter but I could see his hands balled into fists at his side. He wasn’t rubbing them together but I could still tell he was agitated.

“You never came,” he said, startling me.

“What?” I asked, shocked by the vicious anger in his voice.

“You left and never came back. I’ve been waiting for you to come. But you haven’t. Why?”

I had both longed and dreaded for this moment. But in my head it never played out quite like this. I had thought myself prepared for his hurt accusations, but I hadn’t counted on the tortured pain on his face.

How could he feel sad over not seeing me after everything I told him?

“I just, well, Dania isn’t well. And honestly, I thought you wouldn’t want to see me,” I said lamely. I sounded pathetic. My excuse ringing falsely in my ears.

“Why wouldn’t I want to see you?” he demanded, frowning.

“After what I told you, why would you want to see me?” I countered.

“You never let me talk about any of it. You just left. You never called. You never came by the studio. Why would you do that?” he demanded. He was angry. I could see the vein popping on the side of his neck.

The bell dinged above the door again as several people walked inside.

“This isn’t the time to talk about this, Flynn,” I said quietly, trying not to cause a scene.

Flynn slammed his hand down on the counter. “When is the time to talk about this? Because you’re doing the exact same thing you did to me in high school! You said you were sorry for that! Why are you doing this to me?” He sounded agonized and I felt myself swaying under the weight of his unhappiness.

“You’re not upset about what I told you? You don’t hate me for telling you what I did?” I asked, still trying to keep my voice down. We were getting a lot of attention. It seemed that suddenly, JAC’s was the busiest it had been in weeks. People weren’t even trying to hide the fact that they were staring.

“I’m upset, Ellie! Because you won’t talk to me! Because you always hurt me! You make it so hard to love you!” he yelled and I flinched.

I felt like I should just tattoo I’m sorry on my forehead with the amount of times I said it. I was tired and exhausted and had no real excuse for avoiding him. Except that my guilt and self-loathing had made a nasty reappearance.

“Flynn…” I began but his hand shot out and knocked over the stand of lottery ticket. It fell to the floor with a smash. Everyone was now staring openly.

“Just leave me alone!” he screamed and practically ran from the store.

I looked at the people gawking and then to Flynn’s quickly retreating form as he rushed down the sidewalk, away from me.

I didn’t cry. I didn’t scream like I wanted to. Instead I calmly came out from behind the counter and slowly picked up the knocked over lottery tickets. The familiar numbness spreading and taking over. Soft and cuddly Ellie began her steady retreat behind impenetrable walls.

Flynn wanted me to leave him alone. And even as I vowed to do just that, his words still pierced the newly formed ice around my heart.

31

-Flynn-

Many years ago…

I went back to school. Mom said I had to finish the year out and then we would move away. That I would never have to live in Wellsburg again.

But Wellsburg was my home.

I liked it.

It’s where Ellie was.

Or where she used to be.

But I never saw her again.

She stopped coming to school.

I heard people saying that she went to jail. I didn’t understand why she would go to jail.

Jail was for bad people. Ellie was mean sometimes, but she wasn’t bad.

People were looking at me a lot now. More than they used to. I knew they were talking about me as well.

It made me angry and anxious. I didn’t like people looking at me. Or talking about me.

Stu and Dania were still calling me names. They had gotten worse. They said it was all my fault. I didn’t know what they were talking about.

I wanted to ask them where Ellie was but they scared me. I didn’t want to talk to them.

Mom and I were living in an apartment until we could move. I asked her if they ever caught who set fire to our house and killed Marty. She said yes. That they had gotten into a lot of trouble.