“Oh my God.” Emily covered her mouth as her hand came back down from its impact across my very deserving face.

“Emily!” Mike swept me into his arms as tears rushed into my eyes.

“Ara,” she said through her hands. “I’m—I’m—”

“Em. I think you need to go and cool off.” Mike stroked his thumb over the tingling skin on the corner of my lip. “You okay, baby?”

I looked past him to Emily, who stared at me, frozen in place, her eyes liquid. My heart sank. “Emily. I’m sorry.” I pushed out from Mike and hugged her tight; “I shouldn’t have said that.”

“But you were right.” She stood back and buried her face in her hands. “I never got over him either, Ara. And I—”

“Oh, Em.” I hugged her again.

“I just. I’m afraid you might end up like me. That you’ll never move on and you’ll be unhappy and have one heartbreak after the other—trying to find that thing you had with him.”

“Why didn’t you just say that?”

“Because, I—I don’t know.” She wiped her face and looked at Mike, just for a second, then looked down. “You make me mad. I just don’t get you, Ara.”

“What do you mean?”

“You didn’t fight for David. Now he’s gone, you want him back.”

“I told you—I asked him to stay, and he wouldn’t.”

“Yeah, because you asked him. You didn’t fight, and you didn’t fight for Mike either. Ara.” Emily pointed at Mike. “He didn’t care that you loved David. He still doesn’t. He’d take you back in a heartbeat. Why won’t you just marry him?”

“Come on now, girls—” Mike leaned his back on the bench between us, “—let’s not talk about me like I’m not here. Emily?” He looked at her. “You haven’t known Ara as long as I have. She’s as stubborn as a mule. If she makes up her mind—it’s final.”

“But—” Emily said.

“Uh!” Mike held his finger up. “You need to drop it. Otherwise, she’ll change her mind out of guilt. And there’s only one thing worse than a girl marrying you when she’s in love with someone else, and that’s when she marries you out of guilt.”

“But it wouldn’t be guilt—don’t you see? She’s in love with you, Mike. What is wrong with you two?” She stared at us with wide eyes, her head moving from side to side.

“Nothing, Emily. We’re normal. You just live in this world of dreams and fairy-tales, where stories have happy endings,” I stated. “It’s not real.”

“Fine. You say that—go ahead, Ara, but I believe it.” She pointed to her chest, leaning forward. “I have to believe it. If I don’t, I’ll end up like you; withered from the core of the soul, with a tired, wrinkled old heart and nothing good to show for it.”

Mike’s hand touched my shoulder while I watched the empty space where Emily slammed her bedroom door.

“Ara?” He tried to turn me around.

“What have you been saying to her, Mike?” My words hiccupped as the sobs came. “Why does she feel so strongly about this?”

When Mike said nothing, I turned around; his head dropped and his shoulders lifted.

“Mike, what have you said to her?”

“Nothing.” He drew a deep breath, masking his frown with a smile. “Really. I’m fine with this, baby. I told you that. We’re good. Okay?” He rubbed his hand down my arm.

“You’re lying,” I said, unable to believe it.

“Baby, I—I really haven’t said anything to her. She just wants us both to be happy.”

I shook my head. “No, she wants you to be happy.”

Chapter 4

I couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling that came every time I ignored my phone. I knew the number well—even though the caller ID function had been broken for a month and no longer displayed his name—but a part of me still always wondered if I should answer it, just in case he might be calling to tell me about...David.

Dear Eric, I wrote on the pad of paper lined with watercolour pictures of lilies, then scratched it out.

Hey, Eric. Nope, that’s no good either. God, how can writing a goodbye letter be so hard?

I stared out the window at the children playing across the road, and waited for inspiration to hit me. It didn’t. The fact is, saying goodbye to Eric for his own good seems so wrong. He’ll think I’m blowing him off, and I guess, maybe I am.

I picked up my phone and let my finger hover above the green button until the vibrating stopped and the screen read missed call. I didn’t think he’d ever speak to me again after I messed up our kiss, but when all his texts went unanswered, he started calling twice every day. I just don’t know what to say, though. I like Eric, and regretted not kissing him almost instantly—well, as soon as I closed my door and was alone again.

“Argh!” My breath of frustration seemed to carry the pencil I threw across the room a little further than usual, and when an opening line for my goodbye letter suddenly came to mind, I regretted throwing the damn pencil away, too. What is it with me and wanting things only once they’re gone? I’m not really like that am I?

“Hey, baby.” Mike came in and slumped heavily on the lounge beside me. “What you doing?”

“Thinkin’.”

“’Bout?”

I shrugged. “Stuff.”

“Stuff, huh?”

“Yup.”

“Wanna share?”

I shook my head, then almost instantly blurted out, “Do you think I have absence syndrome?”

“Ab-what-now?” Mike sat forward, resting his elbows on his knees while I stared straight ahead.

“Emily says I only want things when they’re not around? Is that true?”

Mike’s silence made my shoulders lift around me ears; I looked at him—he was looking away. “Maybe.”

“Really? Maybe?”

“I don’t know, Ar. I’d like to think that’s not the case, but...”

My mouth fell open around his silence. “Don’t do that. Don’t say but and leave me hanging. Either there’s a but or there’s not.”