“What makes you anxious?” Beth curled her knees up, ready for a real conversation.
“I guess, knowing she’s here somewhere. I’m finally in the same time zone as her. Six thousand miles has now reduced to what, maybe one hundred? If she’s still where she moved originally. Sometimes, I wish I could erase it all. I don’t want to think about her as much as I do.”
Erasing all memory of Brooke would’ve allowed me to move on with my life, but if that were an option, would I take it? Or did the memory of my time with Brooke outweigh theheartbreak?
“Is that why you’ve been putting off taking this trip?”Beth asked.
“Partly.”
“What’s the other part?” Beth reached for the bottle of wine and topped up our half-empty glasses.
“It’s maybe not so much now, but last year I couldn’t shake this feeling. What if she came back and I wasn’t there? What if she changed her mind? I thought she’d come back. For a long time I hoped she’d come storming through my office door and tell me she’d made a huge mistake.” I smiled softly, trying hard not to let the emotion result in tears. I’d done enough crying over Brooke Jacobs.
“She’d tell me all she’d found in Japan was heartbreak, and her life wasn’t the same without me. I dreamt about it for a long time. Then the weeks turned into months, and I realised she wasn’t coming back. It sounds ridiculous when I say it out loud.”
Beth reached for my arm. “It’snot, Holly.”
“I’m pining after a girl who didn’t want me. She quite happily gave up a life with me for what? To sit at the top of her dad’s tower locked away like a damsel in distress, until her father finds her a suitable boyfriend?” There was a fury inside my veins whenever I thought of him.
Beth smirked. “Are you describing Rapunzel?”
I picked up the small decorative cushion and threw it at her, narrowly missing the glass of wine delicately balanced between her fingertips. “Stop it! And this is why I never tell you anything, but yes, it does sound very Rapunzel-esque.” I laughed.
“You literally tell meeverything.”
“How do you know?” I replied smugly.
“Okay, tell me something important I don’t know about?” Beth saidconfidently.
“Last year I hooked up with a friend of a friend of Paula’s, and the next day she wanted to go for breakfast, but I told her I thought I’d made a mistake, and I was in love with someone else.”
Beth finished my story. “And when she asked who, you said my name, because it was the first name to come into your head that wasn’t Brooke.”
“Yes... How did you... Okay well, I never told you what really happened the night you blacked out on your nineteenth birthday.”
“Yes, you did. You kissedmy sister.”
“Shit. Did I tell you that?” I laughed.
“Yes, you told me a year later because the guilt was eating you up inside.” Beth raised her eyebrow. “It was just a kiss, right?”
“Yes, absolutely.” Unfortunately, Beth’s sister was hot.
“Do you know I had to work from home once because I cried so hard watching a film I was emotionally distraught fordays after?”
“Yes, when Mufasa died inThe Lion King. You called me the next day and asked me to send help because your tear ducts had dried up, and you thought you might go blind because you couldn’t produce any lubricant for your eyes.” Beth was smug. She had the memory of a dolphin.
“Oh, now you say it like that, it sounds ridiculous, but I don’t think that film is appropriate anymore. It should be rewritten so Mufasa lives and the other one is wiped from existence. It’s not fair; it made me emotionally unstable.”
I’ll never watch it again.
“Do you want to give in yet?” Bethsaid smugly.
“Did I tell you I slept with the flight attendant on the way over?”
“You’re such a liar.” Beth chuckled.
“How do you know?”
