“The love of my life,” she echoed. She blew out a big breath and looked up at the ceiling, studying it like the answers to the universe were going to be revealed in its popcorn paint.
Sam studied the worn table, refusing to meet their gazes. Sam hated that Dallis and Jordan were forcing her to say the quiet things out loud. She had spent years perfecting the art of protecting herself and her feelings by putting things into neat little boxes. Sitting here now, feeling her two friends study her, Sam realized for the first time in years that she wanted something more than her carefully constructed life. Her boxes were beginning to crumble. And it terrified her.
“I don’t want it,” she said, so quietly she almost didn’t hear it herself. Then, louder, with more conviction, “I don’t want it. Not the job. Not the profit sharing. Not any of it.”
The words landed on the table, heavier than she’d realized before saying them out loud. She watched her friends’ faces register them—Jordan’s eyebrows up, Dallis’s mouth forming a smallOof surprise. She looked between them, desperate for them to just force the issue so she wouldn’t have to, to make her say it, finally.
Jordan did, eventually, like he’d been holding his breath for her. “So…what do you want?”
Sam’s breath caught. She almost reflexively said she didn’t know, but the words had been forming in her head for days, weeks, maybe even years, and now they were ready to come out. “I want Alex.”
The kitchen buzzed in the silence after, the fridge motor kicking on, a dog barking somewhere, a car passing on the street outside. Dallis leaned back with a knowing smile spreading over her face. She didn’t say anything else. She didn’t need to.
Jordan’s expression shifted into something between amusement and exasperation. “Well, fuck, Sam,” he said, throwing his arms out wide. “It’s about time.” He laughed, not unkindly, but quickly reined it in with a glance at her face. Sam must have looked stricken or lost because he quickly put his arms back down at his sides.
“Does she know that?” Dallis finally asked. “Have you talked to her?”
She stared at the ring of condensation on the table, until Dallis’s words finally got to her. Her head shot up, her eyes searched Dallis’s face as she considered her question. A parade of emotions marched across her face. “And say what?” she finally whispered.
“Start with how you feel,” Dallis suggested. “And then go from there.”
Jordan, who had been silently fiddling with the edge of the pizza box, looked up at her, his expression tender. “I mean, it doesn’t have to be poetic, Sam,” he said. “You could just…tell her the truth.”
Dallis reached across the table to take Sam’s hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “He’s right.” Her fingers were so warm and steady, Sam felt herself relax just a bit. “You don’t have to have a script, Sam. After the weekend, she probably already knows how you feel. You two are meant to be together.”
Sam rolled her eyes, trying to brush it off, but the truth was, Dallis’s words landed harder than she wanted to admit. “Not everyone believes in fate, Dallis. Some of us live in the real world.” Even as she said it, she could picture Alex’s face in her mind—how her eyes crinkled when she smiled, how her hands always seemed to find Sam’s when she needed them most, and how her smile was enough to make Sam forget everything else.
Sam fidgeted with her beer bottle, passing it from one hand to the other on the table in front of her. “I don’t know how to be near her without wanting everything,” she finally admitted. “She’s a mom, she has responsibilities. What if I don’t even fit into that picture?”
Jordan snorted. “Please, Sam. That woman is not going to let you walk away again. Not without a fight.”
Sam took a long sip of her beer, pausing to gather her thoughts. She thought about her life in Boston—the apartment with its shiny,perfect floors, the job that made her feel important, if not exactly alive, the city’s comforting anonymity, where no one cared who you were or what you did. She had fought to carve out that life with her bare hands, but she was finally willing to admit that it had never truly felt like home.
But Hicksville did, didn’t it? Despite everything. Sam felt it in the familiar comfort of her mother’s house and the connections she had rekindled with her old friends. She hadn’t expected any of that. She certainly hadn’t expected Alex, but that’s where she felt at home the most. Sam let that idea settle. She’d spent so long believing that safety was the same as happiness. But it wasn’t. It was just a lower grade of fear.
“You’re not alone in this, Sam. And you’re definitely not stupid for wanting to be happy.” Dallis squeezed Sam’s hand with a soft pressure that made Sam feel, absurdly, like she could breathe again. “Now you two have to figure out how to make that happen. But you have to do it together.” She leaned back in her chair and gave Sam a long, serious look. “And you have to do it by communicating.”
Sam was silent. She imagined walking up to Alex’s door and telling her everything—how she had never stopped thinking about the what-ifs, how she was terrified but wanted to try, how being with Alex for even one night had ruined her for anything less than that kind of love.
Sam didn’t realize she was crying until Jordan slid a napkin across the table to her, his eyes kind and uncharacteristically damp. She wiped her face, feeling embarrassed, and tried to laugh it off. “Jesus. I’m a mess.”
“We all are,” Dallis said, raising her bottle in a toast. “But only some of us have the courage to admit it.”
Later, after Jordan and Dallis left, Sam sat alone at the kitchen table, staring at her phone. She picked it up, put it down, then picked it up again. She opened her texts and scrolled to Alex’s name, typed outWhen can I see you?then deleted it. TypedI miss you, then deleted that too. Her thumbs hovered over the keyboard for what felt like hours before she finally gently placed it back down on the table. She knew she needed to talk to Alex, but there were a few other conversations she needed to have first.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Sam woke before dawn the next day, this time by choice. Morning sunlight flooded the kitchen, and everything looked both brand-new and heartbreakingly familiar. She ran a fingertip over the walls, noting how perfect the paint color Alex had chosen was. She looked around at all the other updates, marveling that this was her childhood home. But still, it felt like someone else’s life. Sam’s old life in Hicksville had always been about motion, about running from one thing to the next, pushing herself to do more. But now, everything felt still. She cradled a lukewarm cup of coffee, rehearsing her words. What was she about to do?
Her thumb hovered over the contact for a long moment before finally tapping it. As she listened to the rings echo, her stomach grew tighter. She didn’t have to wait long. Stephanie answered on the third ring.
Stephanie’s brisk voice cut through her rising panic. “Sam? I thought I would hear from you sooner.” Her tone was sharp, but Sam could hear the concern in her voice. “Is everything okay?”
Sam’s throat tightened. She’d rehearsed her speech a thousand times, but all the words flew out the window. “I need to…”
There was a pause. “Come on, Sam. Talk to me,” Stephanie said gently. “I know I’m your boss, but I care about you. What’s up?”
Sam closed her eyes, pressing the phone against her ear. “I’m sorry,” she finally whispered. She fiddled with the edge of the tableto have something to do with her hands. “I don’t want to let you down…”
