Page 54 of Romantic

Annie

I’m at the yacht club and your boat isn’t here . . . ?

For the first time since Sunday morning the three dots ripple. He’s texting me back. I wait for his reply.

Jack

Sorry

I will always love you

Yeah, sure. Brandon was right. Jack never truly loved me. I yank the moonstone ring off my finger and stare at the softly glowing stone. This is the talisman I clung to, desperately trying to convince myself that Jack was my true love—that my heart wasn’t breaking for someone else. With a primal scream, I hurl the ring into the water. It sinks without a splash, an insignificant piece of jewelry drifting down to be forgotten on the ocean floor. I wish I could do the same thing with Esmerelda. Instead, I opt to leave the Mini Cooper in the yacht club parking lot with the keys in it. I’ll walk home. No matter the distance.

First Brandon, now Jack. The men I love keep leaving me—I’m such a joke. All I can do is look pretty and write bad poetry and love the wrong people.

I move at a snail’s pace along Highway One. It’s a cold morning for July. A strong wind rips at dark clouds. I revel in the bad weather and my self-pity. Every once in a while, I look up into the sky and let the wind carry my sobs away. Perhaps a bit dramatic, but it feels so good to let it all out—to cry and shout at the heavens. And Jack! Why! Why did he leave? Why did he pretend to love me? Why did I pretend to love him? That’s the hardest question—the one that cuts deepest, because I only have myself to blame.

I’ve made it about a mile when I hear tires slowly approaching. Edward pulls over in the pickup truck he drives around the park.

“Looks like you need a ride home?”

I want to say no, but who am I kidding? I can’t walk the thirty miles home. I’m lucky he was driving this way.

We’ve covered several miles before Edward asks, “Do you want to talk about it?”

“No, not really.”

“Okay, do you want to listen to anything?” Edward is so companionable and sweet. I may have made a lot of mistakes lately, but I stand by my efforts to bring him and Elinor together. That, at least, was something I got right.

I take a deep breath. “Never mind, I actually want to talk. So . . . Jack is gone.”

“Oh! Wow! Did you break up?”

“No . . . nothing so straightforward. He left for Hawaii without me. I don’t know why.”

This isn’t completely true. We exchanged sharp words after Brandon gave Jack a bloody nose Saturday night. Though we ended the evening on good terms, thinking about it now, I realize that when Jack kissed me goodnight it felt more like goodbye.

“I did not see that coming,” says Edward. “He seemed to really like you.”

“Yeah, he told me he loved me so often I kind of believed him. I thought . . . I thought we had something real.”

“l never thought he was good enough for you.”

“Now you sound like Brandon.”

“Well, Brandon’s a smart guy.” Yep, smart enough to leave me, I think to myself. I can’t say how much it hurt when Elinor mentioned in passing yesterday morning that Brandon and Pepper had left Norland Park for the summer. She assumed I knew all about them leaving, and I didn’t contradict her. Secretly, I expected an apology from Brandon after our rip-roaring fight Saturday night. Instead he left without saying a word.

“Hey, would you not tell Brandon about this?” I ask Edward. “It’s kind of embarrassing.”

“Got it. Don’t tell Brandon,” he says. After a beat he asks, “Why?”

“It’s just . . . the other night he was telling me that there was no way Jack could love me.”

“I’m certain Brandon didn’t mean it like that.”

“Well, he was right.” I start crying again.

Edward pulls a handkerchief out of his pocket and hands it to me. I sniffle a thank you and cry the rest of the way home.