Page 144 of The Best Thing He Never Wanted

“He is not my boyfriend.”

There was a tiny pause.

“No,” Meg said more gently. “What is he?”

Bea leaned back against the counter. That was the trouble, wasn’t it? “I don’t know.”

“Do you still talk often?”

“Most days now. Not every day. Sometimes a couple go by. And our messages are getting absurdly long.” She smiled. “We may have to graduate to email soon.”

Meg laughed. “Good grief. Very modern.”

“It is, actually.”

“And do you miss him?”

The answer rose so quickly that Bea didn’t have time to protect herself from it. “Yes.”

Meg went quiet.

Bea stared across the kitchen toward the open terrace doors. “Terribly, if you want the truth.”

“I usually do.”

“I know.”

“And?”

Bea frowned. “And what?”

“You know perfectly well what.”

She did. Of course she did. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, Meg.”

Her friend waited.

Bea sighed. “Yes. Obviously I love him.” There. She’d finally said it out loud. She held her breath, but nothing in the kitchen changed. The house didn’t tilt nor did the sky fall in.

Meg merely said, very softly, “I thought you might.”

Bea swallowed. “That isn’t really the problem, though, is it?”

“No?”

“No. Loving him doesn’t magically make Montana closer to Crete. It doesn’t make his life here, or mine there. And I’m not giving this up, Meg. I can’t.”

“I know.”

“And I would never ask him to give up his life either.”

“I know that too.”

Bea looked around the room. Her kitchen. Her house. Her keys on the counter. Her little car outside. Greek notes still sticking out of her bag. A life she had chosen for herself, piece by piece, and loved more every day.

“I suppose that’s the ridiculous thing,” she said. “I finally built exactly what I wanted.”

Meg didn’t interrupt.