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It wasn't that important. I didn't want to push him. We had already had to cancel vacation plans; he had a lot on his plate as an athlete, I got it. My parents would get it, too. If things were really busy, I'd just bring him round for dinner or something when he had time. It could wait.
Chapter Three
Roman
Well, that was fucking easy. I didn't want to think that just in case I ended up actually failing, but I was optimistic…even though it didn't matter. Marketing and Organization was my last final, and maybe the A I was pretty sure I was getting in the test would mean something one day.
I joined the slow-moving stream of students leaving the classroom. Veronica was leaning against the wall watching the crowd, looking for me. I waved, getting her attention. She walked over to me with her hands full, a tall coffee cup in each. She said hi, handing one over to me. I took it gratefully, kissing her.
"How was it?" she asked as we started moving through the hall.
"Good. We're done," I said, brightly as I could. She had stayed on campus to wait for me, but she had already had her last paper in the morning. I was glad that she had because I needed to talk to her. Well, I had been glad about it before – now that we actually had time to talk and I would have to do it, not so much. I couldn't stall because we had to study anymore. The semester was over, and that meant time was up.
"You wanna come over tonight? Celebrate?" she asked.
"I kind of wanted to stay home. I've been pretty wiped out lately."
"Is everything okay?" she asked after a short pause.
"What? Yeah, everything's great."
"You've been different this past week." I took a sip of my coffee. I hated lying to her. I fucking hated lying to her.
"Yeah?" I asked distractedly.
"Like, I don't know...more distant than usual," she said. I could hear how sad she was about it in her voice. If she thought I hadn't been honest with her lately, she would be right.
"It was just the stress; you know, finals and stuff. No big deal," I said flippantly.
"You've had finals before," she pointed out. "It's never gotten to you like this." I wanted to tell her to drop it, just shut up because this wasn't the way that I wanted to tell her. We had been together for years, why the fuck had I ever thought I could try to hide something like this from her and think she wouldn't catch on? I was cracking and she could tell. I couldn't hide it from her anymore. I couldn't keep lying. The jig was up anyway but I fucking owed it to her at this point. It had to stop.
"I know. You're right," I admitted.
"I was just worried," she said. Good going, I thought, that was exactly what you never wanted her to have to do.
"Don't be. Listen. How about you come to my apartment with me?"
"It'll be nice to spend some time together when we aren't worried about class," she agreed. I had done some pretty shitty stuff in my life, but I was already sure this was about to take the cake. We walked to the parking lot together, her doing most of the talking. It was hard to pay attention while I tried to remember where the hell I had left my warning order. She had her car today, so she just followed me.
I let her walk into my apartment ahead of me when we got there, almost a hundred percent sure I had left the order in my room. Maybe it was a better idea to bring it out and let her read it herself. That way we could talk about it and she'd know exactly why I had been so distant, why I didn't want to see her parents and why we weren't going to Montana this summer. Yeah, no. Not going to happen. I knew what I had to do.
She dropped her backpack and sat on the couch, lying out on her back. She was here so often she had clothes in my closet. The only reason we weren't living together was she had a roommate, a nursing student in our year, and they had moved into the apartment together as freshmen. She didn't want to back out of the lease and ditch her.
That and the fact that since I was enlisted in the US Armed Forces, I could get a warning order to deploy basically whenever they felt like they needed me, and I didn't want a situation where that happened and she would be trapped in a lease alone… Basically what would be happening now if we did live together.
"Thank God that's finally over," she said.
It's now or never, I thought. You have to do it and you have to do it now. You bitch out and she has to hear it from Tiffany or your dad, and that would only make it worse. Just fucking do it now and you can leave knowing that you did the right thing by her.
"We need to talk, Ron," I said.
"What is it?" she asked, sitting up on the couch. Her eyes were round, and she looked so innocent and unassuming. It was almost enough for me to back out and tell her it was nothing. That I just wanted to tell her that I loved her, or hell, wanted to tell her the truth even. Just tell her I was leaving in three days and it was driving me crazy thinking I'd be leaving her behind. She was worried about what would happen to me when I was deployed? I was worried too.
But I had made the decision to enlist myself. I had been eighteen when I did it – we hadn't even met yet. I had chosen it knowing I would have to deal with the consequences. She hadn't. She didn't have to deal with not knowing what was happening to me while I was gone, whether I'd ever come back, whether I'd be the same person she knew when I did. I couldn't make her wait, and I couldn't make her worry. That wasn't my call, and she didn't deserve it.
"Look, I didn't want to do this before finals; it wouldn't have been fair," I started.
"Didn't want to do what?"
