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Braden
I can’t believe she sent a gift. It means so much to me she remembered Harper’s birthday and wants to know more about her. I wasn’t expecting her to send a gift, too.
I look down at the card, loving that I get a glimpse of her handwriting.
Harper (and Braden),
My mom read these books to me as a kid and they became my favorites. We still reference them to this day. I hope you love them as much as we did. Happy birthday.
-Firecracker.
I pull up her number and push the call button, quickly putting my phone to my ear.
“Hello?” she answers. She sounds tired, but I barely register it.
“Thank you. The books you sent. I can’t wait to read them to her and—” I stop short when I hear sniffling. “Baby, what’s wrong?”
She sniffs again. “My Grandpa died.”
My heart slams in my chest. “What? When?”
“This morning. I found out not long after I talked to you.”
Shit.I knew her grandmother was sick with cancer. To lose her grandfather in the midst of that must be awful. Especially because she’s told me how close she was to him since her dad wasn’t around growing up.
“I’m so sorry. I wish I was there with you. I—I know we were planning to wait to meet. But I don’t need any more commitment from you. If all you can give me is a couple of hours in person each week, that’s fine with me. I want to be there for you. Support you through this.”
“You can’t,” she says, tearfully.
“Why not?”
“I told you, my grandparents live in Ohio—”
“I can take a few days and go to Ohio with you—”
“No! You don’t understand.” She’s full on yelling in between sobs. “My grandma is sick. I told you that. My mom—” She stops as her voice comes to a squeak. “My mom quit her job today. She’s moving there. And I…”
No.
“I’m going too. My mom, her sisters, my grandma, they’re my only family. They’ll all be there. I need to be too. I already contacted a nursing school I got into last year when I was considering going to college there. I have to finish out a couple more days of practicum here, but then they’re letting me do my finals online. I—I’m sorry. I don’t want it to be this way. But we have to end this.”
My stomach twists and my heart shatters.
I drop onto the edge of my bed. After everything, it can’t end like this. I finally found a girl who lights this fire inside of me—one I never knew was there before. And now it just… ends? No.
“I don’t want this to be over. We can do long distance—”
“No. We can’t. I have at least two more years of school. You have a daughter. Neither of us is going to move to be with the other during that time. Who knows what would even happen after? We can’t.”
“Firecracker, I—”
“Don’t!” she yells. “Don’t say it. Please don’t say it.”
“I can’t let this end without you knowing how I feel,” I plead. Love is worth fighting for, right? Maia and I fought and held on for longer than we should have, all because of love—and that was different than this. Different than what I feel for her.
“No. If you say it, I won’t go. And Ihaveto go. Just like you have to stay. These last few months have been incredible. They’ve meant so much to me, but we weren’t meant to last.”
I sniff and wipe a tear from my cheek. She might be right that long distance would be too challenging to overcome, but I want to believe there’s another answer. I finally found her. I don’t want to lose her.
