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The tears prick the backs of my eyes. I select every picture of us and delete them. No point in having those, just to remind me of how blind I was. Did he even love me, or was I just someone he could always count on to go to events with?
“Stupid, stupid, stupid,” I say aloud and bang the heel of my hand to my forehead with each word. I lock my phone and shove it back into my clutch. I’ll worry about social media tomorrow. Do I just delete every picture from those, too? Act like it never happened?
Chrissy gets back into the car and hands me a grocery bag.
“Two California crunch sushi rolls. I even made sure yours has extra crunchies on top.”
A small smile creeps across my face. I am so thankful for my friendship with Chrissy, and I hope she knows I would move mountains for her, just like I know she would do for me.
“Love you, friend,” I say.
“Love you too,” she says then puts her hand on my arm. “You will find your person one day. You will know when it’s right.”
“I hope so.”
Chrissy stayed with me all weekend. We ordered in every meal, drank too much wine, and watched every romantic comedy we could think of. It was exactly what I needed to take my mind off Chad. She wouldn’t even let me check my notifications or emails because of the risk of being reminded.
It was nice to disconnect and just be with my friend, having a sleepover like we used to do growing up.
“Are you sure you don’t need me to stay? I don’t mind,” Chrissy says as she walks to the front door on Sunday evening.
“I’m positive. You have a life to get back to. Also, I need to get ready for work tomorrow.”
“Fine, fine,” she says, raising her hands in defeat. She reaches out and grabs my shoulders, bringing me in for a hug.
“You got this. You are the strongest person I know, and one day your tweetheart will find you.”
“Tweetheart? Cute.” I say as I pull away from her.
“Tweet, tweet, tweet.” She turns and flaps her hands at her shoulders like little wings as she exits my apartment.
“But for real, call me if you need anything at all.”
“I will. Thank you for staying with me and turning my disaster of a weekend into something fun.”
“Any time friend.”
I close the door, turn around and lean back onto it. I take a deep breath in and count to ten before letting the breath out slowly.
You can do this Sarah. Things like this happen all the time and people move on with their life. So can you.
Once I feel like I can move again, I go through the house and pick up. We made quite the mess over the weekend.
I load the dishwasher, take the trash out, sweep, vacuum, and shower before I let myself relax.
As I lay in bed though, that night is all that replays in my head. I still don’t understand. I thought we were happy. I know he had talked about the possibility of being promoted, but he never told me what it entailed. He didn’t even give me the chance to change and grow with him.
Everything happens for a reason, though. And he just wasn't meant to be my happily ever after.
Chapter 3
Sarah
Iwokeupearlyenough this morning to make myself breakfast and have a coffee with my birds. There is a small patio off my apartment. It's just big enough for a chair and a small folding table to hold my mug and my bird book. Right now, I have three feeders hanging from my deck. One that is flat that every bird can come to, one that is shaped like a log that holds suet for the woodpeckers and a feed that is surrounded by a cage so that only the small songbirds can get to it. In the summer, I add the addition of a hummingbird feeder.
My apartment backs right up to a wooded area and a pond, so many birds visit my feeders. My favorites are the woodpeckers, though. More specifically, the red bellied woodpecker. It was the first bird to come to my porch that was bigger than a finch. I was excited.
Now, the little chickadees and finches are so used to me, they will fly right up to the feeders while I’m outside. I even got one to eat out of my hand once. It took a month of holding my hand still with mealworms in it, but when it finally happened, it made me feel like a Disney Princess.
