AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Her friend’s brow was marred. “How’s that been? Going from living together for over a year, close friends, then lovers to nothing at all?”
“It’s not great,” Claire admitted. “Lovers part aside, I miss his friendship. I miss watching trash TV with him and going out for beers when we have hard days. I miss his sarcasm. I even miss his stupid dog.”
“He misses you, too.”
“How do you know?”
“For a while he avoided Noah like you were with me. I assume for the same reasons.”
It wouldn’t surprise her. The four of them were well versed in each other’s defense mechanisms.
“I’m the one who hurt him,” Claire said. “And I don’t think there’s anything I can do to fix it. So I’ve just been avoiding.”
The server dropped off their lattes. Mia curled her hands around the cup. “You’re not hurting, too?”
“Of course I am. I hate it here. But he’s the one who put everything out there—a massive step for Graham, as you probably know—and I’m the one who said no. That puts us in different corners of the ring and I don’t think I should be the one to come out first. If our roles were reversed, I’d want to be left alone. If he tried to talk to me after rejecting me, it would just piss me off.”
“He probably just needs time. You both do.”
Claire scraped a spoonful of foam from the top of her latte and put it in her mouth. That bitch in her chest thought it was a good time to toss up a memory of how good Graham’s dad’s coffee had been the weekend they’d stayed there.Better than Starbucks, she’d told him.
“I have one more question,” Mia said. Her tone was hesitant, which both piqued Claire’s interest and put her on edge. “I promise I’ll only ask it once, but I gotta. I get your reasons for breaking things off with Graham. As much as I can, anyway. No one can truly be in your shoes and know how it felt to go through what you did. But now, after months of being apart and still missing him like you do, are you sure it’s the right choice? Like, without a doubt, one hundred percent, you’ll-never-regret-this-choice sure?”
Tears welled up in Claire’s eyes and she blinked away the burning sensation. “What the fuck kind of question is that?”
Sympathy shone in Mia’s eyes. “I’m sorry. It’s just... I thought I knew what I was doing when I kept away from Noah for so long. I thought it was for the best, too. I was so very wrong, and I’ve never been happier since realizing it. As your best friend, I just want to make sure you don’t miss your chance to do the same.”
Frustration built along Claire’s spine. “Do we ever know with absolute certainty if the decisions we make are the right ones in the long run? All I know to do is look at what I’ve gone through and where I am now and decide based on that information. I’m not psychic. I don’t know what I’ll feel next week, next month, or next year.”
If only that were possible.
“You make a great point, but I’m not sure you realize it actually cancels out your argument for cutting things off with Graham.”
“How?”
“You just said you couldn’t base your decision off future feelings, but that’s exactly what you did.”
Claire frowned, shaking her head. “No, I...”
“When you think about the past with Graham, what’s the first word that comes to mind?”
“Irritation.”
Mia snorted. “Any others?”
“Fun. Loyalty. Friendship.”
“Now, think about the last time you were with him, before the fight. When things were good. Do you remember how you felt in that moment?”
Claire squeezed her eyelids shut, once again trying to keep from crying in a public place. A display like that wasn’t her style.
She didn’t say any of the words out loud.Tender. Loved. Connected.
She could only nod.
“Yes, I remember how I felt.” Her voice trembled and she hated it.
“If your answer to this next one is yes, that’s it. You know what’s right for you. But I don’t think you can move forward until you address this with yourself. You know how you feel about him, and how you felt when you were with him. Anything beyond that is pure speculation. Are you willing to discard all of those things based on assumptions for how you might feel down the road?”
