Stories from the Hart: Buyer Blues, Part 1

Buyer Blues by Shannon Hart
Part 1

I was panting, cursing and swearing at myself as I walked up twelve flights of stairs, dragging along my heavy suitcase and a ton of fabric samples, thanks to the stupid elevators that decided to break down today. I huffed and puffed, lamely regretting not having worked out in an extremely long time. Six months without visiting the gym was clearly too long. It wasn't that I didn't want to go to the gym, it was just that I simply did not have the time. Between my crazy traveling schedule for work and the amount of work that piled up after each trip, I found myself having hardly any time to even eat, let alone exercise. Come to think of it, I really didn't have a life. I used to though. Have a life, I mean. Before I got this job, I had fun-filled Friday nights and partied until Saturday mornings. Before I was promoted as a Senior Buyer for Reed's Department Store - the fastest growing luxury retail store chain in the country - I even had a serious boyfriend. Oh, how the times used to be good.

I reached my office after nearly half an hour, which felt like two hours.

"Janie, you have twelve messages," Lana, my secretary, said as she followed me into my office.

"This early in the morning? Gosh, what time do all these people start?" I complained, dropping my fabric samples on to the floor and collapsing on to my leather chair. "I'm so exhausted!"

"Two are from your mother. She wants you to call your sister about the wedding. And one is from your insurance company. You need to sign some sort of document. The rest are... Well, work related," Lana answered, as she placed twelve pieces of pink paper on my desk.

I stared at my neatly handwritten messages. Just looking at them made me want to pack up my stuff and head back to the emergency staircase and head home, especially the ones from my mother. Those just made me want to curl up in bed and hide under the blankets.

"Do you need me to put you through to anyone?" Lana asked, as she opened my insanely heavy suitcase and started to help me unload all the buying books.

"No. I don't want to talk to anyone right now. I just want to go through my orders one more time so you can key them into the system and send over our final orders before the midnight deadline."

Lana shrugged. She placed the four ready-to-wear books and four leather accessories books on my desk. "Coffee?"

"Maybe later. Do you have my mail?"

"On your incoming tray."

She left my office and let me do my thing, but instead of diving straight into my work, I made the mistake of checking my cell phone.

I had three new messages – three new messages that weren't there this morning. All of them, sadly, were from my mother because aside from my work friends, I didn't really have other friends anymore.

I had a deadline to meet. Noon was when I was due to submit the final changes on the orders I had placed in Paris. I checked my watch and frowned when I noticed I had around two hours left to meet the deadline, but I picked up the phone anyway.

"Hi, Mom," I greeted her as soon as she answered. After two messages left with Lana and three texts, I couldn't imagine the wrath I'd be facing if I didn't call her back.

"Jane Penelope Garrett! Where have you been?"

"Trying to get to my office. The elevators broke down and I had to take the stairs... I'm exhausted and I don't have a lot of time. What's so urgent?" I hated it when she used my middle name. It made me feel like I was a child again, getting grounded for something I didn’t even do.

"It's Amanda, she's getting cold feet."

"But the wedding is in two days!" I exclaimed, slightly louder than I would have preferred.

"Which is exactly why I am in such a panic! Janie, you have to talk to her. You know she only listens to you..."

That wasn't necessarily true actually. In fact, if that was true, she wouldn't have started dating her soon-to-be-husband Vin, and would not be getting married, and obviously would not be getting cold feet at all.

"What am I supposed to tell her? It's not like I'm an expert at this whole getting married thing." I started twirling the phone cord around my finger, anxious to end the conversation with my mother before it turned ugly - the way it normally did.

"But you're an expert on being lonely and you can tell her how much she doesn't want that."

Ah. There it was. The turning point I was waiting for.

From this moment on, the initially civil conversation I had with my mother would turn into bitter resentment-based justifications from me on why I chose this life, and my mother would continue to bombard me with questions of why I would rather drown in work than have an actual life.

"Mom, I really have a lot of work today. I can't talk about this with you right now," I replied, deciding to take a different route today. I had already gone down that road too many times. I just wanted to spare myself from all of the extra angst.

"Look, just call Amanda. Go have a girl's night out or something. Talk to her, please. This is something I can't fix, so you have to fix it for me."

I could hear my mother's tone change. When it came to Amanda, she was always like that, always such the worrywart and always trying to fix everything. It was like she thought she was the designated hero or something. She didn't know that sometimes all we needed was just for her to listen. We didn't need all the comments, opinions (or what she referred to as solutions). We just needed her to listen.

"Fine, as soon as I'm done here, I'll call her. I have to go, Mom." I heard the phone click on the other end, and I slammed the phone down onto its dock. Ugh. She really got on my nerves sometimes.

I tried to dive into work, but I couldn't concentrate. I kept thinking about this whole thing with Amanda. Why would she be getting cold feet now? All her life, all she wanted to do was finish school, meet her prince charming and get married so she could have a ton of babies. She wanted to be one of those Upper East Side housewives who went to charities and planned cotillions for their daughters. She never once thought of anything less or more. She had her mind made up and her heart set since she was thirteen.

I, on the other hand, wanted nothing of the sort. For me, life was more exciting when you had challenges that made you think. I wanted a job, a career that could take me places and keep me busy, which was why this job was perfect for me. As a department store buyer, I had to attend all of the fashion weeks around the world. It keeps me too busy to even think of having a boyfriend so I never even tried - especially since the last one didn't turn out so great. Okay, that's probably an understatement. It didn't just turn out "not so great." It turned out to be disastrous.

Wouldn't you call it disastrous if your boyfriend felt like he had more in common with your sister and asked permission to date her instead?
--

To be continued... 
What do you think of Buyer Blues so far? What do you think will happen? Share your thoughts in the comments section. Thanks!

Stories from the Hart: Leaving Lucas, Part 3

Leaving Lucas by Shannon Hart

Part 3

If you missed Part 1, you can read it here.

If you missed Part 2, you can read it here.

--

“I left my job didn’t I?” he answered, leaving only half a millisecond gap between the end of my question and the beginning of his answer – if that was even an answer.

“That’s not a real answer, Luke.”

“What do you want me to say? God, Katie. I love you. I want to be with you. I can’t imagine what my life would be like if I wasn’t with you. Of course I have doubts. Of course I’d prefer not to move all the way to Georgia and do God knows what for a living! But if staying here means not being with you, then I don’t want to stay.”

My knees started to weaken. He sounded angry and emotional, but what he was saying was so undeniably sweet.

“But Luke, what if you hate it there? Or what if you don’t find a job that you like? Are you going to resent me for it? Are you going to hate me for taking you away from your life here?”

He didn’t answer.

I kind of wished he did answer because then I’d have a good indication of whether I was just thinking crazy thoughts or justifiable fears.

“I don’t want to be selfish here, Lucas. I don’t want to demand you to do something for me and in the end still end up losing you anyway.”

“But you wanted me to go with you! Wasn’t that the whole reason for breaking up in the first place? Because I didn’t want to go with you?”

“Well, yes, in the beginning. But I’ve thought this through. I shouldn’t have asked you to go with me. I mean… you don’t owe me anything. I had no right to demand that you turn your life upside down for me. It’s not fair to you. I don’t want to make you do anything you don’t really want to do,” I said, suddenly feeling exhausted about everything.

The truth was, even as I was saying those words, I didn’t really believe them. I did want him to turn his life upside down for me. I did want him to move away with me. But… somehow I was convinced he didn’t really want to. And because I loved him, I wanted to set him free.

Was I stupid or what?

“Katie, listen to me,” he grabbed my hands and clutched on to them tightly. “I didn’t want to go at first. I admit it. But I’ve thought about it and the two weeks that we were broken up were the worst two weeks of my life. I don’t ever want to feel like that again. Ever. Anything is better than being without you. Jobless or miserable in a new city, whatever; those things I can get through… but I can’t get through life being without you.”

He forced me to look at him and reluctantly, I did. I looked into his deep sea-blue eyes and within moments felt myself drown in them.  It was so comforting and familiar, like coming home after a long exhausting safari. With Lucas, in his arms, looking into his beautiful eyes was where I was supposed to be. All of a sudden, I couldn’t even remember why I was so doubtful of him. I couldn’t recall why it was so difficult for me to believe that he really was willing to do this for me.

“Are you sure about this?” I asked, finding the need to ask one more time before completely surrendering.

He nodded anxiously. “I’ve never been so sure in my life.”

I closed my eyes and closed my mind – I didn’t want to give it another chance to rethink things or over analyze everything again like I always do – like I did the last twenty-four dreadful hours.

What was I thinking – doubting Lucas?

I rested my head against his chest, and felt the sweet lullaby of his heart beating steadily. It was beating harder than usual but all the more comforting – the thought that holding me still had that affect on him made me believe him even more.

“So… are you going to call the travel agent and cancel your flight?” he dared himself to ask.

I shook my head.

“What? But…” he protested.

I looked up at him and smiled. “Not before you put that ring on my finger. I think it’s about time.”

He sighed in relief. He pulled out the beautiful ring from his pocket – I felt the box poking at me when he was holding me – and lovingly slipped it on my finger before drowning me in one of the most passionate kisses I had ever experienced in my entire life.

--

What did you think of Leaving Lucas? Have you read Shannon's other short stories and/or her novel? Leave a comment to let us know. Thanks! 

Stories from the Hart: Leaving Lucas, Part 2

Leaving Lucas by Shannon Hart

Part 2

If you missed Part 1, you can read it here. 

--

Not that the apartment we were at was actually still home. It was just a nearly vacant place that was formerly our home for almost four years.

“Lucas, what are you doing here? I thought you had that big dinner,” I asked, not daring to even turn around to look at him.

“I already give them my notice yesterday, so they assigned the dinner to Franco instead.”

“You gave them your notice? As in you quit?”

It felt as if my heart stopped.

“Well, yeah. We’re moving to Atlanta. I had to, right?”

 As quickly as I could, I crumpled up the letter I had begun to write and tossed it out the half open window.

I turned around, praying in my head to somehow make the soon-to-happen conversation be less painful for both Lucas and me, and looked at him bravely in the eyes.

Brave on the outside that is. Inside, I was shaking like I was naked in sub zero weather.

“Lucas, I can’t let you do this,” I said.

He wasn’t even looking at me. Instead, he was scanning around the room. His eyes stopped at the two suitcases I had right beside the desk I was sitting at.

“Are you going somewhere?”

The actual conversation hadn’t even begun yet but I already had a tear or two escape from my eyes and roll down my cheek. I had no idea how I was going to actually get through the entire conversation without breaking down and crying like a toddler.

“I’m leaving for Atlanta today,” I said, wincing, terrified of Lucas's reaction.

“What do you mean? I don’t understand. I’m not packed yet. Do we need to leave so soon?” He raised an eyebrow, clearly not understanding where I was going with all this.

Who could blame him? It wasn’t like I truly understood everything either.

“You don’t have to leave. I do,” I answered.

So much for hoping my prayers would be answered. That sentence alone brought on an unbelievable amount of pain for me.

“I can’t let you come with me to Atlanta.”

Instead of screaming at the top of his lungs like I thought he would – or like he always did in the past – Lucas laughed. He laughed like I told the world’s best joke ever.

“Why are you laughing?” I asked, part confused and part angry.

“I’m laughing,“ he tried to say in between his chuckles, “because… because you’re insane! Because you’re a whack job and I feel like I don’t even know you anymore!”

“Stop laughing! This isn’t funny!” I demanded. I had my arms crossed tightly across my chest and whatever pain or fear I had earlier about the whole issue had quickly turned into rage instead.

“Oh I’m sorry. You don’t think it’s funny that you demanded that I go with you and then broke up with me because I didn’t want to? You don’t think it’s funny that I realized how much I love you and how much I want to be with you so I propose to you but you don’t say yes? And come on, you have to admit, it’s hilarious that I quit my job and rearranged my life so I can move to Atlanta with you, but now you don’t want me to go with you!”

He kept using the term funny and hilarious but he wasn’t really laughing anymore. It was more of a sinister sneer or something. It was something I’ve never seen him do before.

“I don’t think it’s funny at all, Luke.”

“Are you sure? Because you seem to be taking everything so lightly.”

I shook my head. “Please don’t think like that. If anything, this is the hardest thing I’ve had to do in my entire life.”

Ideally, this would be a conversation to have while sitting down. But with all my furniture already gone, I had no choice but to lay everything down on the table – without actually having a table.

“Look, Luke, this isn’t easy for me to say but let’s just be honest with each other. You don’t really want to do this.”

“Oh, you’re a mind reader now? You can read whatever is in my head?” he replied sarcastically. “You could make a good living off of that!”

I felt my blood begin to boil, but I told myself I needed to keep calm. The only way we could get through this is if one of us kept sane, and with him being all busy throwing snide comments at me, I figured that I was the only designated sane person in the room.

“So, you’re telling me you really want to do this? You really want to leave your job, move all the way across the country with me to Atlanta and leave your friends, your family and start from zero? You truly have no doubts about doing this?”

--

To be continued... What do you think of Leaving Lucas so far? What do you think will happen? Share your thoughts in the comments section. Thanks!

Stories from the Hart: Leaving Lucas, Part 1

Leaving Lucas by Shannon Hart

Part 1

I stared at the blank page for hours. It was as if the white lined page that came out of my favorite notebook was looking back at me, mocking me for not knowing what to write. It was annoying the heck out of me. I was stuck. Completely and utterly stuck.

I sighed.

With only a few hours left before my flight, I had to write something – anything – but I had absolutely no idea what to write. I didn’t even know where to begin.

Thanks a lot, Lucas.

This – my state of blankness – was happening all thanks to Lucas. This was his fault, not mine.

What was I thinking – trying to leave him a cowardly note?

Yes, that’s right – a note. Why? Because I didn’t know how else to tell him.

I was perfectly fine a few days ago. My mind was set. I had my tickets booked online, my new job waiting for me over in Atlanta, my new apartment – furnished and all – waiting for me to move my stuff into, and my stuff already partially taken away by the movers and some taken to be stored in my sister’s attic.

Two weeks ago, I watched Lucas move his stuff out, pack all of it into an oversized van and watched him drive the van away, taking my heart with him in the back seat. Five days ago, I finally embraced the fact that I was becoming single again and about to embark on an exciting new journey in life that involved a better career, a better paycheck, and definitely a better chance of finding a steady, long term relationship that would hopefully develop into marriage and kids five or six years down the line. You know, with a guy who wasn’t so insecure and intimidated by my career; a guy who loved me enough to want to pack up and move anywhere in the world with me because the job offer I got was just way too good to pass up; a guy who would at least give it a try before completely dismissing the idea.

And maybe, as a bonus, he’d have less of a short fuse too. That way, I could actually try and to talk to him like civil human beings instead of fight our way through discussions any time a big decision needed to be made.

So, in other words, I wanted to be on the lookout for a guy who was the complete opposite of Lucas.

What was I thinking – trying to make him turn his life upside down for me?

But when I found him sitting on the cold steps in front of my building yesterday morning, everything that I thought I had decided became uncertain again. By simply pulling out a red box from his pocket and getting down on one knee with tears in his eyes, he undid three months worth of thinking and I was back to being just as confused as I was when I first found out I got offered the lead anchor job in Atlanta.

I didn’t take the ring, but I didn’t exactly decline the offer either.

Instead, I told him I was touched by his proposal but needed to think – because I did need to think about it and because I didn’t want to make some rash decision to accept it just because I was, or am, still in love with him.

The last twenty-four hours were gruesome.  Not only was I sleep deprived, but I had to make the hardest decision of my life.

On one hand, I wanted to be with Lucas. Oh God, did I want to be with Lucas. We had been together for five years and all I ever wanted was to build a life with him and to grow old together. He was the best thing that ever happened to me. My knight in shining armor, my sunshine; you name it – he was everything to me. The only reason we broke up was because I wanted to take the job but he didn’t want to move to Atlanta with me.

So, when he asked me to marry him and told me he’d move to Atlanta with me with tears dripping down his cheeks, I should have been ecstatic, right? Accepting his marriage proposal and starting a new life with the guy I loved desperately should have sounded like a dream come true, right?

But no, I wasn’t ecstatic at all.

If anything, it just got me thinking: Did he really want to marry me, quit his job as a head chef here and move all the way to Atlanta? Or was he doing this just because he was afraid of what life would be like if we weren’t together? Was he just trying to “keep” me because he just didn’t want to be without me?

After clutching on to my pen for hours, I finally took the cap off and started to write.

Dear Lucas,

This probably isn’t the answer you were hoping for.

I stopped writing again.  I finally had the words formed in my head, but I couldn’t bring my hands to actually write them.

Oh God, this is too hard.

Just as I took in a deep breath and tried to write again, I heard keys rattle behind me and I instantly froze.

“Katie?”

He wasn’t supposed to be here. He was supposed to be preparing for a big dinner at the restaurant he worked at.

Crap. Why is he home?

--

To be continued... What do you think of Leaving Lucas so far? What do you think will happen? Share your thoughts in the comments section. Thanks!

Stories from the Hart: The Biggest Mistake

The Biggest Mistake by Shannon Hart

On a beautiful April evening, I sat there, watching the wine in my glass occasionally stir while I listened intently to Jack as he told me his story. I sighed repeatedly, feeling horrible and sick to my stomach as I digested everything.

"So, at the end of the day, I stood up there, said my vows, but didn’t mean a damn thing," he said, resting his elbows on the table and burying his head in his hands. "I was so wasted I don’t even remember half the words I said."

"Why did you do it? I mean, if you knew it didn’t feel right to marry her, why did you go through with the whole thing?" I asked, a spark of anger in my tone.

"I don’t know. I guess I just felt sorry for her. I mean, she would have been so embarrassed if we cancelled the wedding. I guess I wanted to spare her that because she didn’t deserve it."

"And you think she deserves this? To be left after five weeks of marriage?"

His head sunk lower. "I am such a jackass," he admitted, which I completely agreed with.

"Yes, you certainly are." I crossed my arms and gave him a hateful look. I didn’t care that I was sending bitchy vibes to the guy who had been best friend since third grade. I couldn’t stand to listen to him talk about how much of a jerk he had been.

"I know, I know! I’m awful, I don’t deserve to live," he said.

I sighed again.

"So what happens next?" I asked, getting explicit images in my head of Karen torn and in tears. Even I, who was just an outsider listening to the whole ordeal, felt heartbroken and crushed. I couldn’t imagine what it was like to be her and in that position.

"Well, I already spoke to a divorce attorney from my dad’s firm. She already got one too, I think. Her friend, Sam, is a lawyer. I think they used to be childhood neighbors or something."

"How did she… react? When you said you were leaving?" I already knew how Karen reacted – after all, I had been there when they broke up last year. I was literally standing between them as Jack told her that he didn’t see himself being able to commit to marriage to her. I was the one she held on to when she was about to pass out in shock.

"Surprisingly, she didn’t actually say much. She said she already knew I wasn’t in it for the long run and said that she saw it coming right after we moved into the new house. She said she had a feeling that my heart didn’t completely belong to her and that sooner or later I’d pack up and leave."

That surprised me. Not that she knew he would leave, but that she was willing to put herself in the middle of the twisted situation. How could she allow herself to be tied down to him in marriage like that, knowing that it would end anyway? Did she love him that much, or did she not love herself that much?

"What I don’t understand is, if you knew you weren’t that into her, why did you propose? Why did you even ask her to marry you? And why did you play along with all the wedding preparations and everything? You could have just avoided this whole thing if you were just man enough to tell her you didn’t want marriage." Clearly, I was not Karen, but I felt like I had to ask on her behalf since apparently she didn’t ask. I have no idea why she didn’t ask, it would have been the first thing I would ask had I been her.

"I don’t know… I don’t know…" he answered, unconvincingly.

"Oh come on, Jack. Be honest with me. If you couldn’t be honest with Karen, the least you could do is be honest with me." It annoyed me that he insisted on playing dumb about it.

It was then his turn to sigh. He sat back in his chair, looking at the empty plate that forty-five minutes earlier had been filled with his favorite Tuna Aglio Olio Spaghetti.

"Jack, if not for me, then for you. You have to at least be honest with yourself about this otherwise you’ll keep making the same mistakes over and over again. Now come on, man up and spill it."

Jack went silent for a few long seconds. The anticipation nearly killed me but I knew him well enough to know that he’d eventually spill the beans. There wasn’t a single secret he could keep from me. There was that one time in high school when he secretly had a crush on Violet Monroe who sat in front of him during English Lit class; he pretended to not care, but I could tell from the way he looked at her whenever she flipped her hair. He denied it like nobody’s business when I confronted him, but in the end, on a cold, rainy Saturday afternoon while we were decorating the school gym for the winter dance, he finally confessed and said, "You’re right, I think I have a thing for her," while he hung fake crystal ornaments.

"It’s not that simple, Mia. You’ve been away for a long time. There are things that you don’t know."

"I was gone for 8 months, Jack. And besides, it wasn’t like I was off jet-setting and exploring the globe, I was working."

"Working so hard that you couldn’t even come to my wedding," he replied sarcastically.

"Look, if you don’t want to tell me, hey, that’s fine. I don’t want to push you. You have no obligations to me. But at least admit it to yourself."

"What are you, a twelve-step program instructor? Did you get certified while you were off in Africa helping the sick and needy?" he chuckled.

"You really are a jackass," I said, rolling my eyes.

Our dessert came and as the waiter gently placed my plate of buttermilk panna cotta – I promised my trainer I’d lay off the desserts, but with a conversation like this, dessert seemed to be  the only way I’d survive the night – I found myself still dying to know.

"I know you still don’t really want to talk about it but I can’t help it. Call me nosy, I don’t care, I want to know why you didn’t feel for her the way she did for you," I announced as I put my tiny spoon through the soft custard. "I just can’t wrap my head around it. She’s beautiful, she’s nice and she’s smart. She dresses like she’s a movie star and she even puts up with your crap. She even played along when you had that vegan phase a while back!"

Jack nodded.

"She’s everything you always told me you were looking for in a woman. Remember, when we were camping that time? The perfect girlfriend you described is basically her!" I continued.

"I was eighteen, Mia. I didn’t know any better."

I took a moment to savor the amazing taste of the panna cotta melting in my mouth and Jack smiled.

"What?"

"I love how you can grill and torture me with questions and still enjoy a good desert," he laughed.

"Hah. Glad I amuse you," I said, giving him a nasty look.

"Look, I can tell you why, but I’m not sure you’d understand it and I’d like to get through this dinner without looking like more of a jackass than I already do," he said, putting his spoon down and then folding his napkin.

"Seriously, Jack. You could never be more of a jackass than now. It’s not even humanly possible!" I chuckled at his expense.

"Gee, thanks."

We were silent for a while, and all of a sudden things just seemed awfully awkward. Jack was visibly uncomfortable in his seat and kept playing with the corner of his folded napkin.

"OK, look, let’s just forget it. Let’s not talk about this anymore," I decided. "I have just come back from a long trip and I just want to enjoy a good dinner conversation with my best friend. Can we do that?"

Jack laughed. "Of course we can."

"Good, so now let’s talk about work. How’s the new job?"

Jack snorted. "It’s been three months, it’s hardly new anymore. I love it though, I can’t imagine doing anything else."

I smiled, happy that at least something was working well in his life. We continued to talk for another hour, laughing and joking just like we always did. We talked about our dearest friend Kip, who had just declared he wanted to quit his job and backpack around Europe like a teenager (he was 40). We also had a field day mocking Jack’s brother Dean, who just bought a boat but was actually seasick prone.

The night ended too quickly – my cell phone was beeping thanks to the alarm I set for 11pm, to remind me that I had an early morning flight to catch. As we walked out of the restaurant, he grabbed my coat for me and put his own on, then slid his arm around my waist.

"Can I walk you home?" he asked, gazing into my eyes like… like what? He had never done that before. I didn’t even have a comparison.

"What? We always walk home together," I answered, finding my heart beat a little off the beat. What was he doing?

He grabbed my hand and circled my arm around his. Shyly and hesitantly from what I had observed but he did it anyway. And for some strange reason, I let him. I had no idea what I was doing, but pulling my hand away didn’t seem like an option unless I wanted a complete overreaction from him.

"Look Mia, before you go back to Africa and disappear for another year or whatever, I have to get this off my chest," he said as we turned onto 7^th Street.

"Oh my God, are you dying?" I asked. My eyes widened and I almost really believed it.

"No! What are you talking about? I’m not dying!" he exclaimed. I watched a sweat break on his forehead.

"Then why are you so serious?"

Jack halted his steps. He turned to me and grabbed me by the shoulders. Before I knew it, with my hands limp on my sides, he was hugging me. He was hugging me so tight, I thought I’d die of lack of oxygen.

"Mia, you asked me why I couldn’t love Karen…" he started to say.

My heart stopped.

No. No. This can’t be happening, I thought to myself. What was he doing? Panic began to rise within me and I suddenly felt like everything was spinning.

"Mia, the truth is…"

"Stop!" I suddenly shouted. I broke away from his ridiculously tight embrace and put my hand on his mouth. "Don’t say it. I swear Jack, if you say one more word, I’ll kill you."

My heart was racing so fast, it was like my heart was in a Formula One Grand Prix race. Fear of him telling me that he had loved me all this time began to haunt me instantly, and I didn’t know how I’d respond to it if he did.

"Mia, please, I have to say this. I can’t keep this a secret anymore," he pleaded. In my head, I snorted – so much for thinking he could never keep a secret from me.

"But why? Why do you need to tell me? I don’t even want to hear it!" I said, covering my ears and closing my eyes like a little girl. I was this close to humming so I wouldn’t be able to hear him say it.

"Stop that. Stop acting like a little child. This is serious. Besides, you are the one who asked. I am simply entertaining your request," he answered.

I kept shaking my head.

No, I didn’t want to hear it. Seriously – I didn’t want to hear him declare his love for me, and I didn’t want to have to reject him. And I would reject him for sure, because I didn’t mention it, but I had a boyfriend; a wonderful, adorable, good looking and smart hazel eyed doctor boyfriend, who was waiting for me back in Africa.

I have no idea why I never bothered to tell Jack that I had a boyfriend.

"I can’t do this, Jack. Just don’t, OK? I can’t."

"Can’t what?"

"Can’t hear it. Please."

Jack looked down. His head hung from his neck like he no longer had the will to live. He sighed, and I sighed, and I felt like I was going to cry.

"Mia, please. I’ll never have the courage to say this again. Please."

The way he begged me like that just sliced my heart, but I couldn’t hear it. I couldn’t listen to him say the words because… I had a boyfriend. And because given the opportunity, I could very possibly leave him and choose to be with Jack instead. And choosing to be with Jack would mean leaving behind all my life’s work in Africa – leaving my passion and leaving the children I had helped teach all this time.

But then I made the silly mistake of actually looking him straight in the eyes. His blue eyes pierced right through me and I found myself nodding like an idiot. Like I didn’t know better, I let him finally say the words he had apparently wanted to tell me the entire night.

"I couldn’t love Karen because my heart already belongs to someone else. All this time, girlfriend after girlfriend – I could never truly love them because I already gave my heart away."

Oh. My. God.

I thought I was going to throw up out of nervousness.

"I have loved you since the third grade, Mia. I can’t love anyone else."

There. He said it.

And surprisingly, it didn’t kill me. But it did make me want to kill him.

"I can’t believe you! All this time, and you didn’t say a damn thing! And now it’s too late, Jack. I already have a boyfriend and Ethan is amazing. I can’t just leave everything – leave him – behind and be with you!"

I hit him repeatedly, throwing punches at him like he was a sand sack.

"Whoa. Stop hitting! Why are you so mad?" he asked, confused.

"Ugh! I’m mad because… I don’t know why I’m mad! I’m just… mad!" I pushed him away until he almost fell over, and I ran.

I ran as fast as I could to my apartment which, thank God, was only a block away from where we had our dramatic "fight" – if you could even call it that. I opened the lock with my trembling hand and quickly shut the door behind me.

For the life of me, I couldn’t understand why this was happening: why he was telling me all this, why I was reacting this way and why this was all happening now – when I thought I had finally moved on and had a great life of my own. I never admitted it to anyone, but I had been in love with him too, up until he decided to ask Karen to marry him. I tried to tell him to rethink things, I tried to hint to him that he may have other options under his nose, but his mind was made up. He wanted Karen – or he thought he did. Even I thought he did.

He knocked on my door repeatedly, unwilling to give up.

"Come on, you have to let me in! We can talk about this," he said, banging on my door.

"No. Go away!" I shouted.

"You can’t make me go away. If you don’t come out, I’ll just stay out here, I’ll tell all your neighbors that you’re under house arrest or something," he insisted.

I had to laugh a little – it sounded a bit like how I would lock him in his own closet when we were younger.

"Jack, stop. Really. You can’t make me open the door."

I heard him grunt.

A few minutes of silence passed by. I started to convince myself that he left, but just as I slowly placed my hand on my doorknob, he started singing. Like, really singing that old slow-rock song Knocking on Heaven’s Door, and Jack singing was even worse than Jack banging on the door. He was so oblivious of the fact that he was completely tone deaf, that I couldn’t decide whether it was hilarious or annoying. He made my ears hurt, that was for sure, but I couldn’t help but to find it freakishly charming.

"Oh God, please, stop singing! You’re cracking all the windows in the building!" I shouted, desperate for him to stop singing; desperate because it was getting to me as much as it was appealing to me.

"So open the door and the singing will stop, I swear," he answered, still trying to be musical even though it sounded nothing like any note I’d ever heard in my life.

I took a deep breath and gave up. I opened the door.

I opened the door half expecting for him to barge in and demand an explanation. The other half of me expected him to stand outside, begging me for forgiveness, admitting he was completely crazy to have just blurted out that he loved me like that. But no part of me expected him to just charge at me with a soft and gentle kiss.

Nope. Completely did not see that one coming.

His hands held my face and while I could have very much pushed him away and slapped him for being so aggressive, I didn’t. Instead, I let him kiss me.

Which was obviously wrong because my head knew that Ethan was waiting for me in Africa. It was so wrong because Jack wasn’t even divorced yet. Worst of all, it just felt wrong. It almost felt like I was kissing a brother or something.

Eww.

I spent so much time of my life thinking I was in love with Jack, and dreaming of kissing him but when we actually did kiss, it felt more wrong than right.

Could I have been in love with the thought of being in love with Jack? Did I just want something I thought I couldn’t have? Was I just obsessed with the thrill of the chase?

He pulled away, taking a few steps back, looking every bit as awkward and uncomfortable as I did.

"Was that as weird for you as it was for me?" I asked bluntly.

He nodded hesitantly, with his eyes squinted and his nose wrinkled. "That just felt so wrong," he replied, which I then replied to with a sigh of relief.

We stood there looking at each other, not sure what to say or what to do next – after having made one of the stupidest mistakes in platonic-friendship history.

"Where do we go from here?" Jack asked, finally breaking the unbearable silence.

I shrugged. It was all just too bizarre to comprehend.

"Is it going to be weird for us now?"

It took me a few minutes to answer, and when I said "Probably," I saw his face fall and felt my own heart sink. "But you’ll always be my best friend, Jack. No matter what, OK? And the good thing is, I get to go away and be in Africa for awhile so we won’t have to look at each other like this for another six months at least."

He slipped his hands into his pocket and lifted his shoulders. "Great, well, you go on ahead. Go away again and I’ll just stay here and just deal with my miserable messy divorce."

I laughed lightly. "You know, we could have saved ourselves a lot of trouble if you had just told me you were dying instead."

He chuckled.

"So you’re still getting a divorce, even though you now know you’re not in love with me?"

"I am still getting a divorce, yes. Although I’m still not sure that I’m not in love with you, Mia, but I’m positive that I don’t love Karen. I just can’t stay married to her – it wouldn’t be fair to her to continue pretending. It wouldn’t be fair to me either."

I nodded, even though I wasn’t quite sure what he meant. He wasn’t sure he was not in love with me? What on earth did that even mean?

He took his hands out of his pockets and moved a few inches closer.

"Mia, I… I know this doesn’t make sense, but…"

Before I knew it, my heart started pounding again.

"I don’t want you to go back to Africa," he said, as if it was even his call to make. "I know this is selfish and I know that I have no right to even ask you of this, but I don’t know if I’m not in love with you. And until I know, I don’t want to blow my chances by letting you go back to Africa, to your… boyfriend…"

As much as I loved Jack – in whatever sense, be it in the brotherly sense or whatever else it may be, the way he said what he said just made me want to slap him. I couldn’t believe he even dared to say that.

"So, you bend over backwards trying to make things fair for you and for Karen, but not for me?" I snapped.

He shook his head repeatedly. "I know I’m being unfair to you, but what I’m asking for is just a chance, Mia. I don’t want us to part ways now and then realize we’re meant for each other and waste all that time in between. Don’t you think it’s worth a try? I mean, if we’re meant for each other, imagine how happy we could be…"

I didn’t know what to say. I just stood there, like a complete fool, looking at him with my mouth hanging open.

As much as I would love to deny it, I was actually tempted. A small part of my brain, way in the back of my head, asked me "Wasn’t this what you wanted all this time?" But a different part of me kept reminding me that Ethan was waiting – that I had no business messing up a perfectly good relationship just because the guy who I thought I loved all this time suddenly wants to try it out. With no guarantee that things would even work out and considering the possibility that if things didn’t work out I’d lose my best friend, I shook my head.

"No. I can’t. We can’t. It’s not an option, Jack," I answered firmly.

Sure, my legs were shaking. Whatever – I sounded firm enough that he thought it was for real.

"You won’t even give it a week? You can delay your flight back. Come on, Mia. Give us a week… You don’t know where this can go." He took my hands in his. "Please."

By then I had tears in the corner of my eyes and they were ready to drop anytime. I couldn’t pretend like I didn’t want to try. But then again, I couldn’t bring myself to risk damaging the one relationship I always had faith in: our friendship.

Our friendship was too important to me.

So with tears finally rolling down steadily on my cheeks, I shook my head one more time and gave him my final answer.

"If you asked me this a year ago, I’d say yes in a heartbeat. But… things have changed now, Jack. I’m not the same person I was before and I have moved on. I’m in a relationship now, Jack, a good one. I can’t just leave everything behind and gamble everything for something that may or may not turn out great. Don’t get me wrong; I love you. I’ll always love you. But…"

Jack closed his eyes, listening and absorbing everything I said. He nodded slowly, looking like he understood exactly where I was coming from – or tried to, anyway.

"I understand," he muttered.

"Do you? Really?" I asked. "I don’t want you to take it the wrong way, I…"

"No, Mia, it’s OK. I understand. I never should have even asked you to stay. I couldn’t help it, I just…" The sad look on his face quickly became unbearable for me to look at. He looked just about as sad as he would be if he were attending his own funeral.

"I’m sorry, Jack. I really am," I added. My head hung from my shoulders; I couldn’t bear to look him in the eyes. Add to that the fact that my nose and eyes were all red, I had no business looking up at all.

"Don’t be, Mia. Don’t be."

I continued to cry, and it had gotten even harder than before.

"Hey, hey, stop that. Don’t cry," he said softly. He put his arms around me and held me in a comforting embrace. "Please don’t cry. You know how much I hate watching a girl cry."

I wanted to stop crying – God knows I did. But my emotions just went on this gigantic roller coaster ride and I didn’t know how to control it. I couldn’t help but feel so overwhelmed with questions of why, how, when, and what now and it frustrated me so much because no one seemed to have any of the answers. Not me, not Jack, and certainly, not Ethan who was all the way in Africa, completely in the dark about the whole ordeal.

Come to think of it, Ethan didn’t even know Jack existed; I have no idea why I never told him about my best friend.

"Can we survive this? Can we get over this and go back to the way things were before?" I asked, afraid of what Jake’s answer would be.

"Of course! What are you talking about? Of course we’ll survive this. My God, Mia, I’ve known you practically my entire life. Nothing could come between us. Nothing, you hear me?"

I nodded and sniffled, while constantly wiping off the tears from my cheeks. I tried to smile back when he looked deep into my eyes and attempted to give me a smile that was supposed to comfort me – but all that came out of that was a half crooked spasm on my cheek that in no way resembled a smile.

He gave me a peck on the forehead gently, before telling me he had to leave because of an early morning meeting. As I opened the door to let him out, I felt like somehow, I was losing my best friend. Even though he basically swore that nothing would change between us, I had a distinct nagging feeling that things would change no matter what he said.

He turned around and looked at me one last time before entering the elevator. He flashed me his smile again with a wave and as I waved back at him, I whispered goodbye to him, knowing for certain that things would never, ever be the same again.

Seriously, things really would have been so much easier if he had told me anything else… just not that he loved me.