I SHUT my computer and slide down until I’m horizontal on Penny’s bed.
Part of me wants to scream. Screaming sounds like an acceptable course of action, given the fact Alice won’t stop blowing up my phone about the presentation, Professor Santoro keeps piling on the requests, Giana hasn’t gotten the hint that I don’t want to rehash the barbecue with her, and I haven’t seen my boyfriend in over a week.
Ex-boyfriend.
He’s not mine anymore. I made sure of that when I wrote him that note.
That doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt. Somehow, I thought that the heartbreak wouldn’t be as deep if I was the one initiating it, but that was a lie. I’ve thrown myself into work since the moment I got back to Moorbridge, because the moment I take a breather, I can’t think of anything or anyone but Sebastian. I might be staying at Penny’s dad’s house, but there are reminders of him everywhere. When I found the note he left on the jersey in my bag the other day, I shut myself in the bathroom in the lab and tried to breathe through the tears—until Alice banged on the door.
Whenever I do let my mind wander, it runs over all the memories, big and small, and I miss him so much I feel like I just took a rusted knife to my throat. I hurt him. I know he’s ambitious, I know he’s going to succeed at whatever he ends up doing. There’s probably going to be a Sebastian Callahan restaurant empire one day. And what we said about each other’s families…
It’s better for him if I’m not involved in his life. He’ll find someone else eventually, a woman with a family he loves and is happy to be part of. A woman who fits into his life so perfectly, he’ll laugh when he thinks about how he thought I could ever be that person.
I just have to scream through it until the feelings fade.
By the time he got back to New York, I had already moved all my things from his house to Penny’s father’s place. Mr. Ryder and his fiancée, Nikki Rodriguez—also Penny’s boss at the ice rink in town—have been generous about letting me stay here. It’s what I should have done in the first place, sucked it up and spent a few nights here, then moved into the new dorm room McKee offered me. If I had stayed firm, I wouldn’t have gotten involved with Sebastian again.
I wouldn’t have fallen in love.
I wouldn’t have had to steal back my heart.
I grab a pillow and press it over my face. I do scream, my voice hitching on a sob by the end. My phone chimes again. It’s practically Russian roulette whenever I look at it. Will it be Giana? Alice? Izzy? Sebastian?
There’s a knock on the door. “Mia? Can I come in?”
I throw the pillow aside and sit up. “It’s your room.”
“Well, just in case you were naked or something,” Penny says as she pushes open the door. She frowns as she takes me in. I’ve been too busy to do much but eat and take quick showers. My hair hangs limp, I have chipped nails, and I’ve been wearing the same sweatshirt for days. “Is everything okay?”
“The presentation is a disaster.”
She sits on the end of the bed. “No way. It looks amazing.”
“Alice chewed me out for mislabeling a diagram.”
“She can go to hell.”
I snort. “She’s right, though. I’m working on it nonstop, and I keep messing shit up. The symposium is next week, and I’ve barely practiced.”
“Work on it more later,” she says. “I have pizza on the way.”
At the mere mention of food, my stomach growls. I’m not sure when I last ate. Maybe the protein bar at the lab earlier?
Sebastian wouldn’t let it stand. He’d already be in the kitchen, whipping up something amazing.
Something I told him not to pursue.
I flop against the bed again, my breath hitching.
“I thought maybe we could do each other’s nails,” Penny says. I hear the concern in her voice and bite my cheek to keep the tears at bay. “And pick out another movie to watch. Dad and Nikki are going out to dinner, so we can use the big TV in the living room.”
“Fine.”
“I won’t even suggest any rom-coms this time.”
“It’s whatever, Pen. Put on whatever you want.”
She frowns at me. “Sebastian came back from his road trip today. Last of the season.”
“Please don’t—”
“He wants to come talk to you.”
I shut my eyes. The day after I left, he visited the house, asking to speak with me. Penny deflected, which I’m grateful for, even though I’m sure it wasn’t comfortable for her. I need to work on being extra nice to her right now, because she’s the one caught in the middle between me and the Callahans. I’m sure Cooper is positively thrilled with me.
“I can’t.”
Penny’s voice is hesitant. “That’s fine, I’ll tell him to leave the things on the porch.”
“What things?”
“A pair of shoes and your jacket. I guess you left them at the house.”
“You should give him back his jersey.”
“I don’t think he’ll miss it.”
I lean over the side of the bed and rummage in my bag until I find it. My heart squeezes at the sight of it. The one and only time I wore it, he took it off so tenderly. “Take it. Give it to him or throw it out, I don’t care. I don’t want to see it again.”
Her face falls. Her kindness and her father’s kindness are helping keep my dream alive right now. I need to remember that.
“Please,” I add, holding it out.
She takes it. “Okay. But for the record, I still think you should talk.”
“Noted.”
“You were friends too, you know.”
I laugh hollowly. “Believe me, I do.”
“So maybe even if it doesn’t work out romantically, you could just—”
“It already didn’t work out,” I interrupt. “He thinks I should cut my family out of my life.”
“He was just frustrated,” she says. “We all saw what they were like at that barbecue. You don’t think they’re perfect either.”
“We’re just—we’re not compatible,” I say, even though we’ve had this conversation over and over. I know she’s trying to help, but I’m getting tired of explaining myself. “It would have fallen apart no matter what.”
“You didn’t get what you wanted,” she says, a little edge to her voice. “He’s still quitting baseball.”
“That is what I wanted.”
I didn’t want him to stick with baseball, not even for a moment, after our conversation in the bell tower. Now that I’ve had time to think, I know that he’s not quitting because of me. I might’ve helped him along, somehow, but he’s not doing it for anyone but himself. Still, that doesn’t change the fact that eventually, he’d need to compromise for me, whether about marriage or kids or something else, or I’d end up compromising for him. It would ruin us, and the only variable would be how long it would take.
Penny flicks her braid over her shoulder. “Isn’t it? You wanted him to be miserable because your mother got you scared.”
“I need you to stop being Cooper’s girlfriend for a second and be my friend instead.”
The moment the words leave my mouth, I wish I could take them back. Her face falls, something shuttering in her eyes. “Wow. Okay.”
“Pen—”
“I wasn’t saying that as his girlfriend. I said it as your friend and Sebastian’s.”
“I didn’t mean…” I trail off as my phone rings. I glance at it with a grimace before picking up. “Alice?”
“You said you’d be at the lab half an hour ago,” she says. “Where are you?”
I completely lost track of time, but there’s no way I’m going to tell her that. “I’m close. Be there in a few, sorry.”
“Mia,” Penny says as I slide off the bed and start cramming shit into my bag.
“Sorry. I have to go to the lab.”
“We should keep talking about this.”
“What do you want me to say? You fit in with them, Penny. You’re going to have a beautiful wedding with Cooper one day, and beautiful children, and your dad is even Cooper’s coach. It’s like you were made to be a Callahan.”
“And Sebastian isn’t asking you to do any of those things.”
I shove my feet into sandals and toss my phone into my bag. I look like shit, but there’s nothing I can do about that right now. Alice will just have to ignore it. She doesn’t look fantastic herself; she must be at least a few weeks behind on her next dye appointment.
Maybe I should cut my hair before the symposium.
The fact that a haircut sounds like such a good idea to me right now is more depressing than the stained McKee sweatshirt I’m wearing.
“I like to think I know him pretty well,” she says as I open the door. “Just like I know you. And for the record, I don’t think he ever does anything he doesn’t truly want to do. If marriage and kids were deal breakers for him, he’d have said that.”
I just give her a tight smile. “Raincheck on the pizza?”
I wonder if there’s a pair of scissors at the lab.
