Page 99 of When Hearts Collide

My face scrunches and I take in the concern in her kind eyes.

I let out a sob and throw my hands around her neck and breathe in her faint scent of lavender. Old habits die hard. I’m so used to putting on a front with everyone, I keep forgetting I can be vulnerable in front of my girls.

“Shhh…” she hushes me and rubs soothing circles on my shuddering back. “I’m here, Millie. You can tell me everything.”

Tears slip down my face and I nod wordlessly. After a few minutes, she gently pulls away and leads us to the wooden bench, which is protected from the elements by the canopy we had set up at the beginning of the season.

I take out my latest knitting project—a small blanket I barely started—from my tote and stare at it. The stitches look uneven and wrong, like everything else in my life. I pull at the yarn.

“Hey, hey. Tell me what’s going on.” Belle stops my hand with hers, puts my project back in my tote, and hands me a mug.

Staring at the hot chocolate in my hands, I whisper, “Thank you.”

Belle shrugs and gives me a wink. “I see you drinking your hot chocolate like how I inhale my coffee, but be warned, I don’t know how to make them fancy like the way you do. This is just an instant mix.”

My heart warms, the earlier pain fading away slightly as I take a careful sip. The drink is much too sweet, but my soul feels soothed. It’s the thought that counts.

“So tell me, why are you so sad? I thought the plan worked and you and Ryland are together now?”

I stare at the colorful twinkling lights of the tall buildings surrounding us. The city is a veritable Christmas snow globe, with buildings around us glowing in red and green lights, and adorned with festive decor—a sparkling Santa atop a sleigh and his team of reindeers on the rooftop garden in the next building, a light dusting of snow atop any shrubbery or flat surfaces.

The honking of cars and faint melodies of Christmas songs travel through the air from our surroundings. The city is very much alive and bursting with the excitement one normally expects for the week before Christmas.

But my heart doesn’t feel the elation, the thrill of the season.

“Do you know that feeling in your gut when you think something bad will happen? That uneasiness swimming around in your chest making it hard to breathe?”

I blow out a deep breath. “That’s how I feel every time I’m with him. He has never made me any promises. Our interactions are intense but fleeting. A stolen kiss here, a make-out session there. I feel like I’m trying to hold on to him, but he wants to let go, if that makes any sense.”

Belle curls her arm around my shoulder, giving me a squeeze. “Aww, Millie. That sounds so rough. I was hoping things were going well for you two, since I’d seen that smile on your face more this past month than I did before.”

I stare at the cup in my hand, a wistful smile on my lips. “I can’t help but wonder, is it better not knowing how it feels to be loved by him, to feel his warmth and kisses, than to have experienced it knowing it won’t last? I feel him pulling away, Belle.”

“If this doesn’t work out, will you regret it? Or will this be a beautiful memory?” she murmurs, her eyes taking on a pensive gaze as she stares at the buildings in front of us. “I’d like to think, if I were to have a choice, it’d be better to have experienced something earth shattering, to have an empty heart be filled with love, than to never feel it before. If there was a choice, that is…”

Her voice trails off, and she sounds sad.

I look at her just as she turns her head toward me, her eyes dimming. I remember what she said back in the rage room all those weeks ago and how her parents were looking to set her up in an arranged marriage. “Are you okay, Belle?”

She pauses for a second and shakes her head. “Not really, but I will be.” She pauses and I wait for her to continue. “I’ll tell you girls everything someday.”

Belle takes a sip of her drink as she looks far away, a wistfulness in her expression. “And maybe you’ll hate me for saying this, but honestly, I’m jealous of you sometimes, Millie. You’re strong. A go-getter, going after your dreams of becoming an educator, chasing after your man, allowing yourself to get hurt. And while you might feel your future is uncertain, you’re living your choices, Millie. You have a choice. You get to decide what to do next.”

Belle tips her lips up, but the smile doesn’t reach her eyes. “Don’t you think that’s a powerful thing? To have that choice? To choose if you want to risk it all? To let yourself get hurt in the process? To experience love?”

She swallows and sighs. “Not all of us have that choice and for some people who do, they aren’t even brave enough to take a step into the unknown, and that’s how I know you’ll be okay, Millie, regardless of what happens. Because you’ll always get back up. You may cry, you may get hurt, but you’ll stand back up and fight.”

Tears well in my eyes as I look at one of my best friends, who’s clearly troubled by problems of her own, who sees me in a different light, and I’m reminded of what Ryland told me once. Something I once told myself, but have conveniently forgotten.

I’m a fighter.

Squeezing her hand, I whisper, “Thank you, Belle. And you’re a fighter too, just like me, just like Grace. Just like all of us. And I’m here for you.”

She stays silent as we take sips from our drinks, allowing the hot liquid to warm our insides in this frigid cold. After a few moments, she asks, “Want to learn something interesting?” She sneaks a glance at me and grins.

I chuckle, my chest feeling lighter now that I’ve unloaded some emotions weighing me down for the last few weeks. I nod.

“In my mom’s culture, or I guess, my culture too since I’m half-Chinese, there’s a saying, ‘when a woman pursues a man, they’re separated by a silk screen, but when a man pursues a woman, they’re separated by a mountain.’”

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