Page 3 of Echoes

“I love that I comeafterthe running car,” Lydia teased.

“You know you come first.”

“Youneed to come first,” Lydia suggested. “Do you know why I wanted to go camping with you instead of staying in and watching a movie or going for a drink?”

Eliza shook her head.

“Because I knew it was the only way I’d be able to talk to you about this stuff without you fleeing. I have the keys to the car tucked safely away, so you can’t escape.”

“You kidnapped me? Is that what you did?”

“Friendnapped sounds better.” Lydia shrugged.

“You can’t just go around forcing me to do things.” She laughed.

“It’s the job of the best friend to do that exact thing sometimes. I needed to make sure you were okay. I’m worried about you.”

“Why? I’m okay.”

“Because you don’tseemhappy. You seem… lost, El. I can still see it in your eyes. It’s been there since we met. In fact, the only time I ever saw it go away was when we–” She stopped and turned her face toward Eliza’s. “When we made love. And only when we did that in the dorm room, not when we were still in high school.”

“I was away from my mom in college.”

“I know that. She tried to make it better but made it worse for you, so being in college was your chance to move on. And I know how much it hurt you when it ended with us because it was too hard to be with each other but never get tobewith each other. I’m only saying that you’re thirty years old now, and that’s the only time, I think, that I’ve seen your eyes look… happy or not clouded with pain. Obviously, I don’t see your eyes when you’re with another woman, so maybe they’ve been happy when you were, you know,withsomeone else.”

They weren’t. Eliza knew that for a fact, but she didn’t say anything. For years, she’d been holding this in, and maybe now was finally the right moment to tell her best friend that she’d always wanted them to get back together, but Elizahadalways been a bit of a coward, so she wouldn’t be doing that now.

“I just want you to find it,” Lydia added.

“Find what?”

“Whatever it is that makes you push things away.”

“I don’t do that.”

“Yes, you do. And youdid, Eliza.”

“Did what?”

“Pushed me away.”

“No, I didn’t. We ended when–”

Lydia turned on her side to face her and said, “I said it was too hard being with you but not actually being with you. You stopped visiting. You also askedmenot to come on the weekends, even though I was ready and willing to make the drive. Once, I had my car packed, and I was about to pull out of the damn parking lot, but you called and told me you needed the weekend to study. That was the last time. I never packed my car up again because I expected you to call and tell me not to bother or that you weren’t making the trip to see me like you’d planned.”

“I was back in therapy,” she revealed.

“What?”

“When I got to school, I decided to check out student health, and there was a counselor there. I did the consultation, and she seemed okay enough, so I started going to her at the end of September.”

“You never told me that.”

“I didn’t want to admit that I needed it. Besides, I also wasn’t sure it would work. I guess I just assumed she’d give me meds like the first one had done, and I’d go numb again, or I’d stop because it wasn’t helping, so there wasn’t much of a point.”

“I was your girlfriend, Eliza. I was your best friend, too. Not that I think youhadto tell me that you were going to therapy, but youcouldhave. I would have supported you. It would’ve helped to know that. I wouldn’t have–”

“Broken up with me? Why? Because you would’ve pitied me?”

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