Page 7 of Those Heartbreak Scars

“I’m sorry.” I hurry to catch up as we take the steep steps up and up. I truly am. He’s wrong about my not knowing what it’s like to love someone, knowing they will never be yours. “I keep putting my foot in my mouth.”

“It’s not your fault she broke me,” he says as we enter the little courtyard in front of our Airbnb. “And we both knew this interaction would be awkward. It’s probably why you didn’t call me after.”

“And why you didn’t text me for six months.” It felt like he walked away from me too. I tried to tell myself that wasn’t accurate. I can be too sensitive. Take things too personally. But the months bled into each other. “It’s a long time.”

“It’s hard.” He rubs a hand over his heart. “It fucking hurts. It doesn’t stop. Every day I wake up and have this blissful moment where everything is normal and right, and then I remember that she married someone else. That the life I knew for so long is someone else’s. I miss home, but I can’t go home because memories of us are everywhere.”

“You sold your condo.” When Indy told me that, it had felt so final.

I start tapping my thumb to my fingertips. The sensation brings calmness.

“I couldn’t breathe there. She was everywhere. Not just the apartment. In my office. In my car. I can’t be around the people I consider family, because they’re her family. Even my friends… you… EJ… you remind me of her. I don’t know if I will ever get over it.”

I blink back the sudden burn behind my eyes. I know his sentiments all too well. Being on the outside. Unable to be around the person I love without it being painful. It’s why I moved to another continent.

“You wouldn’t understand,” he says, then points at a window. “Well, I think we found EJ and your friend.”

“Oh.” I clap my hands over my eyes when I spot our naked friends doing unsanitary things on the kitchen island. That is way more than I ever needed to see. “It looks like you can add accidentally leaving the curtains open to special occasions where EJ takes part in exhibitionism. My freaking eyes are burning. Have you got anything acidic I can wash them out with?”

“It looks noisy in there.” Gray chuckles, right before Dove cries out like she’s performing an opera for the whole of Positano.

“Christ.” I whimper. I’d be able to handle it if EJ wasn’t like my older brother.

“Want to come back to the hotel with me? You can take my bed. And I’ll take EJ’s. That way if he comes in tonight, it won’t wake you.”

“That depends.” Another ear-piercing cry comes from the kitchen. “Actually, never mind. Let’s go.”

We walk back along the beach until we end up at the hotel. It’s built into the cliff face with a view over the sea. A warm breeze swirls around us and rustles the leaves on the olive and lemon trees that dot the terracotta balcony.

The inside of the building is white with blue and terracotta accents everywhere. The bathroom is full of vintage blue and white Positano tile.

I rinse my hands and face in the sink, the summer night heat clinging to every pore. Gray is emptying tiny bottles of spirits into tumblers when I return to the main room. He hands me one. “Have you considered changing schools? You could go back to the good old U of C. Finish your doctorate there.”

“Have you ever been uncertain of what you want to do, Gray?” I take the drink he offers and move to the balcony where I sip the vodka.

He’s always seemed so certain. He loved baseball, but couldn’t play professionally, so he became a sports agent. His choices are far more logical than mine.

I’m fluent in a half dozen languages, thanks to my parents nurturing my ability to hear and pick up a language almosteffortlessly. I have a decent understanding of Latin. Yet… I don’t know that the logical choice is the right one anymore. “I thought I wanted to build a career around languages, but I can’t manage to communicate openly with the people in my life.”

“You can practice on me.” He takes a seat in a wrought iron chair, his own drink resting on the top of his thigh. “Tell me what you need to say to them.”

I catch a glimpse of him watching me. Those blue eyes, that lush mouth with its bottom lip meant to be nibbled on. His thumb moves idly over the condensation on the side of his glass. It used to be a lot easier to ignore the things I liked about him when Indy was between us.

Swallowing, I retrain my focus on the sea, and then the hotel pool below. It looks inviting as I roll my glass over my feverish skin. “I can’t.”

“Sure, you can.” He stands in one fluid motion before joining me at the railing. His hand, chilled from holding the glass, wraps around my wrist and draws me around to face him.

“You’re a very good friend,” I say.

“I think I’ve let you down,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

“You don’t need to be.” I put my hand on his chest. I should move it, but I can’t seem to send the electrical signal down my arm to make me pull it away. “I didn’t reach out either.”

“Can we make a deal to do better from here?” He puts his glass down and wraps that hand around my hip.

“God, I hope so.” I giggle. “Because I have been doing so shitty lately.”

“That guy?”

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