Page 11 of Summertime Friends

Seeing Emerson again is mine.

Emerson Clarke is every fantasy of mine. Ever since I saw her six years ago, I knew that I wanted her. Instant attraction and crossed paths, a pull to her as if she was the moon and I was a tide. Pushing and pulling me how she needed until we lost all sense of gravity.

She’s the one person who holds a part of my heart and doesn’t even know it. All those summers ago, I tied a piece of me to her, hoping it would connect us forever.

It did, but not in the way I wanted or ever imagined.

Thinking about her doesn’t hurt how it used to. The sting of us hurting each other has scabbed over, healing into a scar. One I wear proudly across my chest.

I grab my coffee off the counter and leave. I’m supposed to be meeting Natalie, my—well, I don’t know exactly what she is to me. Friend? Girlfriend? FWB? We never labeled it.

I haven’t defined anything since Emerson. Haven’t exactly been attracted to anyone in that capacity since her, except for maybe Natalie.

We met last summer, coincidentally the week before I came to Chicago. It was great having someone to show me around the city. She and I fell into an easy friendship and routine while I have been living between here and London.

She’s the first person I could see the slimmest potential future with since Emerson.

I pull out my phone out of my back pocket and text her.

Meet me at my place instead.

Nat: Everything okay?

Yeah

Nat: See you soon!

I share a condo with Callum here. Typically, we aren’t here simultaneously unless there are full team meetings or we are meeting with a potential acquisition. Four-bedroom, four-bathroom, two-story condo in River North. Modern black kitchen with an open concept in the dining and living rooms. The place overlooks Lake Michigan with floor-to-ceiling windows on both floors. The bedrooms are upstairs. Callum and I each claimed one, turning one of the extra rooms into a dual office and the other into a guest bedroom.

Sitting at my desk in our office, I can’t shake the sight of Emerson out of my head. I try blinking, closing my eyes to wash away the image of her, but closing my eyes is even worse. It’s there that I see her even more vividly.

Her chocolate brown hair is longer than I remember, cascading in waves down her back.

Her eyes—my favorite eyes in the world. With the looming summer thunderstorm, her eyes were a sharp-cut piece of Jade. Her eyes always favored storms. The grayness of the sky enhances them, brightening them as if they were lights beckoning you to them—my personal version of the light at the end of Daisy’s dock inThe Great Gatsby.

Anytime there’s a storm, and in London, the odds are high, I think about her eyes. I wonder who they behold. Is there another person in her life? Do they make her happy? Do they treat her right? Do they love her?

I suppose that’s the one good thing that can come from seeing her again.

There is someone else, and I have to infer yes to all the other questions because she’s engaged.Emerson’s engaged.

I should be happy for her, but I’m not. I know I told her I was, but that was a lie. How are you supposed to be happy when you always thought it would be you at the end of the aisle she walks to?

Never in my fantasies was there ever someone else.

I hear the front door close shut.

“Liam?” Nat calls out from down the stairs. “I’m here.”

“Coming.” I press send on the email I’ve been staring at since I got home and head downstairs to meet her.

She’s quite ravishing in a purple sundress, bronze skin, and blonde curls tied back.

I round the stairs and walk over to her.

“Is everything okay?” she asks again. Her gentle eyes wander over my face, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever is happening within me.

“Now it is.”

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