Page 93 of Summertime Friends

She stands there, disbelief washes over her. Then, a wave of calmness crashes over her.

Emerson raises on her toes and plants a kiss on my lips.

38

EMERSON

Three Summers Ago

I’m type A—well, type A-ish. I like things organized, going a certain way, making a plan, and following it. I check boxes on to-do lists in every facet of my life, including other people’s. I didn’t check all the boxes for my dad or mom, so I try to ensure I check the boxes of others in my life.

That’s why I need routines.

Coming to London, my second biggest fear was whether I could find a routine in Liam’s life. Did I fit in? Do I check the boxes?

It was more than an ‘I love you’. To have the relationship with Liam I want, I need to confirm that we’d work and that I would be enough.

Our lives are different. Different continents. Different jobs. Different upbringings.

On the page, they don’t mesh.

Much to my chagrin, I’ve meshed right into his world. Okay, maybe four weekdays wouldn’t be defined as a routine, but this is the fifth day doing it, and it’s a routine enough for me.

Each morning, we get up and run together. After our morning run, we shower, and as Liam gets ready for work, I make coffee for us. Liam leaves pretty quickly after that to head to the office, which has been around seven. Liam’s been working till four the past few days, but I know from experience that normally he’d work much later. I know he’s leaving early for me, but I suppose he’s the CEO, so he can make his own rules.

While he’s gone, I pick up his place before packing a bag to head out for the day. In the evening, he takes me to a few of his favoriterestaurants, and then we explore parts of London, showing me the places he grew up going to.

Today, I find myself at a park near his place—one he walked me through the afternoon after I landed. I’ve visited it the past couple of days. It’s quiet and peaceful. I find a seat on a metal bench overlooking a series of others. I pull out a book and set it next to me while taking in my surroundings.

Across from me is a couple. They appear to be Liam and I’s ages. Her legs are draped across his. He’s leaning into her with his arm around her. Their heads are as close as possible, whispering to each other. The girl is smiling, giggling up at him. His eyes never leave her.

I wonder if that’s what Liam and I look like. Do people look at us how I look at this couple and see a flashing, neon sign that reads they are in love?

Question after question, doubt after doubt, start drifting in. Unlike the blue skies above, my world goes gray. Clouds drift in, a storm of uncertainty, and cold raindrops regulate the temperature between Liam and me.

He told me he loved me. I couldn’t say it back.

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard those words, but it was the first time hearing them that they mattered and didn’t feel like a lie.

That the person saying them meant them. No strings attached. No caveats. No boxes to be checked.

Liam hasn’t asked why I haven’t returned the sentiment. He hasn’t pressured me to say it back. He hasn’t acted like that’s a problem.

But it’s a problem for me. It’s not that I don’t feel the same way. I do.

It was there, on the tip of my tongue—I swear. I tried to tell Liam, but my whole mouth went dry. I wanted to tell him, but when I opened my mouth, I was mute. The words sucked into me like a vortex back into the depths of my soul, the dark part that ischaining me to my beliefs and holding me prisoner from accepting his love and loving him back.

I seized up then. I’m seizing up now.

My lungs seize up, my heart rate increases, my shoulders shake, and my thoughts run a million miles per hour, crisscrossing.

“Is she alright?” The couple across from me stares at me, concern flashing on their faces. The male’s brows are tense as he asks the female.

“Are you okay?” She calls out to me from across the path.

I stare back at her blankly, but I don’t see her or the male in whose lap she is no longer lying in. I’m thirteen again, seated under the covers of my plush, eggplant purple comforter; my arms are wrapped around my knees, squeezing them too tight. I hear the screams coming from downstairs—my mother’s voice and then my father’s. They go back and forth like a game of ping-pong, volleying threats back and forth at one another.

I ran up to my room when it started. My dad clattered his suitcase in one hand and two duffels in the other down the stairs. He must have left the items by the front door because as I picked up my head from my math homework, he looked me in the eyes, patting my shoulder, and told me he was leaving. My mom came flying down the stairs frantically. My dad bolts from me. They collide in the entryway to our house, where his bags are. She has her hands on them, refusing to let him go. That was when they were screaming. When I ran up the stairs, I tripped twice on the way up. Nausea rises in my throat as I enter my room. I throw up in the trash can in my room not once but twice. Climbing onto the bed and pulling the covers over me doesn’t help quiet their screaming as it continues until it all goes silent. I climbed out of my bed, opening my door quietly. As if I were a mouse, I crept to the top of the stairs, where it opened up to our loft.

---