Page 72 of I Always Will

Farid cleared his throat, causing the two of them to jump and look at him. Hailey’s fingers wrapped around Alexandria’s arm as if they belonged there.

“I’ll give you two some privacy,” he said, a shit-eating grin across his face.

At any other moment, Hailey would have rolled her eyes at him. At this moment, she was too consumed with Alexandria to be concerned with Farid’s smugness.

Besides, he’d been there since the very beginning, pushing the two of them along, hearing both sides of the story, and, clearly, wishing for the day they found their way home to one another. Farid was as much of a constant in their relationship as journals and music and wanting each other no matter the distance. She supposed she could let him have this one.

Alexandria rose too, standing impossibly close to Hailey. She smiled and her eyes shone and she was the only thing in the world to ever exist.

“I have something for you,” she said, her voice barely more than a whisper.

Hailey nodded. She didn’t care what it was, she just wanted Alexandria and anything this perfect, beautiful, impossible woman was willing to give her.

Alexandria pulled her sleeve back down and slid her hand into Hailey’s like it belonged there. Because it did.

It was the feeling of coming home after far too long away. It was her tether to this life. It was the filling of the gaps in her soul and in her heart that had been left wanting for too long.

It was Alexandria.

She went willingly when Alexandria started leading them away from the table, apparently unconcerned who saw them leaving together, holding hands.

They didn’t go far.

They arrived in a parlour that was obviously the one set aside for Dan today. In the corner of the room was a large bag. Alexandria led them to it, pausing to take a deep breath before she let go of Hailey’s hand and reached inside.

She pulled out a box—navy blue and deep—and Hailey’s heart pounded painfully as she wondered what it was. She dared to dream but didn’t believe it until Alexandria handed it over and she pulled the lid off.

Two rows of CDs. Two rows of a million things Alexandria had wanted to say to her and never had the words or ability to do so. Two rows of covers written in Alexandria’s familiar handwriting, small doodles in the corners. Two rows of songs-upon-songs capturing all the things Alexandria felt for her.

She felt herself tearing up as she placed the box on an antique sideboard and pulled out one of the CDs. The year in the top corner told her it was from 2011. So long ago now. So many years after they’d said goodbye to each other. And still, it was filled with love songs and longing. Familiar tracks they’d listened to together, and songs she’d heard alone and thought of Alexandria with. All of them filled her with such deep, desperate love, the kind of love that lasted a lifetime. It was the kind of love that sustained you, the kind that hurt when you thought about the time apart, but that came with the promise of better days ahead.

She was fifteen again. Desperately in love with her best friend, doing anything she could to wrangle a future with her, but so scared of losing her that she didn’t know how to tell her.

Except she wasn’t fifteen. She was thirty-five and she knew the pain, the loss, the emptiness without her. Even rejection wouldn’t hurt as much as the last seventeen years had. Not that she thought she would get rejected, but the thought spurred her on, it brought her the words she needed.

She placed the CD down on top of the others, her heart fluttering at the idea of listening to them together, of hearing the story of how each one came to be.

She stepped closer to Alexandria. “Eighteen-year-old me was a fool.” She laughed tearfully. “Every version of me is a fool, but that one particularly. I let the best thing that ever happened to me go because I was so scared of losing you that admitting I wanted to keep you didn’t feel possible. It doesn’t make any sense, but you know what it was like. We heard over and over how it could never last, how young love was doomed to end. And I was a fool who listened to that instead ofthis.”

Alexandria laughed too, tears streaming down her face. “You weren’t the only one who listened.”

“I wish I hadn’t. I wish I hadn’t been so scared.”

“Me too.” She shook her head. The gorgeous waves her hair was styled into for today bounced as she did. “I was so afraid you didn’t really want me, that we were kids and it was just convenient. We were the only two out kids we knew. Everyone was so weird about queer people. And my parents insisted it would never last.”

“We’ve shown them,” Hailey said with faux bravado as she sniffled. “Look at us lasting longer than your parents.”

Alexandria dropped her head forward. “I’m not sure that counts.”

“Oh, it definitely counts.”

“You are ridiculous, Hailey Davis.”

Alexandria was the most radiant, beautiful, perfect person Hailey had ever seen. How had she ever walked away from this for even one second?

“Maybe, but I’m a ridiculous person who loves you, who has loved you for more than half my life, who probably loved you from the minute Mrs. Rhone sat us together in maths class and you were nervous and funny and shy and uptight and so unbelievably perfect. You were my gay awakening and nothing has changed since the minute that happened. I’ve only ever loved you more—more than the day before, more than I ever thought possible, more than makes sense to anyone but us. It’s been you for twenty-four years and it’s going to be you for as long as I live.”

Alexandria was nodding along with everything she said and nothing had ever felt so good. “And even after that.”

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