Page 63 of October
I blinked at him. "Let me guess. You got that suggestion from dear old Daddy?"
He winced again, this time like it actually hurt. "Yes. I told him what happened and he said... if I gave you money instead to make up for it, you could get whatever you wanted and it wouldn't feel... awkward."
laughing bitterly. "DearGod,and in anenvelope!!"
"I know," he whispered. "Iknow. It was stupid. It was horrible. Cruel, even. I was wrong. nothing justifies it. I should have seen how wrong it was on my own, can't blame him for this. I was scared of another confrontation and arguing, I was running as usual, I amsosorry. Nothing will make it better, I know that."
I let the silence settle between us, let him squirm under the weight of it.
Then I said, simply, "Go get it."
His eyebrows lifted, uncertain. "The present?"
"Yes," I said, folding the towel with more force than necessary. "Go get it."
He hesitated for only a second, then nodded. "Okay. If... if you're sure."
Then he slipped out the door, just like that into the night, toward the car. He came back in, carefully holding a small box, dark wood, smooth edges, no logo or label. Just quiet care. He walked slowly, his posture unsure, then set it gently in front of me on the table like it was something sacred.
"What is this?" I asked softly, already feeling my throat tighten. Thomas exhaled, rubbing the back of his neck before sitting across from me again,
"One day," he began, his voice tight as he swallowed hard, "everything just felt... heavy. Like I was drowning in this pressure I'd built around myself—to be perfect, to hold it all together, to live up to some version of who I thought I should be. And I couldn't breathe. I felt like the walls were closing in, and I didn't even know how to ask for help, or who I could ask."
He paused, gaze drifting, as if searching for the right shape of memory. "So I tried to think of a moment when I felt light free, even. Happy. Really happy. And there were many, scattered ones... but you were in all of them." His eyes found hers, and his voice softened, thick with something like regret.
He glanced back down at his hands. "So I got in the car. I just... drove. And I ended up there. At our tree. That old one by the bend in the river." He smiled faintly, a breath like a laugh caught in his throat.
I blinked. My heart did a small, quiet flip, "The one we carved our names into?"
He nodded.
"That day you asked me to be your girlfriend."
He smiled, barely. "Yeah."
"I...I stood in front of it for what felt like an hour," he said quietly, eyes distant. "Just looking at it. At us. That old tree... and the carving. And I remembered the boy I was, and the girl you were. How simple it felt back then. How pure."
My hands trembled slightly as I opened the box. Inside was a necklace — delicate, understated, Its pendant gleamed softly, a warm, earthy brown, the grain of bark or wood and leaves, sealed beneath a smooth layer of resin like a secret frozen in time. I reached out, brushing my fingertip over its surface, breath catching.
As I turned it in my hand, the light caught something small on the back, the faintest engraving, almost shy. I leaned closer, heart stuttering.
T + O — Carved in Time
"I had a piece of the bark taken," he said softly, like he was sharing a secret meant only for us. "And some of the leaves — the ones that had fallen around the roots. I kept them. Pressed them. The bark... I had it shaped into this pendant. Sealed it, so it wouldn't fade."
I remembered that day. God, I remembered it so clearly.
*~??~**~??~**~??~**~??~**~??~**~??~*
We were barely eighteen, I was wearing a fluttery lilac sundress that kept catching the breeze like it had a mind of its own. My hair was a mess—wild and wind-tangled—and I didn't care. The air smelled like pine needles and sunshine, and my heart was doing this nervous little stutter in my chest, like it couldn't quite believe where I was or who I was with.
Thomas walked beside me, quiet as always, the summer sun brushing his shoulders. He wore a crisp white linen shirt with the sleeves rolled up, the collar slightly askew like he'd dressed in a hurry but still managed to look effortlessly put-together. He always looked like he belonged in an old novel — sharp jaw, unreadable eyes, lips that rarely smiled. Most people thought he was cold, maybe even arrogant. Too serious. Too put-together for someone our age. But to me, he was just Thomas. My Thomas. Thoughtful, quiet, always a little lost in his head.
There was always something distant in the way he moved — like he'd grown up in rooms with too much silence and too many rules. But I saw past it. I saw the boy who waited for me after class, who remembered how I liked my tea, who once lent me his sweater when I was shivering and didn't ask for it back.
And I loved him. God, Ilovedhim.
He led me to this tree—tall and knotted and a little bit magical—and stopped like he'd rehearsed this exact moment in his head a dozen times. He stared up at the branches like they held a secret only he could read. Then he looked at me. And those serious eyes—eyes that always looked like they'd seen more than they should have—suddenly went soft.
