Page 90 of Lighting the Lamp
“You’re lucky I didn’t just smack you upside the head.” She clucks her tongue before taking another sip from her mug. “Thatman looks at you like you hung the moon. I’d bet my last crouton he’d catch you if you fell.”
“You don’t even like croutons.” I sniff, trying to play it off with a half-hearted smirk.
“I don’t,” Ramona says softly, like she’s handing me something fragile. “But I love you, and I like Beau most of the time. Even if he’s got secrets and a tendency to brood like a CW character.”
“I just—” My voice catches hard in my throat as I press the heel of my hand to my chest like that’ll keep it from cracking open. “I don’t want to be another girl who believed someone when they said they wouldn’t leave. I don’t think I can survive being wrong again.”
Ramona doesn’t rush to fill the silence. She just reaches over and threads her pinky through mine. But before she can say whatever soft thing is forming in her throat, the front door creaks open again, and in walks chaos in joggers.
Michele stops in the middle of the entryway like a storm cloud sniffing for lightning, her eyes sweeping the room before landing on me—crumpled posture, too-bright eyes, mug clutched like a lifeline.
“You made the group chat,” she says.
“I what?” I question as she turns her phone toward me, letting me see the latest message.
Darius
Don’t worry, she had pants on. They were low-key emotionally eye-fucking, though.
“I’m going to bribe him with cookies and cash to delete that entire thread.” I groan and drop the pillow over my face. “Not that it worked last time.”
“You’re spiraling,” Michele says as she plops into the armchair like she’s in this for the long haul. “And not just because your business is all over the group chat. You’re scared.”
“Terrified,” I rasp, like the word scraped my throat raw on its way out. “Of getting it wrong. Of trusting someone who’s hiding something. Of being too much and not enough at the same time.”
Ramona doesn’t speak. Michele doesn’t crack jokes. They just sit with me, close enough that I can feel them on either side, like bookends keeping me from falling apart completely. No fixing. No hurrying me through it. Just giving me the space to break, even if only just a little.
“I’ve known Beau my whole life.” My voice is so quiet, I’m not even sure they hear me. “He’s not just some guy I kissed and now I’m spiraling about whether he’s gonna ghost me or marry me. He’s basically my brother. He’s one ofmybest friends. He’s—he’s been there for everything. Every birthday party, every shitty high school play, he even held me as I cried the night my dad left. He’s the one who helped me duct tape my first car mirror back on after I hit a mailbox.”
“Twice,” Ramona mutters.
“It was poorly placed.” I sniff, eyes wet.
“Okay, so he’s part of your history. That doesn’t mean you can’t rewrite your future.” Michele exhales slowly.
“You don’t get it. If this goes bad—” I look at her like she’s speaking in a foreign language. “If I ruin this, there’s no blocking him and pretending we never happened. I can’t make up a rumor that he gave me herpes and move on.”
“Wow. That’s the bar for normal breakups now?” Ramona snorts as I narrow my eyes in her direction. “Sorry, please continue.”
“This’ll be different. This will crush me.” I press my knuckles against my mouth, trying to hold the rest in, but it’s alreadyspilling out. “There’s no escape plan. No emergency parachute. If this ends badly, I’ll still see him at every family gathering, every Timberwolves thing, every holiday dinner. I’ll have to smile and pretend I’m fine while my heart’s in pieces at the bottom of someone else’s boot.”
Ramona places her hand gently over mine. “Then don’t plan for the end before you’ve even given the beginning a chance.”
“But what if I’m not built for a beginning?” The words feel like glass in my throat. “What if I’ve spent so long convincing myself I don’t need anyone that now, when I do, I don’t know how to handle it? What if I wreck this because I can’t believe someone like him could actually want me and stay?”
“Then you tell him,” Michele says softly. “You tell him exactly what you just told us. And if he’s worth the risk, he’ll stay anyway.”
“What if he’s not?” I stare at her, mascara clinging to my lashes like brittle armor.
“Then we pick up the pieces with you, but this?” She gestures to the mug I’m cradling like it holds my last shred of courage. “This isn’t a failure. It’s fear, and you don’t get to treat them like the same thing.”
“God, I wish I were the type of girl who could just… detach.” I laugh, brittle and breathless. “To burn it all down and walk away. Leaving scorched earth behind me and never looking back.”
“You? You feel too much to even return a library book late.” Michele raises an eyebrow.
“I’m not built for heartbreak,” I whisper.
“No. But you’re built for love.” Ramona smiles, nudging my shoulder.
