Page 57 of A Dream of Stars and Curses

‘Where does that, erm... Can I still...’

‘Use the bookshop?’

I nod.

He twitches towards me a little like he wants to reach out to comfort me, but he catches himself in the last second. That’s okay. I don’t know that him holding my hand right now would help, anyway.

‘Of course. We can still be friends. Eventually, I’ll move away or you’ll meet someone, and we’ll naturally part ways.’

His voice catches a little, like he doesn’t really want to say the words. I expect he doesn’t—the way he kissed me and shoved me against the wall was real. He wanted to be with me, too. Everything he said... I can’t convince myself that any of it was a lie. He isn’t doing this because he doesn’t want to love me. He’s doing this to protect himself.

And if that’s the case, then me still coming here would be unfair. Kinder to cut myself out of his life now than to keep the pretence up.

I don’t tell him that I don’t think I can be friends. Not now I know how his lips feel on mine, how he feels against me when my legs are wrapped around him. How am I supposed to move on like none of that happened? How am I supposed to look into his eyes again and not break? Being just friends with him is asking too much. I can’t do it.

If he can be strong, though, then I can at least try.

‘I don’t think that’s a good idea,’ I make myself say. Before he can say anything else, I stand. ‘I should go. I...’ My nose burns. I don’t care if I start crying once I’m outside, but right now I’d quite like to hold it together. I turn around to him one more time and almost fall apart when he looks as broken as I feel. ‘Thank you.’

I leave before he can respond. If he wanted to, he could easily catch up with me, but he doesn’t. I imagine he’s still sitting in his armchair when I leave the shop and close the door behind me. I have this vision of myself walking past his shop every day on my walk to work, sitting on the bus on a rainy day and glancing at his door through the running raindrops and reflected lights on the bus window, and wondering if he’s looking at me, too. Of his shop, boarded up years from now because he moved away. Will he still think of me then? Will either of us still wonder what might have been if we hadn’t been so afraid of getting hurt?

Because, as I’m walking through the crowds without really seeing anyone, I’m hurting anyway, and I can’t help wondering:

What’s the point of protecting yourself when you have to break yourself to do it?

Part of me wants to turn around and throw myself at his feet, beg him to reconsider, but I make myself walk onwards. My feet are like lead on the ground, and every muscle in my body pulls me back towards his shop. But I walk on, because it’s the mature thing to do. Because it’ll be kinder in the long term.

I have to believe that or I’ll break down by the main road.

And so, because I don’t want to address this pain while I’m out, I focus on the other meaning behind his words. The ones that matched my dream perfectly.

Was that a coincidence, or am I about to lose everything else, too?

I decide to take a detour when I’m about ten minutes away from home. I know where the path into the forest is now, and I think I’ve earned a moment of soothing nature. The brook flowing alongside the path will help, and maybe, by the time I get home, I’ll magically be over it.

Leverett doesn’t want to be with me because I’m human, so there’s nothing I can do about it. Tears burn my eyes. Such a stupid thing to cry about. I mean, really. I barely know the man. His rejection shouldn’t hurt so much.

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