Page 48 of Versions Of Us

I contemplate telling her that I’m fine. That seeing Henley last night has had little effect on my existence.

But that would be a big fat lie.

“Not really. I called in sick to work today. The idea of being right there in the building across the street from where he is just felt like too much.” I don’t want to admit that I’m running away from my problems, but today that’s exactly what I’m doing.

Liv offers a sympathetic frown. “That sucks.”

One of the things I love about Liv is that she’s real. She’s always telling it like it is. Sometimes there’s no use trying to put a positive spin on something. And she’s right. It does suck.

“Yeah,” I agree.

“You want to hang out and watch TV or something? I’m meant to be meeting my dad for lunch in Little Bay, but I can take a raincheck. Or…” Hope crosses her expression as she tilts her head to the side. “You could come with me?”

I force a smile, but it comes off as weak. I appreciate that she’s offering me a distraction but sitting with my sadness feels necessary. “You’re the best. You really are. But I think I kind of need some time alone to process this.”

She nods. Another thing I love about Liv is that she knows when not to push. She wraps an arm around my shoulder.

“He doesn’t deserve you.”

I stifle a sob. “Thanks for coming by.”

“Of course. I’m around if you need me.”

“Okay.” I force another sad smile in her direction that I know she sees straight through.

With a gentle rub of my shoulder, she rises from the couch and exits my apartment, leaving me alone in a sea of thoughts.

When I close my eyes, I see Henley’s glassy, ice blue stare. I wonder, for the millionth time why he left. Where he’s been spending this time and who he might have possibly spent it with.

And I wonder what has led him back here.

I last another ten minutes on the couch before the walls of the apartment begin to close in on me, the atmosphere stifling. I slip on a pair of slides, desperate to overcome this sudden onset of claustrophobia. I start to walk, not really knowing where I’m going, and if I’m honest, not really caring where I end up.

An indistinct period of time passes before I find myself at the secluded inlet on the river, my bare feet sinking into its sandy banks. My internal compass still leads me here sometimes. Even after everything, I can’t leave it behind.

I climb up onto the large flat rock and perch upon its smooth surface. This giant piece of stone we had once called ours. The tyre swing still hangs from the old elm tree, its rope frayed in places from years of use. That tree will stand tall until long after we’re gone, a lifetime of memories held in its trunk.

Even though it’s the last thing I want to remember right now, my mind takes me back to the first time I ever came here. I was sixteen and we were in the middle of one of the most scorching heatwaves this town has ever seen. The temperature had reached more than forty degrees Celsius for the fourth day in a row, meaning school had been suspended.

After almost a week at home, I’d become a bored and restless teen in need of an outlet, which coupled with the heat, had probably been the reason I’d had a fight with my mum about something stupid. We didn’t often argue, and I couldn’t for the life of me remember what we had fought about, but I must have done something bad because she had grounded me. A rare occurrence for sure.

Mum wasn’t the best with discipline. In fairness to her, I rarely needed to be reprimanded, but in this instance, she’d felt the need to banish me to my room, completely overlooking the fact that I still had my phone. One of my high school besties, Leah, had suggested a trip to the river over text and I defiantly, and uncharacteristically, climbed out of my open bedroom window and joined her and four other girlfriends in cooling off in the still waters.

Leah’s boyfriend, Matt and a bunch of other guys from school had the same plan. That was the appeal, I guess, even if we didn’t care to admit it at the time. When we’d arrived, scantily clad in our favourite bikinis, to find that there was an additional member in the boys’ group, not one of us could keep our eyes off the new guy. Not even Leah, much to Matt’s disappointment. But I knew that it wasn’t in my imagination that his attention was focused squarely on me.

I’d been standing waist deep in the river when he’d waded through the shallows to me, oozing confidence and charisma. He’d greeted me with a handshake, an act I’d thought oddly mature for a sixteen-year-old boy. Still, when he’d held out his hand and said, “I’m Alex,” it wasn’t just the summer heat that had me melting.

I’d taken his hand silently, an unintentionally flirty smirk playing on my lips as I met his gaze. I could never forget the affect his stare had on me from that very first day. His eyes a bright crystal blue that burned like the hottest of flames, tarnished with rebellion and all the broken hearts he’s surely left in his wake.

I knew better than to give into a guy with a perfect pair of baby blues though. My mother had raised me better than that. She’d drilled into me from a young age that a man needed to show his worth.Make him earn it, she would say.

So, without bothering to tell him my own name, I flashed him a wicked grin, then placed my hands on his chest. His smooth tanned skin formed goosebumps under my fingertips, despite the heat of the day, as I shoved him backwards into the river. I paddled away, only glancing back once I reached the shore. If his eyes hadn’t turned my legs to jelly, the grin that he aimed at me had surely finished the job.

I could say those days were simple, but nothing between Henley and I has ever been simple.

I hear the rustling of leaves and the crunching of small twigs behind me, and a sense of nostalgia washes over me. I don’t need to turn around. I know it’s him.

He steps up onto the rock, then I feel the familiar warmth of his body next to mine as he sits down beside me.

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