Bailey

I packed up my last book from the small bookshelf, careful not to let the last half of the pages fall out of the cover. It had been almost a year since I had moved to the dorms at USC and unpacked my favorite book to remind me of Lucas. In a few weeks, we would be celebrating the anniversary of our first meeting in the airport. I was moving out of the dorms for the summer and I refused to leave that book in the pile of other books I was donating to charity.

Lucas kept his promise, like he always did. He emailed me that night after we were cheated out of our airport date. We were both disappointed and feeling like the world had been working against us. After a few months, we were able to let go of the sadness of that day and back into the daily emails our friendship was built on. By winter break, our emails became a little more scattered as I visited my mom and he was promoted.

With summer finally upon us, our emails were getting more frequent again. I'd celebrated my eighteenth birthday in December, and he celebrated his nineteenth in May. Our lives were moving right along, me with my schooling and he with his career advancing. We were best friends. There wasn't anything I didn't talk to him about and I really counted on him to help keep me grounded when my academic stress got to be too much.

I opened the cover of the old romance as I placed it in the box. His masculine writing still stood out black against the bright white of the inside of the cover. I ran my finger over it and wished we could have those minutes back. "I think I'm falling for you. Love, Lucas Kratos Garver." My lips curled up with his brave words. I remembered reading that over and over again on my flight home as I cried.

It would be the first summer I was choosing to go back to my dad's home to visit. He said he wouldn't force me as an adult, but he'd been putting in a lot of work to build a better relationship with me. One of his biggest supporters was Lucas. He really pushed me to let my dad in and I knew he was doing it from a position of experience with losing a parent.

My phone chimed with a text, and I slid my finger across the screen. Jeff from my advanced statistics class wanted to now if I felt like meting up for coffee later. My thumbs froze above the keyboard. He was nice, cute even, but there was just something holding me back from going out with him. Lucas and I hadn't had the talk about what we were to each other, and even though we were still just emailing and hadn't seen each other in almost a year, it just felt wrong to be with anyone else.

Me: Can't. Sorry. I'm really busy.

Jeff: Ok. Maybe another time.

I tossed my phone onto my stripped bed and taped the box of books closed. I was going to miss sharing a room with my roommate, but I was looking forward to having a room all to myself that summer with my dad. I only wished that Lucas would be close. The irony of the whole situation was that he'd be in San Diego for a special training a few weeks of the summer when I'd be back in Miami. We would be like ships passing in the night. If I didn't know better, I'd almost think the universe really was against us being together in person. I knew one day we'd make it happen, but so far, it wasn't looking like it would happen any time soon.

******Vote and share****