and to ask her to help me figure all of this out.
14
Aurora
I feel a little weird about how we leave things but decide not to call her until tomorrow.
Instead, I focus on the good.
All of this time that we have missed with each other seems to have never existed and we pick up exactly where we left off.
I wish I had told her more about Henry, but our breakup is so interconnected with my engagement to Franklin that I got off-track.
What would have I said if I could? I wonder.
Would I have told her that he was the love of my life and I still think about him every single day?
What I have told her is that I thought that this would be just another breakup, but every day that passes the pain that I feel is somehow worse than it was the day before?
No, of course not.
I couldn't tell her any of this because then I would have no way of explaining why I'm marrying the man that I am engaged to.
I pick up my phone, keenly aware of the fact that I’m only doing this because of all the wine. Still, I can't stop my fingers from finding his name in the contacts.
He answers on the first ring.
“Aurora?” he asks groggily.
When I don't respond, he clears his throat and says my name again.
“Hi,” I whisper.
It's not that I don't want to talk to him, it's that it actually hurts my heart to do so.
“Are you there?" he asks.
His voice is strong yet kind and all I wanna do is tell him how much I love him.
“Yes, I'm here,” I say quietly.
Suddenly, my phone rings. I glance down and see that he's trying to FaceTime me.
My heart drops and then rises quickly up into my chest.
My hands start to shake as I press the Accept button.
“What are you doing?” I ask him. “What if Franklin was here?”
“Then you wouldn't have called me,” Henry says confidently.
He holds the phone a little bit away from his face and I see the way that he tosses his hair as he talks. A few strands fall into his eyes and I can't help but lick my lips looking at his gorgeous face.
“You look beautiful,” he says, staring straight into my eyes.
I give him a slight nod, fearing the fact that if I look at him long enough, I might just lose all ability to think.
“Thank you, you look pretty good yourself.”
He doesn't say anything for one moment, and then another.
I don't say anything either.
Instead, we just stare like two people who have not looked at each other in a very long time.
“I miss you,” I blurt out. The words seem to just spring out of me.
His irises move from side to side as he gets closer to the phone. Peering into his eyes, I see a tear form somewhere at the bottom of his lid.
“I miss you, too,” he says, biting his lower lip.
“I'm sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”
"No, that's exactly what you should've said. What happened to us?” he asks. “I thought that we would be together forever. I thought that you would be the woman that I would marry.”
I thought so, too, I say silently to myself. I want it to be you more than I ever wanted anything.
“Relationships are complicated,” I say, clearing my throat.
I say that to let him down gently, but all I see is the pain on his face.
“When did you start seeing him?” he asks after a moment.
I take a deep breath, I don't answer. I don’t know how.
"You have to tell me,” he insists.
Do you want me to lie? I ask him silently.
“Why did you get engaged so quickly?" Henry demands to know.
He props his head up with his hand and peers at me.
He deserves to know the truth, but not the real truth.
But what if I told him what is really going on? Maybe he could help me?
This thought and about a hundred others similar to this one rush through me.
I want him to know the truth more than anything and yet I can't bring myself to tell him. Why?
If Henry knew then I wouldn't be able to go through with it; I wouldn't be able to marry Franklin. And I have to do it, otherwise, I lose everything.
“Tell me about your work.” I try to change the subject.
“No, tell me about your fiancé,” he insists.
"I don't want to talk about this.”
“I don't want you to marry him.”
“I know that, and I'm sorry.