of abandoning someone. Over spring break the year after he left, I ran into him in Mexico, and we spent the night together. I still loved him with every part of me, and I felt so much love from him when I was in his arms that night. But I didn’t trust my instincts.” Tears slipped down her cheeks, and she sank to the edge of her desk with the weight of her confession. “I was afraid I was misreading his emotions, or it just was wishful thinking. I don’t really know what I was thinking. I just knew I wouldn’t survive if he walked away again, so while he lay sleeping, I took off without a word. I didn’t leave a note or anything.” She swiped at her tears, accepting the crushing feeling in her chest as her due. “As cruel as it was, and as embarrassing as it is to admit, I think part of me was still so hurt, I wanted him to feel the pain I had felt when he’d left me.”
“Oh, honey.”
“There’s more,” she said, steeling herself against the sobs vying for release. “I didn’t know it then, but that night while I was realizing I couldn’t survive getting hurt again, he’d realized he’d made a mistake by leaving the way he had, and he’d wanted to try to work things out. But I never gave him the chance to tell me. He woke up to an empty bed, and he assumed I was done.”
“And maybe in that moment of self-protection, you were done. And that’s okay, sweetheart. But if a man loves you, he doesn’t back off because you tell him to. He keeps trying.”
“Maybe some men in some situations would. But Zevy knew how much he’d already hurt me, and he gave me what my leaving told him I wanted. He loved me enough to walk away. I thought I needed to walk away because I had to be done with us to protect myself.” One day Carly would tell her aunt and her mother about the miscarriage, but for now she kept that to herself, because she didn’t want her aunt to mistake the miscarriage as the reason for what she said next. “But it didn’t take long for me to realize that I wasn’t done with him. I looked for him online, but there was nothing. I could have asked his family, but I figured he didn’t want me to find him, and then, well, I ended up here. But until I came face-to-face with him at Char’s wedding, until I felt his presence, truly felt the pull of our hearts and the electric, all-consuming energy between us, I couldn’t have known I was repressing so much of myself. And without that realization, there’s no way I could have realized the bigger truth. I’ll never be done with Zevy, and I don’t want to be. He’s my other half, too big a part of me to ever be overshadowed again. We’re two sides of the same coin. He loved me too much to stay after Tory died, and I loved him too much to stay in Mexico. Now we’ve grown up, and we’re finally in a place in our lives where we love each other too much to ever let go again.”
Marie was quiet for so long, Carly wondered if her aunt thought she was making a mistake.
“Pain is never a one-way street, Carly. You two were so young when you found each other, the odds of staying together were against you. I guess some love defies the odds.”
“You don’t think I’m crazy?” she asked nervously.
“Oh, you’re definitely crazy at the moment, honey,” her aunt said lightly. “Love is supposed to make you crazy.”
A relieved laugh bubbled out, and Carly wiped her tears.
“But this makes me wonder if Colorado was just a pit stop for you.”
“What? No. Are you kidding?” Carly’s heart sank. “You and Wynnie saved my life, and I love my life. I love and appreciate you, and this chocolate shop.”
“Maybe the guy is her pit stop.”
Carly froze at the male voice coming through the phone. “Was that a man? Is he listening to our conversation? Where are you?”
“Yes, that was a man, and if you must know, I’m still in bed.”
“What? You’re in bed with a man and you’re talking to me like nothing is going on? Aunt Marie!”
Marie laughed. “Well, we were done when you called.”
“Ew! Stop! I don’t want to hear that. Tell whoever he is