Hello, Goodbye, and Everything in Between(57)

Clare stares at her knees. There’s a patch over one of them, and she almost laughs, because Aidan is the only person she knows who would mend a pair of sweatpants. He hates to give up on anything.

“I’m sorry,” she says, when she can’t stand the silence any longer. “I guess I shouldn’t have expected that it would change anything. I’m not even sure I want it to, but hearing you say it to your dad like that… I don’t know. Something about it seemed so simple. You made it sound almost easy.”

“Clare,” he says, easing the car onto the side of the road in front of a house that looks like all the others, with flowerpots and a basketball hoop and a wooden mailbox. “There’s nothing easy about this. This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. And the worst part is… it’s just the beginning. This is going to be hard every single minute of every single day for a really long time.”

This time, she doesn’t stop herself. She reaches over and lays a hand on top of his. His face is clouded over, but his eyes, when he looks up at her, are very clear. She wants to say: It doesn’t have to be this hard. She wants to say: It’s not too late to change our minds. But instead, she just says: “I know.”

“We decided this for a reason. All that stuff you were saying before. About how we should be jumping into our new lives with both feet…”

“That makes it sound like hopscotch,” she says, pulling her hand back.

“Okay, well, maybe it was something about diving in. Or was that my thing? I don’t remember exactly. The point is that you had a whole list of reasons. Remember?”

Clare nods miserably.

“And you know this obviously wasn’t what I wanted—or at least it isn’t what I thought I wanted. But now? I don’t know. I actually think you might be right.”

As she listens to him, it starts to feel like there’s something heavy on her chest. She takes a few shallow breaths. “I’m not always right, you know.”

He laughs. “Yes, you are.”

“But what if I’m wrong about this? What if the hardest thing isn’t breaking up? What if it’s staying together—making this work in spite of the distance, in spite of everything—and that’s what we’re supposed to be doing?”

“Clare—”

“No, seriously. What if I’m being a complete idiot and just playing it safe like I always do?” She’s aware of the slightly hysterical tinge to her voice, but she’s powerless to stop it. “What if I’m really just ruining everything?”

He gives her a steady look, his eyes full of a warmth that makes this all so much worse. “But what if you’re not?” he asks quietly. “I think maybe it’s true, what you said before—that we can either end things on our own terms now or let it fizzle out. And I sort of feel like I have this responsibility to—I don’t know—not let you get caught up in the moment and decide the wrong thing.”

She feels suddenly weary. Out the window, the sun is tinting the street a shade of orange so bright it doesn’t seem real, a wash of color so brilliant it almost hurts.

“Look,” he says, ducking his head and rubbing at the back of his neck. “You’re my best friend. And my family. You’re my whole life, really.”

“Aidan—”

“So this thing between us? It’s way too important to let it just fall apart. I don’t want to break up in a few days or weeks or months for some really dumb reason. We’re not that couple. If we’re gonna break up, it can’t be because of the guy always hanging around your dorm room or because I’m sitting by my phone and you’re never calling, or because I’m too busy with lacrosse to text you back, and it starts driving you nuts. If we’re gonna break up, it has to be for a good reason.”

She shakes her head. “I can’t think of a single good reason to break up with you right now.”

“That’s because you’re not thinking big enough,” he says. “It’s gotta be something huge, something grand.”

“Like world peace?”

“If world peace were a possible side effect of you breaking up with me, then yes, sure, that would definitely count as a noble reason.”

“Maybe,” she says after a moment, “it’s just that we love each other too much.”

He looks at her thoughtfully. “I like that.”

“But it’s still a bullshit reason.”

“It’s actually the opposite of bullshit. We love each other too much to get dragged down by any bullshit. We’re above bullshit. What’s the scientific term for that? Not sub, but…”

“Super,” she says. “It’s super bullshit.”

He laughs. “Super Bullshit: worst superhero ever,” he says, but Clare only stares at the patch on her knee with a sinking heart.

“So that’s it then?” she asks, and he nods.

“That’s our reason: We dove each other way too much.”

She rolls her eyes. “That was only cute once.”

He grins. “So was the whole I dove you thing in the first place.”

“Fair enough,” she says. “But I do.”

“Dove me?”

“Love you,” she says, waiting for him to smile again. But he doesn’t. Instead, he looks at her for a long time, his eyes taking her in as if trying to memorize her. Then, finally, he nods.