Begin Again(75)

“Maybe” is all she says in the end.

And maybe we’ve made some progress, opened a potential door. Maybe we’re right back to square one. But where there might have been a fix-it urge before, there’s just a respect that life isn’t that simple—that the things that matter most take time. And as we go to bed with our nails a lot more colorful and our hearts a little fuller, I’m grateful that Shay and I have plenty of it between us.





Chapter Twenty-Five


I’m on the quad squinting against the glare of the sun when I see a boy who looks just like Connor walking toward me.

No, scratch that—Connor is walking toward me.

I stop in my tracks, the day welling up around me like a storybook page. It’s all too perfect. The way the sun is beaming down. The smell of fresh-cut grass and the slight warmth in the breeze. The sounds of students laughing and arguing out on picnic blankets on the quad. And my boyfriend, my handsome, steady, magnetizing boyfriend in the middle of it all, like the beautiful day just conjured him here.

He’s come to surprise me. There’s this simultaneous thrill and ache that I can’t make fit in me at the same time, that freezes me in place. I want to be happy. But mostly I’m just relieved. And maybe even a little bit of something else—something that settles low in my stomach, quiet and confused.

As if he senses me watching, Connor turns his head. His sandy hair catches the light, the tousles gleaming gold, his brown eyes already wide with anticipation. I steel myself—this is the beginning of something, but the end of something else, too. The end of the future I made myself imagine without him in it, the one I’ve been easing into since it became clear that he wasn’t coming back here, and we might not last, either.

But if he’s really here, it must be to tell me he still wants to make it work. I should be happy. I should be happy. I should be—

“What the hell are you doing here?”

It’s Valeria, her dark mane of hair sweeping between me and Connor so fast that it whips behind her like a cape. I watch them the same way I’d watch something unfold in a dream—like I’ve suddenly forgotten I’m a part of the scene, so fixated on what’s happening in front of me that I’m only half in my body.

“I told you to leave me alone,” says Valeria. “You can’t just show up here in the middle of the day and try and—what is it you even want, Whit? To get me back? To have me around as some kind of backup girl?”

It’s weird enough that Valeria’s talking to Connor. It is somehow even weirder to see him talk to her right back.

“I-I’m not here for you, I swear. I thought you were at your sister’s place.”

She points an accusatory finger at him. “I was on my way, but good to know you’re still creeping on my stories even after I blocked you.”

“Look, I’m—just seeing some friends,” says Connor, holding up his hands as if in self-defense. “It has nothing to do with you. Just go to your sister’s. Pretend you didn’t see me.”

Valeria lets out a hollow laugh. “Of course you don’t want to talk. Figures, since I only hear from you when you’re lonely or drunk.”

“I’m sorry, Valeria. Okay? I’m sorry. But I’ve got to get going before—”

“Before what, Connor?”

My voice is so steely even I don’t recognize it. Connor jerks his head toward me with almost comical speed, but I’m as still as the statue at the end of the quad. My body knows something my brain hasn’t processed yet, and every bone in it is telling me to stand my ground.

“Andie. Hi.” His voice is strained, and there’s this smile I’ve never seen on his face before, something that crumbles before it fully reaches his lips. He perseveres, his eyes still wide on mine. “I was—I wanted to surprise you.”

Usually there are so many words in me that they’re threatening to spill out like a Scrabble board. Now there is just this clean, concise hum, like some other Andie has taken over.

“This is certainly a surprise,” I say, crossing my arms over my chest.

Valeria’s eyebrows fly up. “You two know each other?”

“Yeah. He’s my . . .” The word has never had a sour taste to it before. “Connor’s my boyfriend.”

“Whit’s your boyfriend?”

Whit. It didn’t occur to me that he’d use the nickname outside of the team in college, or maybe Valeria would have recognized him as the Connor I’ve talked about long before now.

This is the part where I’m supposed to say something like, Not anymore, he’s not. I’ve seen the rom-coms. I’ve given plenty of advice to people who have been cheated on. It’s just that never once in thinking about this kind of scenario did I ever put myself in it.

That’s when it really starts to sink in. Cheated. While I was working my butt off not just to get into Blue Ridge State but to keep our relationship intact last semester, Connor had already moved on from us. And instead of telling either of us the truth, he’d strung us both along—me last semester, and Valeria now.

It’s all so immediately, brutally crystal clear that it feels like walking straight into a glass wall. Something I should have seen coming. Something that’s so embarrassingly easy to process and accept that it’s probably been right there in my periphery all along.