Unbreak My Heart(37)

“What does it feel like?” I ask, a little nervous, a little hopeful.

She stops and shrugs. “I don’t know how to label it.”

That’s the problem. We’re living between countries, between jobs. I desperately want to define us, but maybe what we are is in-between—straddling the past and the present, being in love and being friends, wanting and resisting.

It’s not easy for me to accept. I like black-and-white. But you have to play the hand you’re dealt.

If my brother had to learn to live between sickness and health, I ought to learn to embrace this time for what it is—time.

I don’t know where Holland and I are going, or if we’re going anywhere, but maybe that’s the point.

To not know, and to keep stepping forward anyway.

And to enjoy the good times, like fish ponds, ice-cream-stuffed bread, and checking out capsule apartments. These random moments remind me why we fell for each other in the first place. We can talk about anything—what is in front of us, what is next, all the what-ifs.

During the summer we were together, we went to the Santa Monica Pier one evening. She stared with horror at the Ferris wheel, and I asked if she was afraid of heights.

“No, I’m afraid of Ferris wheels. They’re terrifying. Let’s do the roller-coaster instead.”

We sped around the bends and steel curves, screaming into the night. Once we were off that ride, I asked what else she was afraid of.

She’d tapped her lip and hummed. “I’m definitely afraid of getting locked in a gas station bathroom. Also, clowns.”

I shuddered. “It’s impossible to be unafraid of clowns.”

“There’s one more thing,” she’d added, looking at me.

“What is it?”

She took her time before she spoke, meeting my gaze. “Being far away from you,” she said, then grabbed my shirt collar. “I’m going to miss you so much.”

It wasn’t the first time one of us had acknowledged the thing. The inevitable end of the summer. The inevitable end of us.

I cupped her cheeks. “I’m going to miss you so much too.”

We’d tried to figure out a path through the next three years. We’d played our options like moves on a chess board. What if we flew back and forth? What if I tried to go to law school in Tokyo? What if she tried to get loans instead of accepting her full ride?

What if, what if, what if . . .

In the end, time and distance won the battle, vanquishing our hopes and dreams.

Those two forces will likely checkmate us again. We won’t be in-between once I board a plane and slingshot myself back to the United States. We’ll be apart.

And I’ll miss her so fucking much.

Probably more.

That’s why I don’t want to waste a chance at good times now.

“Will you come with me to Kyoto tomorrow?”

She smiles. “I was hoping you’d ask.”





22





Andrew



I wait at the train station in the morning, looking around for Holland. I don’t see her among the sea of people moving like schools of fish toward train tracks, kiosks, and escalators. I turn in circles, scanning for her.

I startle when a pair of hands covers my eyes. But I smile as soon as I smell lemon-sugar lotion. “I can smell you.”

“Do I smell good or bad?” she whispers in my ear.

“Neither.”

She drops her hands from my eyes, and I turn around to meet her quizzical gaze. “Neither?” she asks.

I wiggle my eyebrows. “You smell the best.”

A flash of pink spreads on her cheeks. “Thank you. You smell pretty yummy yourself,” she says, then shifts gears immediately. “Are you ready?”

“Ready or not. Also, were you trying to surprise me or trick me?”

She shrugs as we head to the platform. “Neither. I was just being silly.”

“Silly or flirty?”

“Do you think I’m a flirt?”

I raise an eyebrow. “Do you think you aren’t?”

She laughs. “You’re a flirt.”

“Yeah, but you started it.”

She smiles and looks down the tracks. The silver train coasts into the station. “Maybe I am a flirt. Do you think old habits die hard?”

“I don’t see how either one of us can stand before a court of law and deny that.”

On the train, we grab our seats, and I take out my phone and my earbuds. “Want to share Pizza for Breakfast?”

“Is that a new band you’re listening to?”

“Mike from the food stall sent it to me. Want to listen?”

“I’d love to.”

I hand her an earbud, and we lean in close, sharing the music and the headphones as the train pulls out of the station.

Midway through the fifth song, I slide a finger across the screen, angling my phone away from her.



Andrew: Do you like the music?





Her phone buzzes from her pocket and she grabs it, laughing as she reads the message. She taps out a reply.



Holland: Sort of. What else do you have?





Andrew: Tons of tunes. What do you like?