Done

Phew. Now to shut this away and come back to it in a few weeks/months for editing. It didn't quite turn out to be what I thought it would be, but oh well. Current word count is 2,856. Previous parts can be found by clicking.

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“I don't know. God, you must think I'm retarded or something.”

I grinned. “Well, sometimes, yeah.” She punched me in the arm, then stopped and cocked her head at me like she was seeing me for the first time. When she spoke, her mouth barely moved.

“You know Eddie, you've always been so sweet to me.”

I shrugged. She was moving closer; in my mind I could picture us standing there, on the shore, and all I could think was, Holy crap, this is just like how it happens in the movies. Isn't it odd how real things happen and we immediately equate them with fictional occurrances? When things like car crashes or shootings happen right in front of people, invariably when they describe the events, somewhere the words, “It was just like the movies,” pop out. I mean, that's real, that's life and death, right in front of you, and your first impulse is to compare it to a bunch of people pretending on a screen.

In any event, while that phrase was drumming through my head, Audrey had come within perfume range. As if my brain wasn't already having problems stringing two coherent thoughts together.

And then she leaned in and hugged me.

I could have screamed, I could have cried, I could have thrown something. I was in the absolute worst position anybody with romantic feelings towards someone could be in. My arms came up and hugged her back, hoping that somehow I could transmit my true feelings through my hands and into her brain, hoping that I could change the ending that we were racing towards.

Audrey pulled away, and I saw she'd been crying. She sniffled and wiped the tears away, and we walked back up to the school buildings in silence.

I didn't have much contact with her for the rest of the year. We went to different colleges, stayed in loose touch for a few months and then lost even that as our paths diverged.

That's not quite where the story ends, though. A few years ago I was walking into a store, and as I was walking in I saw her coming out. Things had changed; I had changed, away from the geeky, gawky kid I'd been in high school. Perhaps it was meant to be, perhaps this would be the turning point in the story we would tell to our kids and their kids about how she and I met, fell in love and got married.

I ducked my head on the off chance that she might recognize me and she passed me by, Brandon following a few steps behind. Our paths separated once more as I watched her disappear in the distance, wondering if what had just happened had really happened, or if I had imagined it. And I might have been able to convince myself of that, if it hadn't been for the faintest wisp of perfume left on the air.

Audrey.