“Dang it!” I cry out.
My roommate Aaron pokes his head into the living room. His big brown eyes are wide in alarm. “What’s wrong?”
I point at the TV. “She’s engaged!”
Aaron looks at the screen, which now features a commercial of an elderly woman getting a medical alert necklace. “Good for her?”
“Not that lady,” I say. “Claire. From work.”
Aaron furrows his brow. “Claire from work is engaged.” He speaks again, slowly. “The old lady in the commercial told you?”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Stop talking to me like I’m stupid.”
“The handprint on your cheek says otherwise.”
I heave a sigh and gesture at the TV again. “She was just on screen, at the baseball game, and her idiot boyfriend proposed to her on camera. And she said yes.”
Aaron raises a brow. “You’re sure it’s your Claire.”
MyClaire. She’s not mine, and she has never been. Especially now. But I don’t correct Aaron, not when he’s been the sounding board for my issues with Claire. We’re not sitting around like two girls at a slumber party, talking about our crushes. But Aaron’s in a stable, healthy relationship with his girlfriend Pam, and he’s been a good friend to me over the last few years.
I sigh. “Positive. I just texted her an hour ago about being at the game.”
“Wow.” Aaron shakes his head and pats my shoulder. “I’m sorry, bro. I wish I knew what to say.”
“Yeah, me too.” I stand and turn off the TV. “I gotta get out of here.”
“Want something to eat?”
I shake my head. “I’m going to the beach. I need to think.”
Aaron taps my back. “Sounds good. I’ll see you tonight.”
I raise a hand as a goodbye and exit the apartment, trying not to slam the door even though I’m beyond angry, and head straight for the beach. It’s just across the street from our front door, a three-minute walk down some sandy stairs, and then I’m at the ocean.
I kick off my shoes and berate myself for waiting years for a breakup instead of telling Claire how I feel.
Zach isn’t the idiot.I’mthe idiot.
I wade my feet into the water, letting it hit my ankles. It’s ice cold, shocking my system, and I take a deep inhale of the salty air.
Every time I’m at the beach, it feels like home. I watch the waves rolling in, over and over, until I can calm myself and think more clearly. It’s what I would do when I was in college and couldn’t figure out a tricky proof. I’d head to the beach, and the variables and numbers would start floating around my vision, the pieces clicking until I had my answer.
I replay the moment Zach proposed now that I’m able to process it a little better. I saw the moment Claire realized they were on camera and rolled her eyes, which made me laugh. But I also saw her reaction the moment he got down on his knee. I know Claire, and she must havehatedthat he was asking in front of so many people.
But Zach didn’t think about that.
Zach doesn’t know her like I do. How pathetic is that? She’s been dating the guy for ten years and has known him her entire life, but he doesn’t think about the way she’d want to be proposed to.
But I know Claire. I know exactly how she’d want her proposal to go. Something private and quiet, somewhere that was just her and the person she loved—and of course, in this scenario, I always envisioned myself.
I keep piling things on the list—all the reasons why I’m better for her than Zach. He doesn’t know her favorite coffee—two pumps of hazelnut, two pumps of white chocolate. He doesn’t know that she loves being told she’s doing great at work, but brushes it off because she doesn’t want the attention.
He doesn’t know about the book she’s been writing for the last year, the young adult dystopian novel. The one I encouraged her to write. The one she’s kept secret from her whole family, but she trusts me to share her secret dream of being an author.
I inhale and exhale again, letting the water hit the bottom of my pants, but I don’t care. All I can think about is seeing Claire in that moment when Zach proposed. Replaying it now, I remember seeing something flash across her face. It was a split second, but I saw the hesitation in her eyes.
But she still said yes.
