That breaks me.
The tears come, sudden and hot, sliding down my cheeks faster than I can wipe them away. She pulls me into her arms, wraps herself around me like a shield, like a sister, like the only person who’s ever stayed long enough to know the temperature of my grief.
“I’m trying to hold it together,” I breathe into her shoulder. “I’m trying to just enjoy whatever time I have with him, but it already hurts. And he’s not even gone yet.”
She holds me tighter. “I know.”
“And then I’m leaving too.”
“I know.”
“It’s so fucked.”
“I know, baby.”
We stay like that for a while, two girls clinging to each other on a sofa that’s seen too many versions of us. Her hoodie still smells like lavender softener. My hair is damp from the shower I stood under until the water went cold. The living room light hums above us like it knows too much.
Eventually, I whisper, “I don’t want to leave you.”
Her breath stutters. “Then don’t.”
“I can’t. I already signed. I got accepted, Lo. I’m going. It’s real.” I swallow. “I’ve wanted this for so long.”
“I know.” Her voice shakes. “And I’m proud of you. I’m just… scared. Scared I’m going to lose you too.”
“You won’t.” I lift her hand and press it to my chest, grounding myself in the warmth of it. “You’re my family. I will come back to you.”
“You better,” she says, a wet laugh breaking through tears. “Because if you don’t?—”
“I will.”
Silence again — a quieter one, but still heavy, still stitched with fear neither of us can name.
Then she asks it.
Softly.
Fatally.
“Does he know?”
I go still.
“Know what?”
“That you’re going. In sixty days. That you’ll be gone and he won’t even get to say goodbye.”
My stomach drops.
Because no.
He doesn’t know.
Not yet.
But he will.
God, he will.
