Last night felt like a bad dream, the worst nightmare I’d ever had. The fact that I was here, in my own apartment, without him, told me it had been real. My head spun, nausea creeping up from my stomach.
All my life, I’d heard and read about heartbreak. I’d gotten misty-eyed when I’d listened to the songs that bled the most intense kind of pain from every lyric and I’d belted out the power anthems about moving on.
Yet, I’d never imagined that it could hurt so badly. I didn’t realize a person could be in this amount of pain simply because another person wouldn’t be in their life anymore. I also hadn’t realized it was possible to miss someone so much when you’d last seen them less than a day ago.
It was ridiculous but that wasn’t even the worst of it. The worst was that I’d hurt Harrison. Badly.
I’d seen the way he’d looked at me in his car in front of my parents’ house, like I’d ripped the essence of him out with my failure to find the words that would’ve answered his question. Then I’d let him drive away.
I felt like absolute garbage about the whole thing, but it was done. Now all I could do was hope that all those anthems about moving on were as true as the intense pain contained in the songs written about the period before the moving on happened.
When a knock came at my door, I almost didn’t answer. There was absolutely no one in the entire world I wanted to see right now—except Harrison, but I couldn’t stand the thought of facing him either—but then I heard Sadie’s voice from the other side.
“Aurelia! We know you’re in there!” she yelled. “Well, I mean, we don’t really know for an absolute fact, but we strongly suspect.”
A soft laugh followed, and it sounded like it’d come from Maisie. “We strongly suspect? Really?”
I groaned but dragged myself off the couch and cracked the door open, confused about what in the world they could be doing here. “Hey, guys.”
“Surprise,” Sadie said, breezing past me the second the door was open wide enough. “You’re coming with us.”
“I am?” I blinked hard. “Coming with you where?”
“To drop off some presents for Laney and Claire,” Maisie explained gently, holding up a bag with tissue paper sticking out the top. “It’s just a quick run. We thought it’d be nice to get all the girls together.”
I stared at them, completely thrown. It didn’t look like they knew. Harrison didn’t seem to have told them that their almost-sister-in-law had broken his heart two nights before the wedding.
“I—” My voice cracked and I had to avert my gaze. “I don’t think I’m really up for that today.”
Sadie made a scoffing sound, already marching into my kitchen like she was totally at home here. “Not up for it? Honey, I could smell the self-pity from the hallway. You might not feel up to it, but you’re coming anyway. It’ll do you good.”
Maisie winced but didn’t contradict her. “It’ll just be for an hour. Besides, it looks like you could really use the break from being inside your own head.”
Sadie reappeared, hands on her hips and eyes narrowed like she was about to Mom me into submission. “Before you say no again, I’m not asking. I’m telling. Put on some real pants, Aurelia. You’re coming. Also, there’s dinner in your fridge, so no excuses. Let’s go.”
My eyebrows shot up. “Dinner?”
She patted her massively swollen belly. “Mama knows a thing or two about feeding the masses. We brought it over so you wouldn’t be able to use having to cook as an excuse. Do you? Cook, I mean.”
For the first time all day, a tiny, watery laugh slipped out of me. “No, I don’t. Not really, but okay. I guess you might not be completely wrong. I do need a break.”
They exchanged a triumphant glance and I headed to my bedroom to change, wondering if it had been an intervention or a coincidence. From what Harrison had told me, I knew the Westwood women were close. I also knew they spent a lot of time together. It was sweet of them to include me, but I hated the thought of telling them that I wasn’t going to be joining their family after all.
As a result, I was quiet on my way to Sterling’s house, dreading having to look the guy in the eyes. Thankfully, he wasn’t home when we got there. Apparently, he’d been pulledinto some last-minute client thing, leaving Laney and Claire to fend for themselves.
I didn’t mind at all that he wasn’t here. Honestly, it was better this way.
Sadie and Maisie fussed over Laney as soon as we walked in, but she waved them off, freshly showered with her ponytail bouncing as she walked. “I’m fine. Stop it. I’m just ready to get out of the house and be a normal human being again. You guys are worse than Sterling.”
Maisie gave her an understanding smile. “You’re there, huh? Okay, well, we won’t fuss then, and you can make the coffee.”
Laney chuckled. “That’s the spirit.”
I trailed behind them to the kitchen, in awe of how gorgeous the house was and devastated by the knowledge that I would never be in it again. Never get to sit around the kitchen island with them again. Never get to spend a holiday in the festively decorated living room we’d passed on our way in.
While they talked about everything and nothing all at once, they made the effort to include me in the conversation, but they had no idea what I’d done. Claire slept in a stroller right next to Laney, and I found myself staring at her angelic face, drifting in and out of the conversation.
“Uh-oh,” Sadie said in a singsong voice, giggling as she caught me staring. “I thinksomeonemight be feeling the old biological clock ticking.”
