“Then we all stuffed ourselves in Drake’s old truck and got the hell out of there,” Carrie said.
We laughed for a while longer thinking about it.
“How did Mr. Pate figure out who it was?” Drake asked. “I don’t remember.”
Sadie snorted and hit the table, while I barely contained my laughter watching her. “It was because of my bloody knees,” Ireminded everyone. “He’d seen Sadie knock me down through the slats of the fence. He figured whoever’d gone down would’ve been injured. He took one look at my bandaged knees the next day and walked me right to the principal’s office.”
Melinda’s mom joined in. “And then the principal called all of you in, but you texted me first. Sadie’s mom and I showed up with cookies, and suddenly y’all weren’t in trouble anymore.” She winked at us. “Moms are magic like that.”
“It’s weird to think he’s our boss now,” Sadie laughed, looking at Melinda.
“He still likes y’all’s cookies better than mine or Sadie’s,” Melinda complained, looking at her mother and Sadie’s mom.
“So fun,” Sadie said looking at me with a genuine smile; the kind that made her eyes sparkle and brought out her dimples. It was the first time I’d seen that smile since our freshman year of college.
I watched her, unable to look away and wishing I could freeze this moment forever. Slowly, she seemed to realize that she’d temporarily forgotten what had happened between us. She was only remembering the good times. The smile dropped from her face, but her eyes stayed on mine. Then she swallowed hard and looked away.
I looked down at my plate, feeling the loss of the moment deeply.
No one around us seemed to notice, and soon both Sadie and I had jumped back into the conversation. It wasn’t the same, though. Anytime there was a shared experience between Sadie and me, she downplayed it or changed the subject.
It hurt. But I understood. Drake was right; no matter how much I regretted losing her, it wasn’t ever going to be okay between us again.
Soon afterwards I stood up and made my excuses to leave, telling everyone I’d see them at the joint bachelor and bachelorette party in about a month.
“Are you not coming to the next couple of events?” Melinda asked.
I shook my head. “No. I’m sorry. We’re coming up on the busiest time of year at the dealership, and then I’m taking my vacation.”
“Well, we’ll miss you,” Drake said, standing to shake my hand and pull me in for a hug.
“Same. But it won’t be long until the party.” I smiled and waved at everyone, only then noticing that Sadie had disappeared.
I hated to leave without telling her goodbye, but it would be really obvious why I was waiting if I didn’t go now.
“Bye,” I said and turned to head out the gate.
It turned out Sadie was in the driveway getting something out of her car. She turned and saw me, a brightly wrapped package in her hand. “You heading out?”
“Yeah.”
We stood there like that for a minute, just looking at each other without saying anything. I didn’t want to make it weird for her, so I held up my hand and smiled, then turned to go.
“Harrison?”
I turned back around so quickly I might’ve fallen if there weren’t so many cars to grab onto in the driveway. “Yes?”
“We really had some good times together, didn’t we?” The look on her face was bittersweet, and I knew she was remembering the bad wrapped up with the good.
“The best,” I agreed. I cleared my throat. “I’m truly sorry, Sadie. I ruined everything. I took that future we had planned and blew it apart with my arrogance. I was so selfish and sucha bastard,” I shook my head. “I will always regret what I did to you.”
Her eyes looked suspiciously glassy for a moment. “You remember the future we talked about?”
“Of course.” I pushed my keys in my pocket. “When Drake came to tell me about proposing to Melinda, I had this insane moment of jealousy. All I could think was that it was supposed to be us.” I smiled sadly. “But I ruined that.”
She looked down, not knowing what to say. She surprised me again, though, by looking up and meeting my eyes one more time. “I wish we had a do-over.”
I started to agree, but she kept talking.
