Beverly

Blake

BLAKE

1999

“Say something,” Sydney demanded, shoving a Polaroid into my face. It was a blurry snapshot of her at some party, laughing and leaning into some guy’s chest, his arm possessively wrapped around her waist.

I stepped out of the shower, water dripping down my chest, barely registering the picture she waved around like a warning. “Syd, it’s just a picture.”

“Just a picture?” she repeated, her voice rising in disbelief. “That’s all you have to say, ? You don’t even ask who he is, you don’t ask what this means. Nothing.” She let out a sharp, humorless laugh. “You know what’s funny? I thought this would piss you off. I thought you’d see this and—” She shook her head, swallowing hard. “But you don’t care, do you?”

I snatched a white towel from the rack, wrapping it loosely around my waist before finally turning to face her. “Do you want me to scream at you, Sydney? Is that what this is?”

She glared at me, clutching the Polaroid in her hand.

“You want me to lose it?” I asked. “Start throwing accusations like that will somehow change things? Because if that’s what you want, then just say the word. I can do that. I can yell and play the role, the jealous, furious boyfriend. I can ask all the questions you expect me to ask. But let’s not pretend that’s what this is about.”

Her brown eyes narrowed into unforgiving slits.

“Unbelievable,” she muttered, pacing the small space between the sink and the door. “You just don’t feel anything , do you?”

“If you’re hoping to make me jealous, it’s not working.”

For a moment, the fire in her eyes flickered. “So that’s it, huh? I’ve spent weeks trying to be patient, trying to be good enough, but I’m done. I’m done trying to make you want me.”

I should have said something, but the words I needed to speak were trapped in my throat, refusing to come out.

Sydney was trying to play it tough, but I knew better.

She was waiting for me to fight for her.

“I don’t know what you want me to say.” I sighed, not even recognizing my own voice anymore. It sounded tired. Defeated. Maybe even cold.

“You never do. It’s like you’re not even here half the time.” She stepped closer, folding her arms tightly across her chest. “You don’t care that I hooked up with Ethan last week, do you?”

Ethan. The guy who sat behind me in school, always bragging about his dad’s yacht and the ski trips they took every winter.

Part of me wanted to feel something. Anything . Anger, hurt, disgust, betrayal. But when I looked at her, when I listened to her voice crack with that last sentence, all I could muster was a dull ache in my chest, like a bruise that had long since faded.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Do you want me to care?”

Her hands curled into fists, and her voice rose, trembling with frustration. “Are you sleeping with someone else?”

“No.”

“Then what?” she pressed, louder this time. “What is it, ? Why do you look at me like I’m a stranger?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I just?—”

I just can’t force something that isn’t there.

I just can’t stop loving someone else.

“You just what?” she demanded. “You just stopped caring? You just woke up one day and decided I wasn’t worth it?”

“It’s not like that.”

“Then what is it like?” She was begging now. “Because I’m running out of ways to convince myself that this isn’t all in my head.”

I looked at her then—really looked at her.

Sydney was pretty. And she deserved better than the half-hearted scraps I’d been giving her. She deserved someone who could say I’m yours and mean it with every fiber of their being. Someone who could look at her the way I looked at Beverly.

How do you tell someone you don’t love them—not because they are unworthy of love or haven’t tried hard enough, but because someone else has already taken that place in your heart? How do you shape something so cruel into words that won’t leave scars behind?

You could say I’m sorry , but apologies won’t change the way your heart beats for someone else. You could say you deserve better , but that won’t soften the sharp edges of rejection.

“Sydney,” I said softly, stretching out her name as if it might somehow buy me more time, more courage. “You’re my?—”

“Don’t say it, .” Her voice was sharp, but her eyes were pleading. “Don’t you dare say ‘friend’. Not tonight.”

For a moment, I braced myself, half-expecting her to throw something at me. But she didn’t. She just exhaled sharply, shaking her head. “You don’t even know how to admit it, do you? That you don’t love me. That you never did. That’s why you won’t let me kiss you and why you keep me at arm’s length.”

I didn’t answer.

I couldn’t.

Because she was right.

Because my heart wasn’t hers.

“You’re such a coward, ,” she choked out, blinking back the tears she refused to let fall. “God, you can’t even give me that. You can’t even tell me the truth.”

I exhaled slowly, rubbing my temples. I was so tired.

Tired of pretending. Tired of trying to be something I wasn’t. Tired of standing in front of a girl who deserved more and giving her nothing.

Sydney’s voice shook with desperation, her tone rising in one final, frantic effort to drag the truth out of me. “Is it because of Beverly?”

I didn’t answer. I didn’t have to.

She saw it in the way my jaw clenched, in the way my hands curled into fists at my sides, and in the way I didn’t deny it.

It must have been written all over my face.

“Of course it is.” A broken laugh escaped her, and she pressed a hand to her forehead, as if she couldn't believe it had taken her this long to put it together. “It’s always been her, hasn’t it?” The tears finally spilled over, and she wiped them away furiously, like she was angry at herself for crying in front of me. “God, I’m so stupid. I’ve been sitting here for weeks, trying to figure out what I did wrong. Trying to be enough for you. But it was never me, was it? It was always her.”

The silence that followed was deafening.

“Jesus Christ.” Her voice was hollow, stripped of everything but contempt. “You’re pathetic.”

She turned and walked out, slamming the door behind her.

The sound rang out like a gunshot, leaving me alone in the too-small bathroom with nothing but my reflection and the weight of her words. And Beverly’s name—lingering in my chest like a wound that wouldn’t close.

I let out a bitter laugh that barely made it past my throat, tipping my head back against the cold tile wall. Beverly .

Always, always Beverly.

That was the problem—the truth I couldn’t admit out loud.

“What happened?”

I stiffened and turned my head.

And there she was.

She stood in the doorway, barefoot, arms crossed, her face a mix of concern and frustration.

She must have heard everything.

Her blonde hair was a mess, and she was drowning in a white oversized sweatshirt she had stolen from my closet years ago—one that should have looked ugly but somehow didn’t.

She looked so effortlessly beautiful it hurt.

“She’s gone,” I finally said, as if that explained everything.

“Clearly,” she shot back, unimpressed. “So? What happened?”

“She’s losing her mind,” I muttered. “It’s nothing.”

“It didn’t sound like nothing. She was screaming your name, . My name, too. Want to explain that?”

“It’s not a big deal.”

“Not a big deal? She’s out there crying because of you, and she was screaming my name like it’s my fault.”

“She’s gone,” I repeated, not meeting her gaze. “It’s over.”

“, what did you do? What did you say to her?”

“It’s not what I did,” I strangled out. “It’s what I couldn’t do.”

I made the mistake of looking at her then. The second our eyes met, something cracked open inside my chest.

We stared at each other, the silence between us somehow louder than anything Sydney had just screamed.

“I’m tired,” I sighed. “Just drop it, Beverly.”

“That’s not an answer.”

I laughed dryly. “Well, it’s all I’ve got right now.”

“,” she said softly. “Just tell me what happened.”

I swallowed hard, the weight of everything crashing down on me at once. “I told her the truth. Or at least, I tried to.”

“And what truth is that?”

That I feel like I’m drowning.

That my heart aches in a way that has become too familiar.

That your presence feels like both salvation and destruction.

But I didn’t say any of that.

Instead, I let the words fall from my lips before I lost my nerve. “That I never loved her. Because I was too busy loving you.”

Beverly’s eyes softened, but there was something else there, too—something that looked a lot like pain.

For a moment, I thought she might say something.

For a moment, I thought she might stay.

But instead, she turned.

And then she was gone.