Chapter 15
Olivia
“He’s staying home,” I say to Caroline while we talk on my drive home.
“Ol, so what? This is the perfect opportunity to explore what could have been,” she says. She takes her job as my best friend extremely seriously and is always ready to talk me off my hypothetical cliffs. She is also usually the one with the rational brain cell.
“What if he” I start before she cuts me off.
“No. Nope. No. There is no what if,” she says, “You’ve spent two days with him and it's all you have talked about. Obviously, there is something there,” she finishes.
“Car, he left me standing outside, in the rain, in Oklahoma alone. How do I even come back from that?” I ask, genuinely curious about what she says. Caroline may be the rational one but she rarely gives second chances.
“Ten years ago!” she yells, leaving me grateful the Bluetooth in my car allows me to control the volume. “Olivia, people change. Have you even talked to him about that night?” she asks. I can tell she’s getting annoyed but also know it’s reasonable because she’s probably right.
“No,” I say quietly. Remembering back to the other night, the first embrace he wrapped me in saying we have to talk about it.
“What? What was that?” she asks knowing she absolutely won this discussion and that I would have to have this conversation with him.
“He wanted to talk the first night together but I wasn’t ready. I’m still not ready,” I say, almost ashamed.
“Olivia, you cannot keep living in the past. I know it's going to be an uncomfortable conversation and it's probably going to suck. And knowing you, you’re going to cry, but you cannot grow without being uncomfortable. So go get uncomfortable,” she says.
I know she’s right but it took me months to pull myself out of the hole after Oklahoma, with the help of Caroline and Mason. Am I interested in opening that door up again?
Yes. My brain instantly screams yes. There’s no hesitation in that answer. I sense the smile emerging on Caroline’s face through the phone, yet again but we both knew there’s only one answer moving forward.
“Thanks, Car,” is all I need to say before hanging up the phone. I park the car in the driveway of my parents’ house and immediately grab my phone to text Noah.
Me: Friends, let's start there.
I may not be ready to start a relationship with him yet, but the least I can do is work toward rebuilding the friendship we once held, where we were able to be in the same place without feeling an awkward tension pulling us together. Even if I think that tension is always going to be there.
I slide my phone into my pocket and look out the windshield. Pen and the boys are sledding down the hill behind our parents’ house, Cole and Carter are standing at the bottom, watching me in my car. I see Cole lean over and say something to Carter, and everyone starts smiling.
And for the first time since being back in the dreaded Fisher Creek, Wisconsin, I’m happy. Genuinely and wholeheartedly happy to be here and for what is to come.