Twenty-Nine
I remember our goodbyes like it was yesterday.
It was bittersweet.
We’d spent two weeks together, trying to prolong the last remnants of our friendship. I could feel the buzz in him. The excitement he shared with the guys was infectious. They packed their things and got ready to take off one early morning.
Carter’s hopeful face was permanently embedded in my memories.
There was also heartbreak in him too.
Out front, beside Rome’s jeep where the rest of the boys sat, Carter took me into his arms and hugged me tight. He didn’t say anything for a while. Everything important had already been said; I was too choked up for words.
Then he pulled back. He took my face into his hands and he looked down at me.
For the first time in my entire life, I watched a tear fall from his eye.
“I don’t know if I’m making a mistake,” he whispered. “And the problem is, if I am, I’ll probably be too late. You’ve always been wiser than me, Leah. More mature. I’m jealous of you for that. For always being so tough, and for always believing in me. I’m never going to forget that. You’re the only person that’s ever looked at me and saw worth. I’ll be thinking of you every minute I’m gone. I…” He stopped and took a few breaths.
“It’s okay,” I whispered.
He nodded stiffly and just as I went to pull back, he took a step forward and dropped his face to mine.
He kissed me, softly and slowly. It felt like our first kiss. Exciting enough to make my blood run faster, but tame enough to feel the line that was drawn.
“I’ll see you,” he told me with conviction, pulling back to look at me.
I forced a smile as he turned away. I caught the look of panic in his eyes, and my being shook. I kept myself rooted there, ignoring the way my heart screamed for him to stay. That sick need inside of me rose to the surface, begging me to keep him. That I was wrong.
But I wasn’t wrong.
We needed this.
He climbed into the front seat beside Rome, and he didn’t look at me once as he put his seatbelt on. He kept his face forward as Rome honked his horn at me and waved.
I waved back and watched them drive off.
Carter took my heart with him, and it would be a very, very long time before another one grew back.
“You did the right thing,” Melanie told me later that day. “You let him go because he wasn’t ready. That was selfless of you.”
“I’ve spent too long being selfish,” I replied, already wrapped up in a warm blanket of numbness. “It’s time for him to live now.”
“Do you think he’ll still be punching people for being dicks?”
I smiled wistfully. “I bet you he’s punching someone right now.”