CHAPTER 120
Troy
“NO, YOU’RE WRONG, the Persian Empire came first,” Ana lectures me.
“Nope, the Greek Empire came first,” I say for reasons that don’t pertain to factual historical events at all and instead from the adorable crease I manage to always pull from her brows. “I have books to prove it,” I add just so I can see those pretty blue eyes throw darts into mine.
Her eyes snap.
Ha, cute.
“Books written by Greeks!” she points out very passionately.
Folding a hand across my heart, I shape my fingers into an imaginary speaker just to throw her off base and it works. “Bulgaria and Sweden have entered the chat,” I announce.
“You’re so fucking corny,” Ana dishes out, while reaching an arm out at her plate filled with falafel, digging through her Greek salad with her fork until she manages to find an unusually large olive and flicks it at me.
Before we know it I’m aiming a block of feta at her chin and she’s chugging a piece of Persian cucumber right at my nose and I’m pulling on her perfect damn legs to bring her exactly where she needs to be.
In my lap and her hair tucked under my fingers.
I rest my head into the curve of her neck, her sweet strawberry scent already building, and groan against her cheeks. “Fuck, why didn’t we do this sooner?”
She pushes me back just to get a good look at my face.
“Because you were an idiot,” Ana says very innocently.
“I’m the idiot?!”
“Yes, that’s what I just said.”
Her entire cheeks burst into laughter as I grab at her sides, poking all over her soft skin with wild mischief.
Somewhere—a good couple of minutes into the tickling quarrel—from over her shoulder, my face still tangled in between her chocolate waves, I catch a glimpse of the picture frame right to the corner of my television.
At some point I couldn’t even picture it. Falling in love.
Finding that person we’re all pressured to meet. I guess my old therapist wasn’t wrong; Stephanie Wong rarely was.
During our final session—the same laminated scene across from my eyes now—my gaze hooked onto the seashell-bordered frame resting on her coffee table.
A picture of the ocean.
One question about pain.
Ms. Wong shut her notepad, she leaned forward with a grounding conviction and said:
“One day, you’re going to meet a girl who won’t necessarily make you move on from the sadness, but she will help you move past it and see beyond it. The places that have been tainted for you, you will see the beauty in them again, one day.”
But I had already met her. When I was seven, and she was five.
“So…,” Ana’s comforting voice cuts through the memory, “we’re on the same team now?”
“Same team?” I say, taking a second to register that she exists, here, now in my arms. “That’s gonna take some time to get used to.”
She gives a firm nudge to my shoulder as I laugh.
Truth is, I wouldn’t have it any other way.