Chapter 27
During the fall semester of our junior year, Harrison moved to Paris to study abroad.
I remember having a vague interest in going abroad, but after about twenty minutes of researching the cost (expensive) and the availability of courses that would count toward my degree (limited), I’d decided to save up the money from my summer babysitting gigs and visit him during Thanksgiving break instead.
As I’d told him that first night we’d met, I wasn’t sure I believed in soulmates.
But I also remember feeling off for the first two months of the fall semester.
Jo and I lived together and hung out basically every day.
But she was also always on the phone with Macy, who was spending their senior fall semester studying abroad in Argentina, and even when she wasn’t on the phone, I could tell her head was elsewhere.
It was lonely. Not lonely in a literal, spending time alone kind of way, but in an emotional way. I remember feeling like Jo had a right to feel lonely. Her feelings were valid—she was in a long-term relationship. I, on the other hand, felt insane for the way I was missing Harrison.
My feelings didn’t feel justified. I told myself it was weird and creepy of me to miss him the way I did, as if I were missing a part of myself.
When I landed at Charles de Gaulle on the first Saturday of our weeklong Thanksgiving break, I expected to follow the detailed instructions Harrison had given me to take the train from the airport to the apartment he was sharing with three other students from our college.
Turns out that was just a distraction. He was planning on picking me up at the airport all along because, well, of course he was. This is Harrison we’re talking about.
The moment I saw him at the airport, I realized a few things:
My feelings were justified, because
Soulmates do exist, and
I had one.
And if I thought being separated by the Atlantic Ocean was hard, that’s nothing compared to this unbreakable barrier, physically manifested in my droopy popcorn ceiling. Plato didn’t account for the fallout from an excessively tight vagina when he wrote about soulmates.
Once I’ve been in bed for so long that all the light has disappeared from outside, I finally peel myself out from under the covers, intending to get a glass of water and use the bathroom. But just as I’m standing up, there’s a knock at the door.
I pause.
I blink.
Another knock.
I scamper to the entryway, peering through the peephole. It’s dark out, but I’d recognize that face in pitch blackness.
Cracking the door so he can hear me but can’t see me, I wait for him to speak. When he doesn’t, I finally say, “Hi?” My voice is scratchy and nearly unrecognizable.
“Hi,” he says, clearing his throat. He takes his hands out of his pockets, looks at them, then puts them back into his pockets, clearing his throat again.
“Hi?”
“Hi,” he repeats. “Um, can you come with me?”
In the faint moonlight, I can see a thin sheen of sweat on his face, and his hands—back out of his pockets again—are visibly shaking. His eyes are slightly too wide, and his waves have fallen flat, covering his eyebrows. Apparently the mere act of speaking to me is making him physically ill.
“Are you trying to kidnap me?”
“No?”
“You don’t sound sure.”
He blinks at me.
I get it. I really do. He’s trying to be an adult, to talk about his feelings and explain why this isn’t going to work. I don’t know if I can handle another rejection, but I owe it to him to listen after everything I’ve put him through.
“Okay, I’ll come.” I slip on shoes and step outside, folding my arms across my chest to hide the fact I’m wearing ratty pajamas and look like I haven’t showered in two days. (I haven’t.)
We silently walk inside the upper portion of the house, but instead of turning left into his apartment, we walk up two additional flights of stairs to the top of our triple-decker.
When I’m out of breath and about to tell him this is getting ridiculous, he opens a small door and leads me into a finished attic space.
It’s dark and smells kind of musty, and I think the room is totally empty, but as my eyes adjust, I can see the middle of the floor is actually taken up by… two beanbags?
“Um?” I ask.
“Um,” Harrison says, clearing his throat. “This is silly, but…I thought we could talk. And start over. Start fresh, like we did the first week of college.”
My mouth goes completely dry, and I realize…this might not end entirely poorly.
My eyes finally adjust enough to actually see the beanbags. “Are those—” I gasp. “Are those the actual beanbags from Hall Hall?” Harrison nods. “How did you…? How?!”
A dimple appears. “Did you know Rose goes to the same college we did?”
My eyes widen. “You enlisted Rose for a beanbag heist?”
“We’re going to return them in the morning. It’s not stealing.”
“And you’re telling me Hall Hall still has the same beanbags?”
He cringes. “I’ll admit this idea seemed better before I saw the beanbags. I remember them being a little more plush. And a little more clean.”
I gape at him.
He points to a stack of linens on a small side table. “But I have two blankets we can cover them with.”
There’s a squeak as he looks at the table, and now that my eyes have adjusted, I see a travel-size crate.
“And did you…did you bring Raya?” I ask.
He nods. “I know how much you like her. And I needed the extra support.”
I try to swallow, but it gets caught in my throat. “I do. I like her a lot. I might even love her, actually.”
A dimple appears. “You and me both.” He gestures to the beanbags as if he’s a waiter gesturing toward a table at a fine dining establishment. “Can we sit down and talk?”
I nod, silently gliding across the floor. I accept the blanket he hands me and cover the beanbag. When I sit down, I sink so much I can feel the floor.
Harrison sits down and clears his throat, but instead of breaking into a speech like I expect, he shifts and pulls a piece of paper out of his back pocket. “I have something to show you.”
I reach out my hand, but he doesn’t give it to me. Instead, he unfolds the paper, clears his throat again, and starts reading.
“Dictionary of Emma. Volume one.” He looks up, and we make eye contact, mine narrowing, his crinkling.
The corner of his mouth ticks up. “When Em tucks her hair behind her right ear, that means she’s feeling bashful.
” I stop breathing. “When Em blinks rapidly, that means she’s jealous.
When Em pulls her lips to the side and tilts her head, that means she’s thinking about me. ”
I let out a wet laugh. “Rather full of yourself, I see.”
A dimple forms. “When Em lets out a quiet, breathy laugh, that means she’s laughing around other people.
When Em lets out a loud, yelping laugh, that means she’s laughing with me.
” He looks up with a sneaky grin. “Or Jo, but that felt less romantic to include.” The laugh I let out is unmistakably yelping, which makes Harrison chuckle.
His face grows more serious as he scans the next one. “When Emma’s breathing slows and her eyes widen and her brows furrow and her lips part, that means she has something to tell me, but she’s not going to tell me.”
“Delete that entry,” I whisper.
Harrison exhales a light laugh. “I don’t think that’s how dictionaries work.”
“You won’t need it anymore. I promise.”
He studies me, his brown eyes molten in the darkness. Harrison knows me as well as I know him. He always has. And the fact that he always knew I was keeping secrets but never pressed me on them is, to put it lightly, heartbreaking.
“I owe you an apology,” he says, his voice raspy.
“You definitely don’t.”
“Well—I’m giving it to you anyway. Your apology earlier today—”
“What if we never talk about that again?”
“You took me by surprise. I know it looked like I was choosing to ignore you to placate my mom, and I know that’s a problem I’ve always had, but I had actually asked her to come over so I could talk to her.
Specifically, to talk to her about the way she treats you.
And about the way she treats me, too. I wanted to do that before I talked to you and apologized, but then you beat me to it and took me by surprise, which is why I froze, and I just…
I need to clarify how I actually feel. Because that interaction was not indicative of my real feelings. ”
“How do you actually feel?” I eke out, my throat thick.
Surely there are city noises in the background, but I don’t hear anything except the beating of my heart.
It may be physiologically impossible, but in this moment, I would swear on my life that I can also hear the beating of Harrison’s heart. Thump. Thump. Thump.
The corner of Harrison’s lips twitches upward as his eyes soften.
“You’re the best friend I’ve ever had. I love every second I get to spend with you, even when it makes me act like a lovesick teenager.
Which, to be clear, is exactly what I was for the first two years of our friendship. Now I’m just a lovesick adult.”
I dare to tentatively smile, and the change in my expression makes Harrison’s eyes sparkle like the streetlights coming in through the window.
“I wasn’t lying when I said you broke my heart in college.
But what would be completely unbearable, worse than anything we’ve put each other through in the past, is going through that again and never being able to see you or hold you in my arms again.
What we have is worth any risk, at least to me. ”
“Me, too,” I whisper.
“And I am so, so, so sorry for the way I treated you yesterday at the cabin. It won’t happen again.
I know I’m a people pleaser, but I’m trying to start advocating more for what I want.
Which, in this case, is you,” he says, grinning.
“And I want you to know that I told my mom everything, and things are going to be different moving forward.”
“What did you tell her?”
Harrison smiles. “I told her I was still in love with you.”
My eyes widen. “You did?”
“I did. And she was upset about it.”
“Naturally.”
“But she’s going to get over it. And I know she doesn’t act like it, but she’s impressed by you. Or, at least, she can tell you’ve changed me and made me more confident. You’ve been a good influence on me, and she knows it.”
I laugh quietly, reaching out and squeezing his hand. When I try to pull away, he locks his fingers around mine and pulls our hands into his lap for safekeeping.
“I talked to my parents today,” I say. “I decided it was time to be an adult and open up about what I was feeling.”
“I’m proud of you.” He squeezes my hand and smiles gently. “Look at us. We’re doing better already.”
“Doing better,” I agree.
He stares at me for another moment before continuing. “There’s no way I could ever forgive myself if we messed this up. I really, really want this.” His voice is pleading, even though I’ve already made it clear I agree.
“I want this, too,” I whisper.
“I know there’s a lot to figure out, but I’d like to figure it out together, as a team. I want to share your burdens, if you’ll let me. You make me believe in soulmates. You complete me. And I love you, wholly.”
“I need you to look me in the eyes, please,” I say to him, and he hesitantly stares at me.
I lean forward, crawling from my beanbag to his and settling onto his lap.
He wraps his arms around me, and I place my hands on his cheeks, gazing back at him intently.
“I love you wholly, Harrison. I always have, and I always will.”
Without waiting another heartbeat, he kisses me, and the entire world dissolves around me as my heart re-forms itself, mending together all the pieces that fell apart over the last day and last five years. I feel my split-in-half body repairing, my limbs refastening, my mind clearing.
I can’t help myself—I start laughing, completely overcome with joy. “This is one of the happiest moments of my life, and I’m wearing a South Tampa Regional Middle School T-shirt.”
Harrison just grins at me. I suppose when you’re in love with your best friend, you already know they laugh uncontrollably when they’re happy.
“Let’s bring these beanbags downstairs before I start sneezing from this dusty-ass attic?” I ask, smiling against his lips.
Harrison blinks, as if startled back to reality. “Actually, we’re up here because there’s someone in my apartment who refused to leave.”
My eyes narrow. “Please tell me it’s not your mother.”
Harrison laughs softly. “No. A certain friend of ours called me when she got done with her shift at Jo Jo’s and insisted I let her come over so she could yell at me. She has flat-out refused to leave my apartment until we’d sorted things out. You’ll never guess who.”
“Please tell me it’s not Rose.”
“Nope. The other employee.”
“JO!” I yelp. “We need to go update her immediately.” I give him another kiss before jumping out of his lap, grabbing Raya’s carrier, and dragging him through the door.
“Someone’s in a rush to update their best friend.”
“Someone is in a rush to update their best friend so their best friend can leave and give us the apartment to ourselves.”
“You realize we could just go downstairs to your apartment?”
I shoot him a guilty look as we walk down the stairs. “I’d say we need to have a conversation about soundproofing, but I’m less concerned about it now.” Harrison raises an eyebrow in response but doesn’t ask. I have all the time in the world to fill him in later.
We get to his door, and before I open it, I reach out and brush a lock of hair out of his eyes. “I love you. I know I just said it, but I love you.” Raya squeaks from her crate, and I blow her a kiss. “And I love you, too, baby girl.”
Harrison laughs, bringing his forehead to mine. “And I love you the most,” he says.[*]
Skip Notes
* Soft smile · Raised eyebrows · Head tilted downward toward subject | Facial expression | Frequency: high
Love.