“I feel like I should have realized that already.”
“Right? You’re a terrible detective,” she teased.
Ethan grinned helplessly. “Friends, then?”
“Friends,” she agreed.
“Did it help?” he blurted.
“It gave me a nicer memory, so yes.”
“You don’t regret not making a nicer memory with someone else?”
Willow stifled a little chuckle. “It couldn’t have been anyone else.”
“Are you still going to make me jealous with your parade of boytoys?” he asked, smiling vaguely.
“Oh, without a doubt, friend. I mean, if you’re going to keep stalking me.”
“I probably will,” he admitted. “It’s a habit at this point.”
“I don’t mind. I’ll be sure to post a few pictures you’ll like. I’ve noticed you seem to like my legs.”
He closed his eyes and shook his head. “Don’t torment me, I’m only human.”
She chuckled. “Well, if you’re ever in the mood for Chinese food, you know my number.”
“Temptress,” he accused, but smiled anyway.
“Mm. Well, this feels too much like a break-up, and I don’t like to linger with those, so I’m going to let you get back to your grocery shopping.”
For some reason, he didn’t want to hang up the phone. He didn’t really have anything else to say either, but… he just didn’t want to hang up.
Since he couldn’t think of a good enough reason not to, he replied, “Okay.”
Willow hesitated. “In case I don’t hear from you for a while, try not to be too hard on yourself, okay? We both had some demons to deal with
and...maybe we needed that separate life to work through it. If no one ever knows, what was the harm, right?”
“You and I know,” he countered.
“It can be our little secret. I think telling her would have been a mistake—your family is obviously important to you, and I obviously don’t know her at all, but… I think she’s better off not knowing what happened.”
“You mean about the other night…?”
“No,” she said, simply. “Take care, Ethan.”
It felt like goodbye—and he liked it even less than he expected to. He watched the numbers blink, letting him know that their conversation hadn’t even lasted six whole minutes.
He had expected to feel better after having “the talk” with Willow, not…bereft. Sure, she had left a sort of open invitation, but it felt like they both knew he couldn’t take her up on it. If he did, he would feel even worse.
What a shitty hole he found himself in.
After a moment, he collected his thoughts and headed back into the grocery store. Before he grabbed a new cart, he figured he would go back to the produce section to see if the other one was gone.
It wasn’t.
There, parked crookedly next to the display of raspberries and blueberries, his cart waited for him as if he had never been gone, each item just as he had left it.