I didn’t think it was possible to feel anymore shattered than I already had.
I was so wrong.
All he wanted was to be with me. I wanted that more than anything, but couldn’t bring myself to do that to my boys. I wasn’t made like that, and I would be lying if I said it didn’t hurt like hell that Lucas was. At the same time it gave me a satisfied feeling that he could give them up for me so easily.
Without a second thought.
It was followed by raw sentiments that overpowered any other reaction ingrained deep in my heart. Making me feel as if I didn’t love him enough, and that in itself was a rude awakening.
“It’s too late for us, Lucas,” I whispered and I felt my heart breaking into a million pieces.
I would always remember this moment as the first time.
That I…
Intentionally walked away from Lucas.
They say time heals all wounds.
That’s fucking bullshit.
The school year was just about over, and it was hard to believe that in a few short weeks I would be moving away from Oak Island.
Most importantly I’d be moving away from Alex.
The boys and I were all leaving, except Austin, who still had one more year left of high school. I decided to attend Ohio State. They had a great engineering program. I had a passion for building things, even as a child. Jacob and Dylan got accepted as well, so it didn’t take long for them to jump on board. Our parents were spending a small fortune on out of state tuition, but I think they were just relieved that we were staying together in an apartment off campus. Not at the fraternity house we planned to pledge.
Dylan was upset to be leaving Aubrey since she was in the same grade as Austin. I think it bothered him that she seemed so nonchalant about it, but he never said anything to me. He said they were going to try to do the long distance thing for a while and see how well it turned out. She seemed to understand. I could tell he loved her. He possibly loved her as much as I loved Alex. I would be lying if I said it sure as hell didn’t bother me that Alex didn’t put up a fight against me leaving. For some reason I knew the girl I grew up with would have, she probably would have put up a fight against all of us leaving.
But too much had happened.
We were way past that now.
Jacob wasn’t dating anyone, in fact he never dated anyone, so the decision for him was easy. As we got older Jacob still remained single, I mean he dated girls on and off but nothing serious. He said he preferred it that way, and I never pressed him for more information than he willingly shared. Growing up, Austin hated that he was younger than all of us. I think he knew that this day would eventually come, us going off to college together before him. He was a lot like Alex in that sense. Very intuitive and always wanting to be one of the boys. It comforted me knowing that he would still be here to look after her for one more year and then she would really be alone.
For the first time, the future was unknown for all of us. I never imagined that the roads ahead would be as unclear as they were now, assuming they would only get worse as time went on. With each of us taking different paths and going in separate directions that may or may not lead us back to Oak Island. I don’t want to say that my mom was right, but I decided it was wise to follow her advice and expand my horizons. Especially after nothing changed when I poured my heart out to Alex. At least not the way I wanted it to. We became friends again, but we hadn’t been back to our abandoned house in years. It held too many memories for the both of us and it was easier to sweep everything under the rug.
It took us a few months to get used to this new friendship we evolved into. We were the same but different…
I’m not going to try to understand any of it. She was in my life again and that was good enough for me. I think we were all just ready to try something new and different. I guess you could say things went back to normal.
With all of us.
“Oh my God, will you stop fucking texting Cole for two seconds?” I snarled.
Alex placed her phone in her back pocket and smiled at me. “I wasn’t even texting Cole, thank you very much.”
“Right…”
Oh yeah, and Cole didn’t fucking go away.
“I like the gray sheets, they look better than the black,” she stated, taking the black sheets out of my hand and grabbing the gray ones.
She conned me into going shopping for the apartment. We were leaving after the fourth of July and that was only three weeks away. I hadn’t given much thought about what I would need. I didn’t have to. Alex had done it for me. I could have done this shit in Ohio, I didn’t want to lug around any more stuff than I had to, but it made her happy and at the end of the day.
That’s all that mattered.
“For the last time, I don’t fucking care, Half-Pint. Get what you want, I’m over this.”
“We just got here, do you see this list?” She placed the paper in front of my face.
“I’ve only crossed off two things from the sixty on the list,” she informed me, assuming that I would give a shit.
I didn’t.
“Oh my God, I’m going to die here.”
She rolled her eyes. “Bo, I took off work for this.”
“Good. You work too much anyways,” I grinned, glancing at her.
“I thought you loved it when I fed you.”
I smiled. “Yes. When you feed me.” I didn’t have to say his name for her to know what I implied.
She reminded me often that she and Cole were still just friends. I believed her because what other choice did I have?
“Why couldn’t you and Aubrey do this?”
She sighed. “Aubrey is having a hard time with all of this.”
We walked down the aisle and I looked over at her while she dumped more random shit into the shopping cart.
Did she honestly think I would dust?
“What do you mean? Dylan said she’s been fine with everything.”
She shrugged, grabbing a broom and dustpan that I grabbed from her and placed back on the rack.
“No,” I ordered, rolling the cart to leave the goddamn cleaning aisle.
She placed the same dustpan and broom that I just took out of her hands back into the shopping cart, completely blowing me off with a great big smile on her face and a scowl on mine.
See? I told you things were somewhat back to normal.
“Alex,” I warned.
“What?”
I shook my head. “Nothing.”
She placed her hand on her hip, cocked her head, and looked right at me. “You’re going to need a broom and dustpan, I know how messy you boys are. I don’t want to have to go buy one when I come and visit.”
I loved that she was already thinking about coming to visit and we hadn’t even left yet, so I disregarded the smartass comments that I really wanted to say.
“I can’t believe you boys are leaving me in three weeks,” she softly spoke not meeting my eyes.
“We’re not leaving you.”
“I know.”
“We will come back all the time. Ohio isn’t that far away.”
“It’s over a ten-hour drive.”
I nudged her with my shoulder as we walked side-by-side. “Look at all the practice you can get at driving. Maybe I won’t fear for my life when I’m in a car with you anymore.”
She smacked my chest and shoved me away from the cart, rolling it to the next aisle.
I subconsciously looked up at the number above our heads, three. How many fucking aisles does this store have?
“I’m a cautious driver,” she stated, pulling me away from my thoughts.
“No, you’re a scary one.”
“How would you know? You never let me drive your truck.”
“That’s because you can barely see over the steering wheel, and the first time I let you drive it, you popped a curb and scratched my rim.”
She scoffed, placing her hand on her chest. “That curb came out of nowhere.”
“Right… because that happens all the time. Curbs popping out of nowhere and shit, I’m constantly hearing about it on the news.”
She glared at me and I laughed. “I drive in your car enough to know that you can’t drive worth shit.”
“I just got that car.”
“Exactly,” I stated with wide eyes.
Her parents had bought her a white Honda Civic a few weeks ago. They thought if they waited until she was almost seventeen to buy her a vehicle, that she would have more time to practice. That she would somehow develop some sort of awareness for driving.
She didn’t.
We stayed in the store for the next three hours. I drew the line when she tried to buy accent pillows for the couch and my bed. She tried to play it cool when she added some of her own toiletries and other stuff that I knew were only for her. I didn’t call her out on it because I didn’t want her to take them out or make her feel like she wasn’t welcome or wanted. As much as she tried to pretend that she was excited for us, I knew deep down she was scared of another change in our short lives. Not just with me this time.
With all of us.
I wanted to reassure her that everything would be all right and tell her anything else I had to say to ease her concern. Except this time I didn’t want to lie to her, it’s what started our complicated chaos in the first place.
Things were changing again.
It was inevitable, just like the days changing and time moving forward.
But I never imagined it would be to the degree that it did.
I hated that we grew up.
I hated that we still had so much more growing up to do.
I hated that they were leaving me.
I hated that I felt like I was left behind.
It would only be Austin and me for one more year. Then I would be alone, even Aubrey would be gone.
I hated that more than anything.
I tried to pretend that none of it bothered me. That I didn’t lose sleep over it, or that it wasn’t constantly on my mind. But when I was alone with nothing but my thoughts and nothing to distract me, there was no escaping it. The realization quickly followed. I did have a co-dependent relationship with my boys, and I had yet to figure out if that was a good or bad thing.
I always wanted to be with them.
That’s just the way it was.
As a child you don’t comprehend how much impact relationships like ours can have on your life and the decisions that you needed to make. Especially when it came time for everyone to go their separate ways. Which was another thing I never considered.
Leaving.
My junior year was fast approaching and it was time for me to start thinking about the future.
My future.
What I wanted to do with my life and where I wanted to go. My parents told me they would pay for any college of my choice, though scholarships and grants would be easily attainable for me. I was a great student. Made honor roll ever since I could remember. That wasn’t what plagued me. I could get in anywhere.
There was a major difference between my boys and me.
I didn’t want to leave.
I loved Oak Island. It was home to me. I guess I assumed we would all attend Wilmington University and grow old here like our parents did. When the boys told me they were leaving because they wanted to live in a big city and do new things, I wanted to yell at them the same way I did when we were kids, and they told me something that didn’t make any sense, but I couldn’t.
It wouldn’t be fair to do that to them. I had to let them grow up, exactly the way I always had.
My mom had always told me that boys were different than girls. That we were made differently, and I never considered it to be true until they told me they were leaving so easily. The words flew from their mouths like the waves of the ocean. I pretended to be happy, ecstatic from the news even. My boys knew me well, so when they pulled me into tight hugs my eyes began to water. The older I got the harder it was to hold back my emotions. To keep them hidden like I did when I was a kid.
I guess I really did turn into a girl at some point.
Lucas had been spending more time with me and I knew it was for both our benefits. He would miss me as much as I would him.
That wasn’t even a question.
The answer was already ingrained in our hearts.
I didn’t know how long it would last, so I cherished it as much as I could not knowing when it might end. I started thinking about the future and how much it could really change. As soon as thoughts of love with other people crossed my mind I immediately shook it off.
I would rather be surprised than to expect it.
It was easier that way.
Or so I thought…
“Whatcha thinkin’ about over there?” Lucas asked while we were watching a movie on his bed.
“I’m watching the movie.”
“What’s it about?”
I looked from the TV to him. “Huh?”
“The movie, Half-Pint, what’s it about?” he grinned all knowing.
“Oh,” I smiled. “Is the movie too smart for you, Bo? Do you need me to explain it so that you understand?” I teased to no avail.
“You think that’s going to work on me? Give me some credit, Alex. What are you thinking about?”
“Why does it matter?”
He turned to face me. The intensity of his stare causing me to pull my legs up to my chest and wrap my arms around them in a comforting gesture.
“I can’t do this with you again,” he recalled with a familiar edge in his tone. “I can’t lose you again. I won’t, Alex. It doesn’t matter what happens between us, you have to be in my life and I don’t care if it’s just as my best friend. Know that I’ll take you any way I can. So, please tell me what you’re thinking, because I can guarantee you that every answer to your question is a no.”
The severity of his words shocked me to my core. Somewhere along the way my boy also grew up.
Into a man.
No longer the boy that I was in love with.
“I’m scared,” I half-whispered, and by the look on his face it wasn’t what he expected me to say.
“I’m scared that you’re moving away and you’re going to forget about me. I’m scared that you all will. I’m scared that nothing will ever be the same like it was when we were kids. I’m scared that I have no idea what I want to do with my life,” I paused to let my words sink in. “But mostly, I’m scared that we’re growing up and that our paths may never cross through the same direction, Bo. That we’re destined to remain in this friendship that I love so much, that I cherish with all my heart. The ups and downs are what make us, Bo and Half-Pint. What if that’s all we’ll ever have?”
He took in each and every word as if I recited his favorite song and then softly grabbed the sides of my face and looked deep into my eyes.
“I told you every answer was no,” he simply stated with a heartwarming look on his face before he leaned in and kissed the tip of my nose.
I wanted to remember this always.
Because what happened next…
I wanted to forget forever.
It was the Fourth of July.
Southport was the next town over and highway 211 was closed down every year for the Fourth of July Festival. Since 1972 over 40,000 tourists and residents gathered around to enjoy the day’s festivities. It was usually my favorite day of the year.
Not this year.
This year, my boys were leaving the very next day.
“Alex, honey, what are you doing here? Why aren’t you at the festival?” Mom asked as I cleaned my last table.
“I’m working,” I simply stated.
“Alex, you don’t need to be working. You’re missing the fun, you’re missing your boys. They leave tomorrow.”
“Don’t remind me.”
“Oh, honey,” she sighed as she grabbed my arm, making me sit with her.
“That’s what this is about?”
I shrugged because I didn’t know what to say.
“They’re going to come back for every holiday and I bet some random weekends, too. You will visit when you can. I promise.”
“Right.”
“Oh, Alex, at times I wish we would have been more careful with you and those boys.”
That grabbed my attention, making me look up at her. “What?”
“You’re so attached to them. Sometimes I worry if that’s healthy for you.”
“I’m fine. I’m just sad, is all. They leave tomorrow and I don’t want to ruin their last day here.”
“Now you know that’s not true. Do you have any idea how many times Lucas has called the restaurant begging me to let you off work? Why did you tell them that we’re making you work? That couldn’t be further from the truth.”
“It was easier that way. If I didn’t, they would be sitting here instead of enjoying their last day on the island.”
“Easier for who?”
I bowed my head.
“I don’t have to tell you, but you know that you’re so young. You all are. Honey, your lives are going to go in separate directions eventually, but that doesn’t mean that you won’t be in each other’s lives at all.”
“How do you know that?”
“It comes with age.”
“It doesn’t feel that way to me.”
“Just trust me, Alex, for once, I promise. Your heart is here, which is true for all of you. Sometimes it takes leaving to know where you come from. To know where you belong.” She wrapped her arm around my shoulder and tugged me closer. “I love you, but if you don’t get the hell out of here right now. I’m going to fire you.”
I laughed.
“Now go!” She pushed me off the bench, smiled and left.
I went to the bathroom to change into a bikini under my dress. I let down my hair and put on some mascara, blush, and lip-gloss. After a few minutes I felt better about my appearance and walked out into the restaurant.
Cole sat on the exact bench that my mom and I were just on. I hadn’t been spending much time with him since he arrived on the island. I gave Lucas and the boys my undivided attention. Cole never complained about it, he knew they were leaving. We still talked on the phone and texted all the time. He was there for me as he had always been. The past summer’s incident was long forgotten.