Hold the Forevers

“Please,” I said.

“Fuck.”

Then he bottomed out inside of me. I gasped and hit the ceiling. Everything felt fuzzy and distant as my body pulsed all around him at the same time that he came hard and fast.

I collapsed backward on the couch. My brain was slow on the uptake. I felt foggy and disoriented. As if I were in a euphoria cloud.

Cole leaned his forehead against my shoulder. His chest was still rising and falling heavily with the exertion. “God, you’re amazing.”

I kissed his shoulder. “You’re pretty amazing yourself.”

“Was this your idea all along?” he asked, trailing kisses across my collarbone.

“Yes, I’m so sneaky.”

He chuckled, pulling back to kiss my swollen lips. “You cast a spell on me.”

“Someone else must have done the casting because I’m equally under your thrall.”

“A love spell,” he agreed.

“Or maybe,” I said gently, “you can’t resist me.”

“That is a fact.” He rubbed his nose against mine once. “You’ve always been addicting.”

“That doesn’t sound good.”

“I keep needing a bigger hit. I never want to let you go. And when I’m without you, I go through withdrawals.”

“When you put it that way, it doesn’t sound so bad.”

He sighed and finally pulled back. “Except that I’m still in San Francisco and you’re still here.”

“When do you go back?” I hated the question as soon as it left my mouth.

“Tomorrow.”

I flinched.

It was the obvious answer. Of course he had to go home tomorrow. He had a job and a life in San Francisco. And I had a job and a life here.

Cole headed to the bathroom. I used Josie’s to clean up and change into sweats. Then I put in an order for Thai. I already knew Cole’s order. We used to order Thai every Friday night for almost a year while we’d dated in college. The memory panged the way it always did when I thought about him and the impossibility of us.

Cole appeared a few minutes later, back in his clothes. He dropped onto the couch next to me, slinging an arm around my shoulders and bringing me in close.

“I have an idea,” I said. “What if you didn’t go back?”

He chuckled softly and kissed my hair. “I have to.”

“I know,” I said with a resigned sigh. Then, another thought hit me. “Okay, what about … what about if I went to PT school there?”

Cole pulled back to look at me. His face a mask of skepticism. “You’d do that?”

I bit my lip and nodded. “I mean, I could apply. I’m applying right now to all the Georgia schools. My number one has been Emory, but UC-San Francisco has a good PT program.”

His face was completely blank. I had no idea what he was thinking.

“Say something,” I begged.

“You’d move to San Francisco for me?”

“I don’t know,” I said, suddenly unsure if I’d overstepped. “I just … I don’t have to go to PT school here.”

“That would be amazing,” he finally said.

I broke into a smile. “Yeah?”

“Yes. Absolutely. I want nothing more than for you to come to San Francisco.”

I swallowed back the rise of emotions. This was what I wanted too. So bad.

“Well, I still have to get in.”

“I have every faith in you.”

He kissed the top of my head and let the subject drop as our food arrived. It wasn’t a guarantee that we’d work out, but it was a kernel of hope. A kernel that I hadn’t had in a long time. I held on to it for dear life, and the next day, I set to work on the PT applications I’d been ignoring since graduation.

22

Savannah

April 8, 2012

My mom liked for all of us girls to come home for Easter Sunday. Even though none of us had been raised Catholic and I was the only one who had gone to a Catholic private school, she insisted on mass for Easter.

So, I’d driven down to Savannah for the weekend. I sat with Mom as we went through the pile of PT school acceptance letters. I’d gotten in everywhere, except my two biggest reach schools. I could go to Emory and stay in Atlanta. I’d still get to cheer for the Falcons on the weekends and only be four hours from my mom. Or go to the University of California, San Francisco and try something new. Move a thousand miles away to a place I’d never even been, let alone lived. All for the hope that things with Cole would work out again. Maybe I could even audition for 49ers cheer. Anything was possible right now. I hadn’t felt this light in ages.

My mom was excited that I’d gotten my spark back. I’d been floundering for too long, and I felt more like me again. I had to make my final decision.

“You remember that girl that you went to school with, Amanda Rochester?” my mom asked as mass finally finished and we rose to our feet to stretch.