Prologue

September

Cara

“Hey babe,” I answer the phone but the deafening silence on the other end makes my skin break out in goosebumps.

“Cole?” I ask, setting my coffee mug on top of the counter.

“We need to talk,” he says, his voice barely a whisper and removed from feelings and tenderness. I’ve come to expect this call by now. The call that says we need to take some time apart or that I’m not paying enough attention to him while I’m away, but I thought we were done doing this. We talked all summer about our future and how close we were to settling down and hopefully moving in together. Talk to your boss and we’ll go from there, he said just a month ago—yet here we are again.

“I know we said we were going to push this further, Cara, but I think we just need to end it.”

“What do you mean we need to end this, Cole?” I ask him, annoyed and hurt. Every year he asks for a break. Some time off for him to explore without strings attached. Distance and time and blah blah blah. But this time he used the word end . You can’t just eliminate, erase, and finalize eleven years of love, trust, and friendship. Something that took years to build—and now he can just say he’s done?

“Exactly that, Cara. I’m ready to settle down and start a family. I’m done with the back and forth,” he says, yawning. Fucking yawning. Like he’s bored out of his mind having this conversation that is ripping out my heart and serving on a platter—with a knife through it. I get that I live far away, and the long distance is hard on everyone, but I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve told him I’m willing to move back to Baker. I pace in place, trying to make sense of this whole situation before I lose my temper. The last thing I need is for Cole to see how much this is affecting me. How much it always affects me.

“Okay, well, I can settle down. We’ve talked about this. I can move back to Baker Oaks, or you can move here. We can have a family. Together.” I choke on the sob I’ve been holding. I didn’t want him to hear me cry but goddamn it, how can I not? I thought I was beyond begging, but apparently, I’m not.

“No,” Cole snaps.

I wish I could see his face right now. It’s so hard to read his emotions and meaning without seeing him. Is he tensing up? Are his eyes roaming the room? Is he with someone else? Does he mean this for real? My heart is going to come out of my chest, beating so loudly that everything I’m hearing is muffled by the loud palpitations.

I hit the FaceTime button at the same moment he says, “You don’t understand, I’m done.” He, of course, won’t accept it. Coward. I’m stuck here, with my phone in my hand, with Cole’s voice on speaker as he delivers the death blow to the hope I’ve been holding on to. One that most people saw coming, but me. So fucking naive.

“No, Cole. You’re right. I don’t understand,” I reply, hoping that what I think is going on is actually not. He can’t be ending a decade-long relationship. For what? For marriage? Marriage with who? I’m down to get married. It’s all I’ve wanted from him, for longer than I care to admit to everyone but myself.

“I’m done with us, Cara.” How can someone be done with a decade of stories? A decade of shared memories and a decade of growing up together?

“If marriage is what you want, Cole, I can marry you. That’s not a big deal. God knows we’re old—” But I stop talking when I’m interrupted with the words that no one wants to ever hear. The words are not only hurtful but cruel.

“I don’t want to marry you, Cara. God! Why can’t you understand that? I was trying to let you down gently and let you go, but you can’t read between the lines, and I’m done. It was fun while it lasted, but darlin’, you are good for a short time—not for the long run.”

“Cole—” my voice a broken plea “—don’t do this.” I hate that I’m begging. I hate that he’s hurting me so much I can hardly breathe. I hate that I love him so damn much.

“It’s done. I never meant to hurt you, but I think it’s for the best that we do this now and we stop fighting the inevitable. Have a good life, Cara.”

The line goes silent, and my heart skips a beat. I scream loudly to the void of my apartment and start pacing back and forth, trying to stop this spiral. I deserve better than this. I deserve better than this. I deserve better than this , I repeat over and over as if saying it out loud will stop the pain. What do I do now? I can’t just sit here in this misery and anger. When you can’t do anything about it, get busy, Cara, my mom used to say so I do just that.

My mind plays his words on a loop while I deep clean the whole apartment. I don’t want to marry you . I scrub the bathroom for the second time on my hands and knees, cleaning until the squeaks from the Scrub Daddy invade Cole’s voice in my head. I think it’s for the best —while my tears mix with the water in the toilet bowl after scrubbing it three times until all I see are sparkles. I’m done with us— while I bleach the shower curtain, carefully so as not to touch the freaking toxins because the last thing I need is to also get sick from the damn fumes. Because at the end of the day, all those words mean the same: you’re not enough, Cara, and you were never enough.

“I’m home!” Allie shouts, walking into the condo after shutting the door loudly and scaring the bejesus out of me.

“In here!” I call from the bathroom, opening the sink’s faucet and splashing cold water on my face to try and hide my state. Today is Allie’s last day with me before her six-month assignment in Florida. I’m going to miss her, but I’m more worried about her. She’s been freaking out over going back to Florida and possibly running into her ex, Jake, who she hasn’t seen in ten years, but I know for a fact there’s no way she’ll see him.

Jake lives in Baker Oaks, my hometown, and although Allie wants nothing to do with the place, I visit every summer so I can see my parents. This is how I know that Jake barely leaves Baker at all and, knowing Allie, she won’t step foot close to Baker at all . I told her we needed one last hoorah tonight before she leaves. I wasn’t counting on being totally heartbroken and on the verge of a spiral, but here I am. I must put on a strong front for her and show her a good time. Help ease some of those nerves, regardless of what’s going on with me. I can wallow in my feelings tomorrow after she’s gone. Her life is so damn boring; maybe she’ll get some popcorn and eat it while I tell her how my whole life feels like a movie. Not a rom-com; more like a drama-rom.

“Hey, hey, hey, what’s wrong?” Allie asks as soon as she sees me. There goes my trying to hide it from her.

“Nah, nothing major. Same old, same old. Cole and I are on a break, again. This time may be forever, though. He said, and I quote, I don’t want to marry you.”

Allie flinches at the honesty of my words but then her face turns from concern to anger. “Cara, that man deserves none of your tears,” she says, bringing her hand to my face. “When are you going to kick him to the curb and give yourself a chance at something real?”

“Well, he already did that for me, didn’t he? And who knows—maybe it’s for the best?” I try to keep it light and change the subject immediately. “I still can’t believe you’re leaving me again. I feel like I just got you here.”

“Cara, let's talk about this. I’m worried about you.”

“Don’t, Allie. Really. I’m fine; everything is fine. Let’s talk about you, Miss Traveling-Again-Away-From-Me. I hate it here.”

“I know, I know. I’m requesting an area near here next so we can do this again. I love you,” she insists and pulls me in for a hug.

“Yeah, yeah, I love you too, bitch. Now let’s go get ready. The night is young, and we have places to be, things to drink, and…” I look at her and wiggle my eyebrows, encouraging her to finish my infamous phrase that she hates.

“And people to do.”

“Yeeeeees, queen! Let’s go!”

The night goes by in a flash. We dance and drink until oblivion. Allie is annoyed at me for keeping her out later than expected while I was trying to find something to make me feel like the ray of sunshine everyone thinks I am. The drinks, the dances, the people—none of it makes me feel anything. All I keep repeating in my head is If I wasn’t enough for the boy I gave everything to, am I even worth it? And as the hours go by, and man after man tries to touch me while dancing or sends me drinks with the expectation to take me home with them, the more I remember that maybe all that I will ever be good for is a fun time.