Page 87 of All at Once

I pick up my dress, my shoes, and I run as fast as I’veeverran in my entire life.

Luca’s voice echoes from behind me. “Jasmine! Hold on!”

I run even faster.

“Wait,” he pants.

I wouldn’t have exactly stopped, but there’s nowhere else to go now that we’re just a few feet away from his car. I put on my dress, still enraged, with my back still facing him.

I hear him exhale deeply, before he says, “You don’t need to do something that makes you that uncomfortable just to prove something even to yourself.”

Okay. That’s it. I don’t want to hearit anymore.

I turn back around with an anger that’s fully consumed me. “Can you please stop? Just pleasestop.” He takes a step back as if I’ve pushed him. “Stop trying to make me feel better about everything.”

Luca runs a hand over his face in frustration. “I just didn’t want you to feel bad for not doing something that’s sostupid.”

“You didn’t want me to feel bad?!” I laugh sardonically.

I shake my head through my glaring eyes, making sure I say this slowly.

“Do you know how alienating it feels to not be able to do things that come so naturally to people your age? To feel so terrible watching things happen for everyone around you, while you just sit and watch no matter how fucking hard you’re trying to be like them?”

A tear falls down my cheek. “I trusted you. I told you the most personal thing about myself. I know I didn’t need to. But you didn’t need to use it against me.” I lift up my shoulders. “And now what? You’re trying to suddenly help me feelbetterabout myself?”

He’s frozen. His eyes, his expression, his body. It doesn’t even look like he’s blinked. It’s like he knows I’m still not finished yet.

I know I’ll regret this as soon as I say it. But I’m way past being livid.

“At least Enrique doesn’tpretendto care about me.”

I watch Luca’s jaw clench but don’t stick around to see any other kind of reaction. I immediately turn around and walk toward his car.

I’m not about to take an Uber in the middle of the night by myself no matter how upset I am.

_________

The car ride back feels ominous. As if we’ve drifted so far away from each other that we’re no longer even on the same planet. Our breathing is the only sound that fills the silence. I hold in the rest of my tears as I stare out the window at the sparkling stars, wishing that’s how far I could actually run away to.

When we finally make it to our floor, I rush to open my door without even a backward glance at Luca.

The only person I want to talk to is my mom, reaching for my phone to dial her number with my increasingly shaky hands.There’s no response. My fingers rest over my dad’s number, remembering how he told me not to call him if anything went wrong on this trip.I still call. One ring. Two rings.Fiverings.Nothing.

As the call goes to voicemail, my phone starts buzzing.

“Dad?”

“Jasmine?” my father answers, his voice skeptical. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah, is mom with you?” I ask cautiously.

“No, she went to pick up some food.” I hear him clear his throat. “Something happened, didn’t it? The way Itoldyou it would,” he doesn’t even hesitate.

“No, I’m fine,” I quickly reply. “I just wanted to say,” I make sure my voice doesn’t crack, “hi.” I end the call shortly after, before he has the chance to make me feel worse than I already do.

The second I forgot why I was never as adventurous as I hoped to be in my early twenties, I’m reminded of exactly why this decade has played out this way. Because when I make a decision where something remotely goes wrong, I’m made to feel that I should have seen it allcoming.

I don’t bother taking off my makeup. Or changing my clothes. I just slump onto the bed as my back shakes, releasing the flood of tears I’ve been holding in. Not just from tonight. But also the onesI’ve held in for years. Making up for past disappointments I never allowed myself to mourn for. The pieces of myself I won’t ever get back.

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