Page 121 of Better Than Gelato
My brain is working at half speed, but one thing is getting through to me:Jake doesn’t love me anymore. He doesn’t tell me he loves me because he doesn’t love me anymore.
Another tiny sigh. “Listen, let’s not do this tonight.”
My throat feels like it’s closed up. With effort, I push the words out. “It’s already done.”
“Juliet,” he says. “I care about you. It’s just too much. If you were here, it would be different. But…you chose not to come. I’d still like to be friends.”
It takes me a second to realize he’s waiting for some kind of response.What did he just say? He still wants to be friends?
I finally find my voice. “Yeah, no. That’s not going to work.”
“Juliet.” That tender voice again. The one that told me so many magical things. The one that is breaking my heart with each word. “I’ll call you tomorrow. What time do you wake up? I’ll call you first thing.”
“No, Jake.” My heart hurts so bad I can barely open my mouth. But I force myself to say the words. “Don’t call me tomorrow. Or the next day. This is done between us. So let’s be done.”
A pause. Then a tired, “Okay.”
I don’t say “goodbye” because it hurts too bad. Or “talk to you later” because I won’t. I simply hang up.
I take a breath. I take stock. I’m sitting in the grass on the other side of the parking lot from my apartment. Tears are flowing freely down my cheeks and my hands are shaking. Who knew the world could end on an ordinary Wednesday night?
I pick myself up and walk with trembling legs across the parking lot and up the stairs to my apartment. Petey and Pirate are watching a movie, but I angle my face away from them and make it to my bedroom undetected.
Maggie finds me there an hour later, curled up in the fetal position. My face and pillow are soaked with tears and snot.
“Juls, what happened?”
I shake my head. I can’t talk. I can’t say the words out loud.
“Are you okay?”
Another head shake. I’m not okay. I’m wrecked. I had no idea it would be like this. The physical pain in my chest. The feeling of complete annihilation.
She picks up my phone and punches in my password.
“You have three missed calls from Jake,” she says. I don’t respond.
She comes and sits on the bed next to me and strokes my hair.
“How bad is it?” she asks. “Do you think you can work it out?”
I shake my head again. It’s all I seem capable of doing. Everything in me feels numb.
“What happened?” she asks.
I squeeze my eyes tight and then say it. “He doesn’t love me anymore.”
“Hey, that’s not true,” Maggie says in a soothing voice. “Long distance is just hard.”
My shoulders crumble. “It is true,” I say. “He told me. He told me he doesn’t feel that way anymore.”
And then my body is heaving with sobs. My shoulders are shaking so hard I feel like I’ll shake apart. There will be nothing left of me but pieces.
Maggie rubs my back and says over and over, “I’m so sorry, Juls. I’m so so sorry.”
* * *
The sun rises the next morning, and I don’t even know why.
