CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

I've always wondered how trees know to shed their leaves without being told to do so. Time after time, they undergo such a significant transformation without complaint, moving through the seasons, unafraid of change.

They don't cry. They don't mourn their loss. Instead, they wait patiently through the long, harsh winter for the sun to come back and make everything okay again. It was a kind of resilience that I wish I knew.

Julian and I were doomed from the start; that much was inevitable. And as easy it is for me to let him shoulder all the blame, my hands were far from clean.

It takes a crooked kind of person to accept a crooked kind of love. But even with all the crookedness, things weren't always so malicious between us.

It was hard to stomach. The thought of April making its return again next year, marking the end of yet another frost. Everything would be the same on the outside—thick air, gray skies, wet grass.

While on the inside, it couldn't be more different. I won't be warm beneath Julian's cotton sheets, my head on his chest, rain pattering on the windows.

I could still hear it, even now. The sound of his heartbeat in my ear. The rhythm of his breaths beneath me.

"What are you thinking about?" Using the palm of his thumb, Julian traced the creases forming between my brows.

At the time, there was a lot to think about. I never would've imagined that in the final months of my high school career there would be so many questions needing answers.

"Everything." I said stiffly, staring at the television, watching as the picture changed shapes but not focusing on what was actually going on.

"What's wrong?"

I didn't say anything at first. I was lucky enough to have a place where I could go to get away from all of my problems.

It was the perfect hiding place; no matter how hard they looked, they couldn't find me. So by bringing them here now, I would taint the only sanctuary I've ever known.

"It's okay, you can tell me." His hand moved from my face and into my hair.

And I knew that he meant it. Which only blurred the lines of our situation even further.

His bedroom was coated in just enough light for me to search for my jacket amongst our other articles of clothing scattered across the floor.

I pulled out a wrinkled piece of paper from the pocket, lines creasing the once smooth surface from all the times I had folded and unfolded it, and handed it over to him.

Julian's eyes studied the words on the page for what felt like the longest minute of my existence.

"Wow, congratulations." He finally said.

"It's not anything crazy." I've never liked the way that felicitations felt. "It's a community college a few hours from here."

The countdown has been menacingly looming over me this entire year, reminding me that my days were numbered. Until now, I could pretend that it was happening to someone else instead of myself.

But as the acceptance letters appeared, it got harder to keep up the delusions. It wasn't happening to someone else; it was me who would leave the only place I've ever known in a few months time.

"Wait, I'm confused." Julian folded the paper back onto one of its many creases. "Isn't this a good thing?"

"Wasn't your whole plan to get out of here as soon as possible?"

He was right. I've always felt like a prisoner in this town, waiting eagerly for my sentence to be over. So why now of all times, when I was so close to the end, did it all feel wrong?

Life has a very sick sense of humor. It was finally giving me what I've always asked for, but with an ultimatum. I could leave, but I couldn't take Julian with me.

"It's supposed to be." I sighed. "But what if I don't know what I'm supposed to do with my life?"

He laughed, pulling me back onto his chest. "You've got time to figure it out." He reassured me. "Isn't that the whole reason people go to college in the first place?"

I thought I knew what the future meant—go to college, get a career, and contribute to society. But now I was second-guessing all of that; maybe it was so much simpler, like rainy nights spent listening to the melody of someone's heart.

"I don't know; I feel like everyone else has some sort of idea about what they want to do."

It was irrational. To think the way I was thinking. To plan my life around someone who, when imagining the future, didn't see me.

"You'll figure it out. I know you will." He pressed his lips gently against the skin on my forehead.

I know that when August comes and my expiration date arrives, I'll do exactly what I am supposed to do. And I'll leave my heart behind in this tiny room, wishing he would've asked me to stay.

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