|CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR|

Waking up from a daydream and walking into reality was something I felt in all the angles of my body and within the deepest parts of my mind. One moment I was riding the highest waves of tangible bliss, the next I was lying curled up in my bed with Luis purring on my chest and my limbs asleep and unwilling.

There was an emptiness, a space I had cut out specifically for Bash, that I had no experience fixing. I wanted him back, I craved the security of having him close, but everything I knew about love and life told me that it was over, that I had ended it, and that I needed to move forward. I had big plans for myself, and my summer distraction turned first real love was not an excuse to lose focus.

I had to repeat these things to myself over and over again to numb the sadness that lingered at the edge of all of my thoughts.

He is not an excuse.

Perhaps I was too young to understand the idea of sacrifice in a love like ours. Perhaps I was too wrapped up in the plans I had made for myself before Bash. I had my life figured out in bullet points and to-do lists. That's how I had grown up. And, when you're about to become independent—when you're about to do life all by yourself, people like me don't take risks.

People like me hold their heads high, smile through the pain, and cast what has been done over our shoulders to try and forget. We build armor and we go off to war.

I packed the things Bash gave me into a box: the hair elastic off his wrist, a stack of books the library was going to get rid of, a Leonard Cohen cassette he insisted I needed in my life, bits of half-written poetry he'd write while I studied, developed photos, and the sticky note that started it all among other things. I packed those things up and pushed it to the back of my closet. Just having them out of sight helped me pull myself back together—something Quinn was watching me struggle with.

"You know," she said the day before graduation as she painted my fingernails a deep blue to match our gowns. "He would take you back in a heartbeat."

"He told me to leave," I replied in a monotone voice while waving a freshly polished set of nails. "And rightfully so. I was so stupid going to his house and thinking we could have a conversation that would end in closure. But, no. Most of it was yelling and crying. Sloppy and unfinished. And I just feel awful about it all the time." I frowned deeply and took the nail polish from her. "I keep myself up at night cringing over the whole thing. I don't think I can ever look him in the eye, again."

Quinn's eyes were soft and sympathetic as she watched me ramble.

"He did something to you," she commented thoughtfully. "Something good. You're different now."

My brow furrowed. "I know. It makes everything harder."

She watched as I painted her nails for a moment and then took a breath. "Don't close back up, again—like before. Don't push people away like you used to."

I kind of smiled at that and looked her in the eye. "After what I did to Meredith? I have to lead by example, Quinn." I laughed softly. "I'm just prioritizing. Let me get settled in my new life outside of Ashwood Creek and I'll start experimenting, again. Who knows." I shrugged.

Quinn snorted. "So full of plans and expectations. You can't let your life fall apart when something doesn't happen the way you're anticipating."

"I know."

"Do you?"

I sighed heavily as I closed the nail polish bottle, using it as an excuse not to look at her.

"There's always Bash," I finally said. "I didn't plan on him and he ended up being everything I didn't know I wanted. So, if something in my life isn't going according to plan, I'll just think of Bash. Accidents, unexpected opportunities, detours...all of those things can be magic, too."

Quinn considered me for a moment, trying to find something genuine and honest in what I had said. And then, wet nails and all, she stretched across the table to hug me. She rarely smiled at me the way she was smiling now. It had never been a big deal before, but there was something satisfying about making her proud. She had always been like a sister to me, but that day was when I realized just how important she was. And, for the first time in days, I felt my heart warm.

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"Who are you and what have you done to my Jo-Jo?"

Blushing, I shook my head and closed the gap between Henry and I in a short, tight hug, careful not to poke his eye out with my graduation cap. Meredith beamed at us, but straightened me out again after I let go of my father.

"You look lovely as well, Mer," Henry told her.

I glanced at her in her pearls and well-tailored dress with her hair curled smooth and her face etched in a perfect, seemingly permanent grin. Her cheeks warmed, much to my surprise, and I had to keep myself from gaping at her.

"I told you, it's Meredith or Miss Sinclair," she said a little stiffly after clearing her throat, eyes not meeting his.

Henry shook his head. "Oh, no, not today. Our daughter is graduating. Toss the formalities out the window, Mer, because this is a special occasion."

Meredith made several attempts at beginning a sentence and then gave up and smoothed down her skirt instead. "Fine."

I smiled at Henry, and he winked back.

There was something different about them since the whole blowup between Meredith and I. They were finally warming up to each other, or at least, Henry was trying again. And, Meredith, well, she wasn't protesting quite as hard. It was nice, sort of. All the tension that seemed to exist between them was fading, and I felt less uncomfortable standing between them. It felt like people weren't staring at us so much anymore. Being escorted into school like that was more than I could ever hope for. We felt like family.

The graduation ceremony was short and formal. Ashwood Creek isn't a big place, and they really know to organize efficient events that are frill-free. If it's going to cost people time, it's banned. If it's going to take away from the professionalism and formality of the ceremony, it's banned.

Some graduations have students cartwheeling towards their diploma or holding flash mobs.

Our school, inspired by my mother-mayor herself, rejected all of this.

In-and-out.

Name. Accomplishments. Diploma. The end.

So, when they announced us as official high school graduates, and our tassles were switched from right to left while the school song blared in the background, it felt quite sudden and a little bit surreal. Caps were tossed, the entire room exploded in applause, and suddenly I was lost in a sea of my peers with Quinn bouncing up and down across the gym towards me and a small weight lifted from my shoulders.

"We're done with high school, bitches!" Quinn cheered as she tackled me in an off-balanced hug while Zoey and Noel gathered around us, closing us in for a group hug.

I couldn't help it, I started laughing and bouncing along with them. Of the many steps in life that are deemed essential to success, I had ticked off one of the first, and I was absolutely flushed with excitement. And then, Quinn brought her lips to my ear and said the unthinkable.

"Bash is here."

My stomach dropped, and suddenly, I felt myself unable to move, unable to think.

Bash here? At my graduation? Attending the very ceremony that was the deadline for our relationship?

How?

I couldn't even think of facing him, much less catching a glimpse of him in the crowd. I felt embarrassed, foolish, immature, and completely heartbroken. He couldn't be here. If I felt awful, I couldn't imagine what he was going through.

Still, as the girls all let go of me, I looked up into the bleachers and scanned the families standing up and coming down to find their graduates. But, he wasn't there. It wasn't until I looked toward the corner, at the end of the bleachers near the door, that I found Bash standing in his work clothes, hair fastened in a tight bun, and hands in his pockets staring at me.

I held my breath when he met my eye, but the corners of his lips rose softly and he nodded at me.

"Go."

I looked back at Quinn and the girls who were all watching me with palpable interest.

I didn't say anything, just let my heart guide my feet to where Bash stood.

He watched calmly until I was standing in front of him, and then he motioned for me to follow him outside. Everything in my head was fuzzy, and I followed without question.

The cool breeze was a refreshing change of atmosphere since I'd been sweating in the muggy, overcrowded gymnasium for a little over two hours. And, that cool breeze was all I needed to wake up.

"Bash, I'm sorry," I said as quickly as the door shut behind us and before the smell of freshly mown grass could reach my nose. "I'm sorry that it ended that way."

Sighing, Bash held up a hand to stop me from going any further. His eyes were tired, not wide and sparkling like I had always known them to be.

"I just came to say congratulations and I hope that your life is everything you want it to be."

It's horrible the way people say some things some times. This was particularly awful because I could hear in his voice just how hard it was to say that to me. I would have done nearly anything in that moment to get his voice to be slow-melting chocolate again and for his eyes to shimmer mischievously and for his infamously aloof body language to return.

"You are the greatest person I've ever known," I told him, my voice shaking. "And I'm sorry I'm the way that I am. And, if I had met you in a different life there is no doubt in my mind that I would do anything to make forever a reality."

He smiled in a watery way that a person does when they want to cry. "No, don't be sorry. You have to do this, Jovie. I would hate for you to resent me in the future because I didn't allow you to grow independently as a person. People need that, I needed that. I get it. But, if I had met you in a different life I would have asked you to marry me, and it's thrilling to know that there is a possibility you would have said yes."

Relief is a wonderful thing, and I felt that when he told me that he understood—that I was, in a sense, forgiven. He made me want to experience our entire love story all over again.

I took his hands in mine and gazed up into his eyes with as much sincerity as I could muster. "Thank you for the adventure, Sebastian Daley the Third."

His face turned blotchy and he turned it away bashfully, as always, trying to convince me he wasn't blushing. But, after taking a deep breath, he was able to look at me, again.

"It has been a pleasure learning all of the things that make you unequivocally mesmeric. Thank you for giving me the opportunity."

And that's when I kissed him one final time. I felt the last of his papercut fingers sliding across my skin, and smelled the last of his amber cologne on his clothes, freedom and desire encircled us in one final embrace, and a craving I had gotten so familiar to satisfying received its final allowance. His lips on mine, they tasted like the last few moments of first love.

No other person in my life has ever recreated the things I experienced with my first love. No other person has loved me the way that Bash did, has given me the confidence to be whatever I wanted to be.

They say to stop talking about how my life changed after him.

I think there are many factors that contributed to my awakening, and he just happened to be my favorite part. Love, some say, can change the world. Whether it is romantic or otherwise, it spurs something in us, something special. It's the purest form of human compassion and understanding and commitment.

When our worlds are not in chaos, what could be better to stir up our simple lives than a whirlwind of love? It is more powerful than anything else, so much so that the phrase "swept off my feet" is too gentle.

He was not everything, but he was something. If anything, he was an indulgence that I still savor.