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Another call. Another text:Carter, please. I didn’t mean for you to see it like that. Please let me explain.
Nothing. No answer. No message.
No hope.
He’s gone. And he’s not coming back.
I sink down onto the bed, the tears spilling over now, unstoppable.
Because I didn’t just lose a story. I lost the man I love.
And this time, it’s my fault.
***
I pack my belongings and catch the first flight home.
Ness is waiting for me outside the airport when I arrive, standing by the curb like she’s been glued there for hours. She’s holding an ice cream cone in one hand, her other arm stretched wide like she already knows exactly how bad this is going to be.
I talked to her the whole time I was at the airport. I called her before I even finished zipping my suitcase, rambling, crying, barely breathing. She stayed on the line until the moment the plane took off, promising she’d be right there when I landed.
And she is.
I pout as I walk toward her, sticking my bottom lip out like a child needing comfort. The second I’m close enough, she tosses the melting ice cream into the trash and pulls me into her arms.
“Why would you throw away perfectly good ice cream?” I say, burying my face against her shoulder, and let the tears come.
Hot. Messy. Ugly.
“It’s okay,” she murmurs, rubbing my back. “You’re okay, babe. Just breathe.”
I shake my head against her. “I’m not okay. I don’t know if I ever will be again.”
She holds me there for a long minute, letting me cry it out in the sticky afternoon heat, before finally pulling back just enough to look at me.
“Come on,” she says gently. “Let’s get you out of here.”
She steers me toward her car like she’s built for this exact kind of rescue. Well, I can admit it’s not her first. We’ve had each other’s backs through multiple heartbreaks, but this one, it’s different for me.
The moment we climb in, she shoves a bottle of water into my hands and cranks the AC.
“You wanna talk about it, or you want me to just drive and let you ugly cry in peace for a while?”
A broken laugh slips out of me, watery and cracked. “Can we get some more ice cream?” I manage to say.
“Of course, honey. I scream, you scream, we all scream for Carter. I mean… ice scream,” she says, trying to lighten the mood.
We stop by a drive-through. “Can I have two cones, triple scoops each, please?” I say yell through the passenger window. “She will have one triple scoop ice cream cone, please,” Ness corrects after ordering a shake for herself.
I glare at her. “You’ll thank me later,” she says with a knowing look.
I love ice cream, and ice cream loves me, but like with many dairy products, we don’t always go together. We both have a sensitivity for the damn thing, but can’t help but treat ourselves to ice cream whenever we’re in distress. It’s crazy, really. It’s like we shift the discomfort from our hearts to our stomachs so we can spend more time in the bathroom crying.
She’s looking at me, waiting for me to open up about everything going on.
“I don’t even know where to start.”
Ness nods like she understands.