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Chapter 5

The dawn of Monday morning brought with it a fresh breath of relief. Revisiting the past had been exhausting. After that drama-filled weekend, I could finally go back to my normal life, my real life – the life that was separate from the group, separate from the past that reared its ugly head whenever we were forced into contact with each other.

My class wasn't until two in the afternoon, so I spent the morning sitting around in a relaxed, almost zombie-like trance. It was foggy outside and I wasn't looking forward to having to step out into the cold later on. I had turned up the heat to its maximum setting, so that my room was nice and toasty. I was curled up on my chair, sporadically clicking around on my laptop just to pass time.

I didn't check Facebook often, but today I found myself typing the link into the address bar of my browser. After replying to some messages and scrolling through my newsfeed half-heartedly, I found my mouse hovering over the search bar at the top of the page.

I watched the clock change from 10:13 to 10:14, and then to 10:15, before I finally put my hands to the keyboard and typed – Nik Eisenberg. Twelve results popped up, but there was only one Nik Eisenberg I had fifty-seven mutual friends with. Nik's face grinned out at me from the thumbnail of his profile picture. Funny how just that one, out of twelve different people with the same name, had the ability to send my heart into a tailspin.

I jabbed at the mouse button with a trembling finger.

As his profile page loaded, I saw that he had several unanswered messages on his wall. It didn't look like he had been online since his return a few days ago. The names were all unfamiliar – and to be honest, a little exotic-sounding. Most of them were asking when he would be returning to Asia next. I scrolled down the page, watching as photographs of him appeared – him standing with the skyline of a beautiful modern city in the backdrop; him laughing into the camera with an international cast of friends; him in all sorts of places, doing all sorts of things with all sorts of people.

Places I had never been to, things I had never done and people whom I didn't know.

I lost track of time as I scrolled down and down the never-ending page of pictures and messages on his Wall. Finally, at what felt like the millionth photograph of him looking like he was having the time of his life, I closed the tab with a decisive click. Then I sat back in my chair, feeling inexplicably annoyed.

It made me feel petty, begrudging Nik the happiness he had gotten out of his experiences abroad, but seeing those photographs of him had only brought home how much the paths of our lives had diverged since he had left. He had changed more – he had seen the world and discovered who he was and what he wanted out of life in the process. Whereas I... What had I done in these past four years? Sure, I had moved on with my life too, but all I had to show for it was my comfortable clique of university friends and a half-written thesis. I didn't even know if the career path my degree led to was what I really wanted to do for the rest of my life.

What, exactly, was I doing with my life?

A buzzing noise dragged me out of my downward spiral into self-pity. For one crazy moment I panicked that it was Nik calling, until I caught sight of the name emblazoned across the screen and forcibly calmed my thudding heart.

Valentina – one of my friends from uni. Not Nik. It could never be Nik, I reminded myself.

"Hey," I said into the phone, not bothering with the usual niceties. I had met Valentina in the second week of our first year, at a get-together for freshmen organised by the department as part of orientation. We'd chatted a little awkwardly, and that would've been the end of it, if we hadn't shared three of the same classes afterward. We had sat together in all three and then gone for lunch together that week. And everything that came after was, as they say, history.

"Tamy!" Valentina's perky voice filtered through the earpiece, "Where are you? I'm done with class!"

This was Valentina-code for a lunch invitation. Since our schedules for the semester were almost entirely different, we usually met for lunch together at the school cafeteria on Mondays, before my class and after hers. I would usually be waiting at the cafeteria by now, but I had gotten distracted today.

"Is it noon already?" I jumped out of my chair. "Crap. I'm going to be a bit late, sorry."

Valentina laughed, her voice light and airy. "No problem, take your time. I'll get us some seats."

"I'll be there in eight minutes," I promised.

She laughed again. "You and your exact estimated times," she said, before hanging up.

By the time I made it to the cafeteria, Valentina had already managed to find a seat tucked away in a corner. She had been lucky – the cafeteria was crowded with students and even the queues extended out of the food-collection area past the staircase leading towards the exits. Valentina leapt up when I approached, giving me a greeting hug. Pulling back, she grinned at me. "I feel like I haven't seen you in forever!"

Her grin was contagious. I found myself smiling back as I sat down at the table. "We met up just last week."

She made a noise of displeasure. "A week is a long time." Then she propped her chin up on one hand and stared at me with narrowed eyes. "You look terrible. What happened?"

"Let's get some food," I said, evading the question much too obviously. I jumped up and I made my way towards the food-collection area.

Valentina joined me in the queue. She was quiet for a moment before she chirped, "So, in class today..."

I should've felt relief at her tact. She obviously wasn't going to pry into what she saw as my private life. But maybe, it dawned on me quite suddenly, I wanted someone to pry. I needed someone to bully the story out of me.

Because bottling it up was slowly killing me inside.

The line, although long, moved along quickly. By the time we reached the metal rack where the plates of food were being placed almost as soon as they were being taken, I had made up my mind.

"Should I get the Schnitzel?" Valentina pondered aloud.

I grabbed the plate of meatloaf closest to me and announced, "I saw my ex over the weekend."

Valentina turned and stared at me.

The guy behind us, getting impatient, said loudly, "Hello? Are you done?"

Valentina snagged the plate with the Schnitzel, placed it on her tray together with a can of Cola, and scurried over to the cashier area. Then she looked back at me and said, "Okay. So what happened?"

"I..." Now that I had broached the subject, I was at a loss for where to begin. Nik and I – and not to mention the rest – went so far back that I couldn't talk about him without bringing up my entire life story.

I hadn't confided in Valentina about my break up with Nik at the time it had happened. It had been nine months into our freshman year and we hadn't been that close then. She had known that I had been going through a bad break up, but she hadn't pried and I hadn't offered details. By the time our friendship had solidified, I had been determined to forget everything associated with Nik and the others who had taken his side over mine. And so the topic had never come up.

Until now.

Over lunch, I found myself giving Valentina the briefest rundown of events – all the way from high school up to the recent outing on Sunday. I included only the most important details – the real reason Nik and I had broken up, the others' assumptions about what had happened, and how the buried past was rising back to the surface now that Nik was back.

It was only when I was done talking that I saw that Valentina had long since forgotten about her food and was regarding me with a fascinated look, akin to the expression on one watching their favourite soap opera.

"Wow," she said after a pause. Her fork hung limply from her fingers as she continued to stare at me. "That's just... wow. I never would've guessed that you led such an interesting life."

"Hey!" I exclaimed.

She laughed. "Okay, okay. Seriously, though, I can't believe all of that happened. No offence, but those friends of yours suck."

"Except Ansel," I reminded her.

She nodded. "Except Ansel. Damn, that boy is fine." She had met him once and he had apparently made quite the impression on her.

I made a face. Valentina grinned at my expression. "Okay, okay. Now's not the time to moon over Ansel. Tell me about this... Nik." She said the name with the slight grimace of someone trying out the feel of a name for the first time – clumsy and unfamiliar.

"Right," I replied. "Nik." In contrast, his name rolled off my tongue like I had never stopped saying it. I didn't have to try out the name, not even after more than three years of never speaking it out loud. It was as if my mouth still remembered the taste of his name.

Valentina cocked her head when I didn't say anything more. "So..." she prompted.

"I don't know what to say," I said honestly. How did you begin to describe someone so much a part of your life – your self – that you couldn't even clearly remember what life had been before them? How did you begin to describe someone who had been best friend first, before he had been your boyfriend, and now simply... wasn't? After several false starts, I clamped my mouth shut and frowned down at my plate.

"Well, from what you've told me so far," Valentina said, "he sounds like a total jerk. But I'm going to have to see a photo before I pass further judgement."

It was my turn to laugh.

"Just look him up," I said. "He's on Facebook."

Valentina gesticulated wildly. "Show me now!" When I reluctantly took out my phone and started up the app, she asked, "Are you still friends with him on Facebook?"

"No. I deleted him after... after everything." I looked up to see Valentina nod knowingly.

"I know what you mean," she said, "I would've done the same."

I typed in his name and, not wanting to look at his profile again, handed my phone over to Valentina without looking at the screen.

She swiped silently at the screen for a long time, scrolling through what I imagined must have been the information I had seen just this morning. His photographs, his friends' messages. His life in another world.

Then she blew out a long breath and said, "I don't see what's so special about him." She scrunched her face up as she handed the phone back. "Okay, fine," she relented, "he's kinda good-looking... if you're into the smirky, blue-eyed type. But you could definitely do better."

I blinked. This was such the opposite of what Wolf, Nadine and Lux had been insinuating all weekend that I was momentarily stunned into silence.

"You don't even know him," I pointed out when I eventually found my tongue.

"But I know you," Valentina said, her voice fierce all of a sudden, "and I know what you told me he did. You don't deserve that. He doesn't deserve you."

"It takes two hands to clap," I said, looking down at my hands, which were tightly folded in my lap. "Nothing in a relationship is just one person's fault. I was too clingy, too demanding..."

"You did what any girl would've done when her boyfriend suddenly pulls away without a reason," Valentina argued stoutly. "He had a choice – he chose to leave. And he chose to screw everything up. It wasn't your fault. It's all his. Nothing could have justified him doing that to you."

"I don't think him staying would have changed anything," I said, finally admitting the truth to myself. I was speaking very softly, so softly I wasn't sure if Valentina could even hear me. But had I pitched my words any louder, she would have been able to hear the crack in my voice.

Judging from the concerned expression on her face, she might have heard it anyway.

I cleared my throat and lowered my head to poke at my meatloaf. I loved meatloaf, but this one tasted like rubber in my mouth.

Suddenly, I was blinking very hard, trying to force the rising lump back down my throat. I didn't dare look at Valentina.

She, for her part, was silent. I didn't know what she was doing, but I couldn't hear any noises coming from her side of the table. All around us, voices rose and fell amid the clinking of cutlery against plates as we both sat there silently, as if in the eye of a storm.

"Do you still–" Valentina began, only to cut herself off. We both knew what the answer to that question was.

"Is there still a chance?" she altered her question to ask instead. "That things may work out between the two of you?"

"No," I said, but then my voice dipped into a more honest whisper, "I don't know."

"Well," said Valentina briskly, trying to lighten the mood, "on the bright side, you'll always have Ansel to fall back on."

I finally looked up at her. Her eyebrows were drawn together in direct contrast to the smile on her lips.

I made a smacking gesture in the air, like I was trying to hit the idea away before it had even fully formed. "Don't be silly. Ansel and I are just friends."

"But you could be more," she said mournfully. "You know, I think you guys would make a great couple. He was there for you when you most needed it, right?"

I cast my gaze away. "Yeah," I admitted, "but just as a friend. Nothing could ever happen between us."

"Why?" Valentina pressed. "Is he gay?"

I burst out laughing. I would have to tell him about this later.

The conversation turned to lighter topics after that. Valentina was determined to cheer me up, which worked very well because I was equally determined to be cheered up. But if anyone asked me afterwards what we had talked about, I wouldn't have been able to give a concise answer. For the rest of lunch, my body was functioning on auto-pilot.

In class, I sat with my usual group of friends – two of the other girls, apart from Valentina, who made up our little clique. The group presenting in class today consisted of two guys who were known for turning everything into a joke, and their presentation on pedagogy had most of the class laughing outright at their antics. Even the professor, a stern older man, cracked a smile or two.

After class had ended and I had bidden farewell to my friends, I found myself wandering in the direction of Palace Square. The sky was already darkening, even though it was only five in the afternoon, but the thought of returning to my room made me feel almost claustrophobic. I didn't know what I was trying to accomplish by revisiting the one place guaranteed to remind me of Nik and everything I didn't want to be reminded of just then, but I found my feet bringing me towards the middle of the Square out of sheer habit. Back then, before everything had fallen apart, this had been my special place. I used to come here to think. Or, depending on my mood, to stop myself from doing just that. I had found that sitting in the park in the middle of the bustling city was a good way to calm myself down. It made me feel like I was a part of the crowd – but at the same time, not quite. It was the perfect way to feel both detached and included simultaneously, enough to stop myself from over-thinking.

I hadn't come back, alone, to this spot since Nik had left. Of course, I thought sarcastically, it had taken his return to drive me back to old habits.

Once there, however, I was faced with a startling sight. Sitting hunched over on the bench, staring blankly into space, was Ansel.

Right. I had forgotten – this was his thinking spot too.

"Hey," I said, my voice higher than usual from the surprise of meeting him here out of the blue. "What are you doing here?"

He looked up at me. "Just thinking," he said slowly.

I sat down beside him on the bench. He didn't say anything, just leaned forward to rest his forearms on his thighs and heaved a loud sigh. I watched him rub at his face tiredly with both hands for a moment, before I moved to bump my shoulder against his.

"Work?" I probed. Ansel had been working overtime on a particularly tricky case lately, one under a lot of media scrutiny. He had been working overtime to make sure he didn't screw up the first big case he'd been handed, but, judging from his reaction, it wasn't going well.

"I want to quit," he said in a low voice.

"No, you don't," I replied confidently. "This – becoming a lawyer – it's your dream."

"I screwed up today." He stared broodingly into space. "I messed up. The hearing is in two weeks. I don't know how I could've made a mistake like that." He sighed again. "Maybe I'm not cut out for this."

"So you made a mistake. Everyone makes mistakes. Now you have to work your ass off and make things right again," I stated matter-of-factly.

"Sometimes it's not that easy," he said, a growl of frustration leaking through in his voice. I could feel myself getting a little irritated. Just because I wasn't yet a part of working society, didn't mean I thought working full-time was all sunshine and rainbows. I was fast getting sick of the patronisation I got from some of my friends who had already started working. But that was a rant for another time. Ansel didn't need this right now.

"I know," I said. My smooth agreement had surprised him, I could tell. "Life is hard. Working sucks. Sometimes you just don't want to care anymore. I get it."

He was silent.

"You know me," I said, quietly now. "You know how I hate those trite motivational quotes. Like – sometimes I just want to sit and feel sorry for myself. What do you mean, 'it's not how things are, it's how you see them'? Sometimes things just plain suck."

That got a chuckle out of him. Then he turned pensive, "I don't know. Sometimes I feel like... why am I doing this? I can't even get some fucking reports right." He stopped then, biting back the words already on his tongue, his pride keeping him from voicing the rest of his crippling self-doubt.

"You know, I don't even know what I want to do for the rest of my life," I admitted. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him look up. I had never told him this before. "But you've known all along that you wanted to be a lawyer. And now you are on your way to becoming one. Two more years of practical training, and then one last exam... and you'd be living your dream." I reached over and grabbed his hand. "Remember those crazy years of uni? All those laws and case studies to memorise, and that essay you had to write in less than half a night. And slogging through the academic exam? You made it through all of that. You've already come so far. So you have two weeks to find a solution. So what? You'll figure it out. I know you can do it."

His fingers curled around mine slowly. "You're right," he said. I looked over and saw that a smile of reminiscence had graced his lips. "Damn, that essay." He laughed. "That was so stupid. I can't believe I forgot all about there being a final essay until three hours before it was due. I honestly thought I was going to fail that class. That essay was worth sixty percent of the grade."

"I can't believe you still got an A on it," I said, rolling my eyes. The guy was a bloody genius.

Ansel smiled.

"You've come so far, Ansel," I murmured. "I can't believe you're almost a lawyer now, for goodness' sake."

"Yeah," he repeated, just as softly. "I'm almost a lawyer now."

"You're going to make a brilliant one."

He snorted. "We'll see about that."

"Good," I said, "Now quit feeling sorry for yourself and go do something to fix your problem."

He laughed. Across our linked hands, I felt him give mine a quick squeeze. "You are brilliant, Tamy," he said, looking me straight in the eye for the first time tonight. "You'd make a great teacher, if you do decide to go down that path."

I just chuckled, pushing at him playfully. "Go do something about your problem."

"Aye aye, ma'am," he mock-saluted me and got to his feet. He stood there for a moment, shaking his head as if shaking off any disheartening thoughts that might have remained. "Thanks. I needed that."

I smiled back. "What are friends for?"

He took a couple of steps away, before swinging back like he had only then remembered something. "Are you going to be all right here alone?"

I rolled my eyes. "It's barely seven. I'll be fine."

"It's already dark out," he argued.

I made a noise that suggested it didn't matter. "It's not my first time alone out late," I pointed out. "I'm not a child."

"Come on. I'll walk you to the station, at least."

"You have work to do," I reminded him. "Besides, the station is right there! It's barely a minute away."

"Well then, a minute isn't going to set me back by a lot," he raised his eyebrows.

Sighing exaggeratedly, I got up to let him walk me to the station, just so he would shut up about it.

As we set off in the direction of the lit-up sign, Valentina's words came back to me. "You know," I mused, "you'd make a really good boyfriend."

"You're not getting any ideas, are you?" Ansel responded wryly.

I flashed him a cheeky grin. "Why? Afraid you can't resist my seduction techniques if I put my mind to it?"

He laughed. He knew I was joking.

We fell back into a comfortable silence for a while. I was listening to the thud of our footsteps against the ground. I knew Ansel always walked slower than he normally did when he was with me, so that I could keep pace with him.

"What are you going to do about Nik?" Ansel asked, out of the blue.

"Nothing," I shrugged. "What's there to do?"

He shot me a little sideways glance that told me I wasn't fooling him in the slightest.

I looked away with a grimace. And then plastered a smile on my face as we came to a stop by the escalators leading down to the underground station. "See?" I dragged out the word exaggeratedly, "It was one minute away."

Ansel shook his head, snorting to show what he thought of my statement. I reached out and shoved at him lightly. "Okay, bye now."

"Ungrateful wench," he muttered, but he was smiling. "Bye."

I rolled my eyes and stepped onto the escalator, knowing that he wasn't going to leave until I was out of sight.

He was a good guy, Ansel was.

And what a hypocrite I was, giving him advice with all the confidence of someone who had it all figured out... when that couldn't have been any further from the truth. Ansel had it more figured out than I did – he was working his dream job, living in a cool apartment in one of the most sought-after districts in the city... His life was in place. What was I doing?

People liked to talk about how your twenties were supposed to be the best time of your life. You were just starting out in the world – finding out who you were, establishing a career, meeting the perfect someone you wanted to spend the rest of your life with... But they never talked about how terrifying it all was. About how there was always this crippling fear lurking at the back of your mind, questioning your every decision – was this really what you wanted? What if you were making all the wrong choices? What if, twenty years down the road, you looked back and thought to yourself, 'I should have done everything differently'?

Frustrated with the familiar path my mind was headed down, I heaved a loud sigh and leaned my head back against the seat. The young woman sitting diagonally opposite me flicked me an odd look. Lowering my head, I bit my lip and forced myself to settle down for the rest of the commute.

By the time I stumbled into my dorm building, I was cold and utterly sick of the company of my own thoughts. A quick shower, I told myself, and then bed. I refused to do any more thinking today. I could figure out my life some other day.

I took my time going up the stairs, feeling more lethargic with every step. At the landing, I turned down the corridor to my room, automatically reaching for my keys as I always did. I looked up just as I neared the door – and froze in my tracks. There was a dark figure standing at my door, hand stretched out but not quite knocking yet, head bent like he was thinking something over. He turned at the sound of my footsteps, and I felt all the air knocked out of my lungs at the sight of that familiar face that had been haunting me all day.

Nik's blue eyes flicked over me, scanning me from head to toe like he was taking inventory, making sure all of me was here. Then he smiled, and my heart started beating again.

"Hi," he murmured.

***

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