SIX MONTHS LATER.

        I TUG ONTO the sleeves of my tan sweater; it was surprisingly cold for a February night. Or maybe I'd just gotten far too accustomed to the warmth of the California summer.

        The walk back to my dorm feels more like a mountain trek, especially with my backpack tacked against me like an extra fifteen-pound weight. My hair whips back and forth in the wind and I regret not bringing a ponytail holder to tie the long strands back. Still, I continue up the way until I can see the illuminated light coming from my dorm.

        I stop in my tracks. Marcus had gone home for the week. Did I leave the light on? Or had somebody broken in?

        I rush up the stairs until I'm outside in my hall, staring at door 342 with confused eyes. I unlock the door with my key, narrowing my eyes underneath the bright light of the room. There's a loud scream of 'happy birthday' and as my eyes adjust, I realize these weren't intruders. It was just my friends.

There were gifts strewn across my dorm as well as a banner with the words HAPPY BIRTHDAY BRAYLEN in sloppy blue paint. Hunter's handwriting, I was sure.

        "What the hell?" I screech out, eyes wide. Robyn rushes forward and pulls me into a hug, one that I am quick to return. She'd cut her hair down to her ears and dyed it, again. But her smile was exactly the same. "You guys!"

Devin claps his hands in amusement, pulling me into a hug just as easily as Robyn. "Happy birthday, man. Well, early birthday. A few more hours to go, yeah?" he says, squeezing me tightly. I hold him just as tightly back, breaking into a huge grin, one that quickly turns to disgust when he plants a wet, slobbery kiss against my cheek.

"Awww, Devin!" I groaned, wiping my face with my sleeve. He laughs loudly in my ear before reaching behind him and pulling up a large, rectangular gift wrapped in blue wrapping.

        "This is for you," he says. "It's not from me. I got you something else. But someone wanted you to have this."

        I open my mouth to ask for further details regarding my super cryptic birthday present, but then Hayley pulls me into an embrace and Hunter after her. By the time we've all finished saying hello, my cheeks are flushed with happiness and the phantom birthday gift is at the back of my mind. "There's no way you all came home from school just to see me."

Hayley purses her lips. "What, like we'd make you spend your birthday alone?" she asks, laughing once.

"Yeah, man. We're here because we love you," Hunter says, bright blue eyes alive and wild. I exchange a look with my friends; this was how he always looked before he made things weird. "It doesn't matter if you're 89 years old and in an old person's home and we like, have to change your diaper before you can eat your birthday cake—"

"Ew, Hunter," we all groan out. I toss streamers at him, laughing loudly with my friends. And it feels like home.

We stay up the entire night, playing UNO and laughing at one another's jokes. I couldn't remember the last time I'd laughed this hard. When the clock strikes midnight, we cheer so loudly that I'm sure my neighbors want to kill us. But I didn't care. I was so happy to be here, so happy to be alive, to be twenty. To be with my friends.

It's a few hours after midnight when my phone starts ringing. I was lying across Robyn's lap, close to sleep, and the sound of its buzzing seemed to wake up the entire room. "Turn that shit off!" Devin groans, pulling the blanket up over his arms.

I flip him off and climb to my feet, rushing into the hallway before glancing at my cell phone. It was a number I didn't recognize. I answer it anyway. "Hello?" I breathe, voice deeper with sleep.

"Braylen?"

My heart freezes in my chest because I know this voice. A voice I hadn't heard in months but could recognize in seconds. My fingers shake and I have to clutch the phone with both hands as tears well up in my eyes. I hadn't heard his voice since the day of Oba's wedding. Six months later, it could still bring me to my knees.

"Roman?" I whisper back, voice breaking.

There's a soft chuckle on the other side of the phone. I can tell he's smiling, even from 5,000 miles away. "Hey," he breathes, sounding older and younger at the same time. "Happy birthday."

I echo his laugh, surprised that he remembered and even more surprised that he was calling me now. Roman was never good at phone calls or text messaging when we were together, and it'd been even worse since we were apart. I wanted to be angry at him, for not calling, for not saying anything for months. But I couldn't be. He had a life, a business. But I still wondered. "Why haven't you called?" I whisper hollowly.

He sighs and there's the sound of rustling papers. I imagine him in a well-furnished office in a three-piece suit, a traditional phone pressed to his ear. "I wanted to," he admits, voice small. "But I didn't know if I should. I didn't know if I could. I don't have that much strength when it comes to you, B."

I sniff once, turning my head down to the linoleum floors. "Are you happy?"

"I am," he responds soundly. "Are you?"

I let out a watery chuckle, sliding down the wall and settling onto the floor. "I'm happier. Does that count?"

"Of course it does," he responds. There's a pause where we just listen to the sound of one another's breathing. It felt so strange to be like this, to have him on the other side of the phone and know that he was there. "Is there...is there anyone that you—?"

"No," I breathe, my heart pounding in my chest. "No, there's not anyone else." I hesitate before speaking again. "Of course, there isn't. You're it for me. Unless you—"

"No," he says quickly. "You're it for me, too."

There's another pause. I drum my fingers against my thigh, stare down at the fading scars on my hand, and count to thirty. Then, I whisper, "I miss you." A tear falls down my face and I wipe it away with the back of my hand.

"I miss you, too," he murmurs. "I wish...I wish things were easier. I wish that—"

There's the sound of a knock on his door, his office door. I can hear a man speaking to him in Italian and him replying back quickly. When there's the sound of a door shutting, I know that he has to leave. I bite my bottom lip. "You have to go," I whisper, tucking my hair behind my ear.

"I'm sorry."

I shake my head. "It's okay. Just...just don't disappear again, okay? Don't be a stranger. I think it'd kill me if you were."

Roman chuckles softly over the phone and for a moment, I laugh too. I could almost see him now, the scrunch of his nose, the dimples etched in his cheeks.

"I won't, alright? I love you," he whispers back quickly. "I know it doesn't seem like it and I know that I have no right to, but I do. I love you."

"I know," I get out, tears streaming down my face. "Me too."

He sighs once over the phone. "Still?"

I nod, knowing he can't see me and simultaneously feeling like he could. "Always," I say soundly. I nod again. "Always."

I can hear the sad smile in his voice. "Happy birthday, Braylen."

"I love you, Roman."

        I hang up. I glance around the empty hallway, letting out a watery laugh and wiping tears from my face. He remembered. "God," I murmur. He remembered. He remembered. The gift!

        I rush back into the room, grabbing the rectangular gift and card attached. I start to peel off the wrapper but Devin groans again. I flick him off for the second time and retire back to the hallway, the gift tucked under my arm and card clutched in my fingers.

        Peeling the wrapper off, I stare down at the medium-sized box waiting for me, realizing it's not a box at all. It's a painting, stuck in a black frame with words carefully scripted on it.

         To my angel.

        Tears fill my eyes again as I take in the painting. It was watercolor and seemed to be placed at a wedding, with two guys holding one another as they sway underneath the fairy lights. I get it instantly. It's us, that last night we were together. He'd painted us.

        A small sob wracks my body as I remember all the time that had passed between the two of us. The time that we spent together, the time that we didn't. It haunted me that most of the time spent was time apart. I think back to Roman's promise, that the story would end with us, and choke back another sob as I read through the letter he'd written.

        Someday. I stare back down at the painting, at the love he'd managed to capture with nothing but a memory. Maybe that's all we were. A memory. A fleeting, passed-on memory. Maybe we'd be more.

        "Someday," I whisper, forcing my heart to believe the word to be true.