Memory 15 ♡ The End of The Beginning

The first farewell was Ayrton's. After the big party following the showcase, he gave me one big bear hug and said, "Now that you're going to New York, I'm going to have to look for another roommate."


"Uh, it's just a summer internship, though."


"Bitch," he said as he pulled back from the embrace. "You're telling me you can afford to pay rent here and also in the most expensive city of the country?"


Ah, good point.


I waved him off from the curb of our apartment complex as he drove away. Aunt Jem was going to need quite a lot of help especially the first month, and Ayrton was going to fill in for her at the bar. He'd worked as hard, if not more, than I did to prepare for his final exams and despite the trips between Orlando and Sarasota, he had aced them. I had no doubt that he was going to become the world wide known, awarded and multimillionaire movie director he wanted to be.


The next goodbye was also one that I'd been expecting, but it was strange nonetheless. Miguel invited me to his graduation. And Becca too, I had to add. After everything we'd gone through this semester, we'd all become pretty good friends. She shed some tears as Miguel's name was called to the stage to pick up his diploma. On my other side, Charlie gave me an eye roll so exaggerated that I feared Becca had seen it.


"Only my stupid brother would invite two girls for his graduation," she muttered loud enough that I could hear.


I shrugged. "We're friends."


The look on her face asked, without words, if I was stupid. I certainly felt like it as Becca dabbed at her face next to me.


"Damn it, if only he were at least one semester younger," she said next to me. "I guess it wasn't meant to be."


She got that right.


Once time for the pictures came, I volunteered myself to take them. His dad and sister stood around him, smiling proud at their boy. There were a couple of funny ones where Charlie made faces at her big brother. I'd actually never seen her laugh so much in my life.


Then Malik came over and I took a few snaps of the two of them. It was Malik who casually told me Bryce and Miguel hadn't ended in good terms, which was why he wasn't joining our group for the pictures. Becca squeezed herself in between the two guys, and I went full on professional photographer on them. I reminded them of my words before the fashion showcase, and Miguel and Becca struck their best supermodel poses unprompted. Soon a larger crowd of Miguel's business buddies joined, and I had to step away even farther to get all of them in the frame.


"What about you?" Mr. Bernal, Miguel's dad, asked me from the side. "Aren't you going to be in any of the pictures?"


"Oh, that's okay," I told him, and I was about to give a very polite excuse when a hand snatched my cellphone from my hands. Before I could react, I was being squeezed against someone.


"Say whiskey," a familiar deep voice said.


I turned to Miguel's smiling face as he lifted the phone up for a selfie.


"Isn't it supposed to be cheese?" I asked him, at the same time as my body tingled where we were connected.


He was so close to me when he turned my way that it would have been easy to kiss him if I'd had any balls.


"In Venezuela we say whiskey," he explained. We both looked at the camera and said the word with big smiles on our faces.


That was the only picture we managed to snap together before he was pulled away by his friends. He and his family were organizing a nice brunch at the golf club my father absolutely loathed, but I was going to miss it because my best friend was coming to town. I watched as Miguel and his friends joked around and took more selfies, and I figured that was it. I excused myself with Mr. Bernal, who tried to convince me to stay.


I gave Miguel one last glance and noticed that he'd been staring at me. I waved my hand at him and mouthed good luck, but I didn't know if he caught that. At the same time he was pulled into a hug by one of his guy friends, and I thought Miguel tried to untangle himself but didn't succeed.


I got into my car and looked at the pictures. Without shame I could admit to myself that I wanted to get one last good look at him, so I sat there for a couple of minutes zooming in on his face.


Shame that it wasn't meant to be for me either, because I kind of thought he was perfect for me.


A rapping at my window made me jump and scream. My phone hit the roof of the car and landed on my lap.


Outside Miguel started laughing so hard that he doubled over.


I willed my heartbeat to slow down before I opened the door, and if he hadn't straightened on time I might have bumped him in the head.


"You scared the lights out of me," I told him, still kind of hyperventilating.


He wiped tears off one eye and said, "I'd never seen someone levitate from their seat like that."


I folded my arms to try to hide the fact that I was dying of embarrassment.


"So," he started, mimicking my stance. "You thought you were going to leave just like that?"


"You were busy." I shrugged.


"I'm never too busy for you, Addy."


I willed my knees not to buckle at the way he smiled at me.


"Are you sure you can't come to the brunch?" he asked one last time, but I shook my head.


"I have to head over to the airport now. It'd be a bad idea if I leave my friend waiting there for long."


"Right." Miguel sighed and looked down for a moment. It took him a couple of seconds to speak again. "Well, it's been great hanging out with you this semester. Don't be a stranger after you go to the big apple, okay?"


I smiled. "Are you sure you won't be the stranger once you relocate in the good ol' north?"


"True, there's barely any technology up there among the icebergs and polar bears," he joked, eyes twinkling under the sun. He ran his fingers through his hair of copper tones. "But I'm sure I'll find a spot at least with radio signal."


I laughed and immediately I wanted to cry. I was going to miss him so much. His sense of humor, his protective instincts, his ridiculously defined muscles. I was sure I'd have dreams of the way his eyes lightened every time he smiled and the way he clutched at his belly when he laughed as if he didn't have a care in the world.


"Thanks for everything," I managed to say with a trembling voice.


"Come here," he said, pulling me closer to give me a hug.


I wrapped my arms around his waist and even though I was taller, I buried my face in the crook of his neck and shoulder. He held me there, his arms secure around me, his warmth enveloping me, for a long time. Until I had to break away because my best friend was going to land soon. I pulled away and before I lost my nerve, I pressed a small kiss to his cheek. Without further ado, I got into my car, strapped myself up and drove out of the parking lot. From the rearview mirror I saw that he was still standing exactly on the same spot.


I did some ugly crying while I headed over to MCO. Which was a PSA I was going to have to give to everybody, because blurry vision, fits of sobbing and Florida traffic didn't mingle well. I still made it to the airport and found my best friend in the whole wide world standing by the curb in the arrivals area. A couple of people kept casting weird glances in her direction, but it was hard to tell that it was actually Vera de la Cruz with her expensive blonde wig and sunglasses. She jumped into my car as soon as I pulled over and I dumped her suitcase at the back.


"Best grand I've ever spent," she said as she ran her fingers through her fancy hair and took off the shades that hid half of her face.


"Holy shit, that's an expensive wig."


"Peace of mind has no price, I tell you," she said. "Thanks for picking me up. You probably had other stuff to do."


"Not at all," I lied, hoping she didn't catch on. The truth was that if she hadn't scheduled the visit to her brother this weekend, I'd have had to go to that brunch and I didn't know I'd fare well with an extended goodbye. It had already been painful enough. But with Vera in town I was going to be busy all the way until I flew out to the big city, armed with my measly intern salary and my credit cards. It was going to be quite an adventure.


"Hey, let's take a detour," she suggested. "There's this new ice cream shop in downtown and I want to try it in peace before my hurricane of a brother sucks the life out of me."


"Whatever your highness wants," I said, and this earned me a smack.


We caught traffic on the way downtown as per usual, and I could tell that being stuck in lines of cars made her nervous. Despite putting on the sunglasses again, one kid in the car next to us took a picture of her.


"Wow, I didn't know you were that famous."


She cringed and said, "After the Backstreet Boys and NSYNC this town had waited a long time for its next big act. It just so happens to be us."


"It's a tough life—ow, stop hitting me."


"I will, when you stop making fun of me."


To appease her I decided to go into the ice cream shop by myself and call her phone to tell her all the flavors and options they had. As the clerk gave me a weird look I just told her that my friend's leg was broken, borrowing some inspiration from Aunt Jem's accident. I walked back into the car with two massive and colorful cones that she had to hold for me as I drove us to a quiet corner of Lake Eola.


We sat on a bench overlooking the big fountain in the middle and attacking our ice cream under the shade of a big tree, as though our cones had committed a grave offense.


"I miss the simple life a lot, you know," she said after she was done, leaning back into the breeze.


Overhead the sky was blue, with a couple of fluffy clouds. The wind blowing through the leaves was soothing and I knew she didn't have a lot of opportunities to enjoy moments like this. Her life had become a whirlwind of flashing lights, confined recording cabins and the wide expanse of stadiums full of people screaming back the lyrics of her songs. I'd seen her give it her all on stage many times, and I'd also seen her collapse into a heap backstage when the shows were over. It was a good thing Ashton was always there to catch her and help her cool down. Or warm up, I suspected. They were quite chummy chummy.


"How do you do it?" I asked her. "Where do you get the courage every night to do something that terrifies you so much?"


If she shared the key to that, maybe I could grow the pair I needed to never again deny myself what I wanted. Even if that was to kiss a boy in the lips, instead of his cheek.


Vera let her sunglasses slip down to the tip of her nose, so she could give me A Look.


"With the same kind of cojones you have to go and take on New York City all by yourself."


That was an unexpected answer.


"I thought you were going to say something inspirational, not that the balls were hanging in between my legs all along."


That made her laugh.


"My dear Addy, I've literally seen you bloom in the face of rejection and disdain from the people who should cherish you the most. You are one of the people who gives me cojones." Vera smiled at my bulging eyes and open mouth. "Or did you forget that you were one of the first people to believe in me?"


I squirmed. "Well, um. It didn't require a great stretch. You are incredibly talented."


"And so are you. Did you think you scored that big internship by mistake?"


I hesitated, but at her glare I admitted, "Probably not."


"Definitely not." She pushed her sunglasses up. "You're a woman of talent, vision and hard work. The only person stopping you from taking over the world is yourself."


"I'm very annoyed that you're probably right." Then after a pause I added, "And also at the fact that if we'd had this conversation earlier, I might have kissed the boy."


The first time I'd ever shown her a picture of Miguel was back at Trinity, one night in our dorm room. He'd come up in the conversation when she'd said she was Venezuelan, and I remembered that he was too. He'd been beautiful then, and even more so now, and Vera had remembered him when I'd sent her a couple of pictures of him decked in my designs after the Design showcase.


She sighed. "Yeah well, you're both heading your separate ways now but let this be a lesson to you. Don't doubt yourself ever again, or what you want might slip right through your fingers."


Those words would haunt me for years, because despite our reassurances to each other, Miguel and I did lose contact. And despite the boyfriends or flings I got here or there, my mind kept drifting back to a smile I never thought I'd see again.


That was, until exactly seven years later.





and we're back full circle because we know exactly what kind of reunion they had


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