Home should be constant. It should be stable and reliable, an anchor in the storm. A place where you can come and go, grow and change, but return to find everything in its rightful place.

The exterior of Capri was never changing, but the people in it couldn't be trusted as a source of stability. At least, that's what I thought until I saw my ex-best friend sitting at our old spot in the lifeguard tower—a relic of time, of a past that we inescapably shared.

I removed my shoes to navigate the sand, letting it burn the bare soles of the feet that had been absent for too long. It was like home was punishing me. You left. You changed. You're not her anymore.

No, I wasn't her anymore. I was stronger. And I no longer craved stability. I craved change. I wanted to move forward.

Lola's profile had always been striking, just like every last part of her. While Elijah and I were the golden couple of our high school, Lola Sinclair was the reigning beauty of the entire coast. Her flawless, snow-white skin rivaled the smoothness of silk. Her hooded eyes were so hypnotic that they could lure the most resilient of men in sweet, dulcet tones.

But that December day, as she crouched in the tower with her slender legs to her chest, her sharp, cutting features were merely a painted mask. Her silver hair was uncharacteristically unkempt, tucked into the hood of an oversized sweatshirt that concealed the perfect curves that she was usually proud to show off. And even though her face wasn't fully visible, I could see the blank stare veiling her usually penetrating gaze.

She was a shadow of the girl I once knew. Of the girl who'd been my best friend since kindergarten. Somehow, it was fitting.

It was also so sad that it pricked my healing heart.

"Madison?"

I'd been observing her so closely, but I'd missed the moment that her eyes left the horizon to find mine. I peered at her through the railing of the tower, salt and sea hitting my back as waves crashed on the rocks framing the shore.

"Hi."

She raised her head from her knees at the sound of my voice. Up close, everything that I'd noticed from afar was confirmed. I didn't think it was possible, but Lola Sinclair looked like shit.

I didn't know much about my former-best friend anymore. Strange, to suddenly know less about a girl I'd shared my life with than I did about three guys I'd just met. But our mothers were still in touch, and mine had told me that Lola deferred university for a year. That made sense. She was never the academic type. She was always destined for billboards and magazines, not for some stuffy classroom training for a nine-to-five.

But she wasn't jet setting yet. She wasn't working runways or selling protein powder on Instagram. She was still in Capri, still as broken as the last time I saw her in my dad's old ice-cream parlor, both of us crying over the boy we both loved. I sensed it from my bedroom window, and it was even clearer now. Something was tethering her spirit to this place, keeping her Louboutin-clad feet bolted to the sand.

And I had a pretty good idea of what that something was.

"I didn't know you were coming home today."

I tilted my head, my loose curls brushing against my shoulder. "No?"

Though the railing concealed her mouth, I thought I saw it twitch. "Maybe I heard something." She shrugged. "You know what Capri's like."

"Spinning gossip like it's cotton?"

Not even the railing could block her smile then. She smiled so gratefully, as if I'd given her a present and not a terrible joke. It was such a pretty expression, such a genuine one, too. One so bright that it almost made up for the bags under her eyes and the knotted mass that had become of her silver hair.

Even though that girl broke my heart just as much as Eli did, seeing a smile crack her cold veneer warmed a part of me I'd long since repressed.

"How are you?" she whispered, her voice mixing with the cry of a gull overhead.

I didn't need to think twice about it. "Good."

Maybe I should have thought twice. Maybe it was insensitive to admit that I was fine when she clearly wasn't.

Still, I felt too raw to lie.

"Really. I'm ..." I trailed off, the faintest of forces pulling at my defiant mouth. Faces and memories flooded my mind. A mirage of smiles and laughter, of Dex and Noah and Kara.

And James.

How could I forget James?

"I'm great."

Part of me expected her to be upset about that. The last time we'd spoken, she'd told me that she'd always envied me. That she'd always wanted what I had. Who's to say that hadn't changed just because the source of my happiness had?

But Lola didn't tense at my response. She didn't even flinch. She simply nodded. Like she knew.

"You?" I asked gingerly.

A light laugh escaped her full, pink lips, the type that was utterly devoid of mirth. She shrugged. "I've missed you."

I missed her, too, though that hadn't always been the case.

First, I'd been upset with her.

Then, I'd been disappointed in her.

Quickly, I'd hated her. I'd despised her and resented her and wished horrible things on her.

And, then, I missed her. I missed us.

Was I dumb? Was I naïve? Maybe. Probably. But I still crept up that ramp to sit alongside her on the ledge.

I think that surprised her even more than my attempt at humor had.

Silence swelled between us. We watched the rising tide go in and out, just like we had on lazy days when we were girls. We'd sat in that exact tower almost every day after school since third grade. We did our homework there. We talked about boys there. We mapped out our lives there, planned our fashion line and our girl band and our future weddings there. For the latter, she'd envisioned The Plaza—grand and illustrious, a glamorous affair that her guests could brag about attending for years to come. I'd envisioned the chapel at the top of Capri's northern-most cliff. Close to family, close to the beach. Close to the sound of waves and to the salty smell of home.

A dull aching snaked around my heart. Once again, I was reminded that Lola cheated me. She didn't just cheat with my boyfriend. She cheated me, full stop. Cheated me out of having a lifelong best friend. Out of having someone at my twenty-first or at my wedding who knew me and who I knew. Totally, completely, entirely. More than a man ever could.

Still, I couldn't shake her away. I couldn't seem to cut that tie, or to turn off that part of me that still seemed to care about her. Was that dumb? Was that naïve? Or was that just what being a sister was?

"Ask me about it."

I moved my eyes from the sea. I cast them back on her profile, searching her guarded gaze.

"That's why you came down here, isn't it?" She tucked a pin-straight strand of hair behind her ear, taking a shallow breath before daring to meet my eyeline. Her stare was brimming with nerves, with a toxic concoction of shame and dread. "To ask me. To know."

I was surprised that she addressed everything so openly. That she was so readily offering me full disclosure.

Then again, it wasn't like we could put the cat back in the bag.

Still, I swallowed hard. I didn't know what I wanted to know, or if I even wanted to know more than I already did. She was right; initially, I thought that's what I'd come down to the beach to do. To take another step in my journey toward healing, to ask questions and get answers and closure just like I'd promised James that I would. It was only when my feet hit the sand that I realized the truth.

It was only when I saw someone suffering that I realized that I wasn't anymore.

Something was being offered to me, something that I'd craved since walking in on Eli and Lola entwined with one another in the back seat of his truck. It was being dangled right in front of my face after I'd sought it out for so long, but, suddenly, I didn't want it. I didn't need it.

I didn't need answers. I didn't need to know the ins and outs of Eli and Lola. Because it just didn't matter anymore. Rather, he didn't matter anymore.

No, my journey for answers no longer concerned Elijah. Rather, there was only one thing that I needed to know. What my best friend's betrayal was worth.

"Did you really love him?" I hated that my hunger for an answer pooled in my eyes, that it laced my words with a pathetic kind of desperation.

But maybe it was a good thing that it did. Maybe that was what she needed to be honest.

"Yes," she said, breath catching in her throat. It pained her to say it. It pained her to even have this conversation. She was usually so prideful, so righteous and selfish. But as she uttered that word, that simple confirmation, I could practically see her heart breaking through the murky green of her eyes.

Despite everything, my sister-senses were firmly intact. They were telling me that Lola was broken. That she was exactly where I'd been, drifting out to sea without anything or anyone to anchor her.

And that's when it hit me. The real reason why I'd felt a pull to Lola since I saw her from my bedroom window. The real reason why I'd come down to the beach in the first place. Not for me. Not for my healing, not for my closure. I was already whole. It was her heart that was fractured, and while I wasn't obligated to fix it, I felt enough love for her to try.

I didn't like Lola. But I did still love her.

I pulled my sleeves around my hands. It wasn't cold, but I was shivering like it was. "Do you still speak to him?"

"We never spoke," she scoffed, the sound bitter and dry. "We fucked."

A sharp breeze of ocean air slapped me in the face, and I blamed that for the pink hue that settled on my cheeks.

She cast her winged eyes out to the ocean again, biting the side of her lip, contemplating her response. "He's like a riptide," she continued softly. "He doesn't really come back into my life. He crashes. He pulls me under, sucks me in. He makes me feel wanted. Breathless. And then he's gone, and I swear to god that I'm never getting back in the water. But I can't help it. I love that feeling too much. Even though it's fleeting. Even though it's dangerous."

It was strange. It was all so strange. She was talking about a boy that I'd spent so much of my life with, but it didn't sound like she was talking about him at all. The boy that she described didn't sound like my Eli—sweet, caring, tender Eli. Eli who'd weaved me a promise bracelet out of blue and white yarn, who'd left a single red rose in my locker every Valentine's Day from seventh grade to twelfth.

But I had to catch myself. I had to remember that I didn't know Elijah. Not really. In fact, I think the closest I'd ever come to seeing the real him was after our breakup, when he'd come to my dorm room and begged me to take him back while his fists balled with rage and his eyes scorched like fire.

It got me thinking. I felt my heart beat with something other than nerves as I considered the possibility. "Was he ever violent with you?"

The upset on Lola's face melted down into something heavier. Something more akin to shame.

"We were violent with each other." She shook her head, picking at a splinter in the plank of wood beneath her feet. "It's like ... we took on these characters. These personas. We knew that we were doing something bad, so we had to be bad, too."

An overwhelming tightness constricted my chest. Confirmation. Or as close to it as I would get. Perhaps as close to it as I could handle.

Perhaps my former best friend knew that.

I hugged myself tighter as another shiver rippled up my spine. How many times had I seen bruises and scars on Lola's arms and legs? How many times had she told me that they were from tripping over her own two feet? One of our longest-standing inside jokes revolved around her supposed clumsiness—another lie that collapsed on top of so many others.

I felt sick at the thought. I felt like a failure of a friend. I felt completely, utterly stupid.

Then again, how could I have known what was happening behind closed doors? How could I have known that my prince was her beast?

"I knew that he didn't love me. Not like he loved you." It was like she'd read my mind. Her eyes had become teary, brimming with moisture that I could tell she felt too guilty to let fall. "I was just a solution for him. A way to release that evil and still keep you pure. But I was stupid, so I loved him anyway."

"And now?"

"I hate him."

I could see all over her face that she didn't.

I never intended to feel bad for Lola, for the best friend who'd helped the boy I loved tear out my heart and shatter it like glass. And maybe to say that I felt bad for her wasn't the true essence of what I felt either. She still did what she did. She even admitted that she knew it was wrong, that she had to lean into some inflated version of herself in order to do it over and over again.

So, maybe it wasn't that I felt bad for her. Maybe it was simply that I didn't want Eli to have this kind of hold over her anymore. That I wanted our narrative to be over. I didn't want to dread coming home. I didn't want to dread seeing either of them from across the street. I wanted to live my life without constraints, and I wanted to let any baggage that I was still holding on to drift out with the tide. I wanted all of us—her, him, me—to be free from one another.

Freedom. Yes, that's what I wanted. And by the tired lines decorating Lola's face, I could tell that it's what she wanted, too.

"You'll get over him."

She rested her cheek on her knees, staring up at me sleepily through thick, curled lashes. She'd managed to splinter the piece of wood from the plank below her. She twirled it mindlessly when she asked, "Did you?"

The ice around my heart thawed, and all that I felt was gratitude. "I did. But it didn't just happen. I had to work for it. It wasn't easy."

That was an understatement. I remembered all that I'd sacrificed for the sake of my healing heart. Or, more precisely, who I'd sacrificed.

She sighed, her eyelids fluttering shut before a single tear broke free. "I don't know how you did it, M." She paused, shaking her head wistfully. "I don't even know why you're speaking to me right now."

My eyes found my house. They found the window to the lounge where I'd stood with James earlier. I didn't know if he was still there, if he was still playing with Bandit or watching me through the panes of glass. But the ghost of that small moment with him was enough to cast a smile on my lips.

"Perspective." And, silently, purpose.

"No," she disagreed, and I turned back to meet her with curiosity. "You're just too good for us. You always were."

I didn't know what to say to that. Maybe a few months ago, I would have taken it as a bad thing. As a reminder of how naïve I'd been, of how weak being optimistic and trusting can make a person.

Now, I took her words for what they were. A compliment. Because I'd learned that having an open heart wasn't a weakness. Seeing the best in others wasn't a flaw. Being capable of loving as deeply as I did was a gift.

I just needed to find a person worth giving it to.

"I really do wish that I could hate him," she added, her plump lips lifting into a sad smile. "Like you."

I frowned, because what she said didn't feel right.

I thought I hated Eli. I knew that I probably should. But whatever I was feeling in that moment—whatever I'd been feeling for a while, actually—suddenly felt too feeble to be compared to something as strong as hate.

"I don't," I realized. It was like a weight had been lifted from my shoulders, like the sun streaming over the ocean was infiltrating me with its warmth. "I don't care enough to hate him. Not anymore."

The truth was, I felt ... nothing. And not numb-nothing. Not spiteful-nothing, either. Just ... nothing.

Elijah Kovač was a name. He was a person I'd once known. But he wasn't my heart anymore.

That was completely my own.

"And what about me?"

I had to squint through the light to see her clearly, to see her looking back at me with bated breath. She was still sitting in the same position—her head resting on her knees while her arms cradled her legs protectively.

It was the smallest I'd ever seen her.

Some people enjoy danger. They seek out a rip simply for the rush. Others get stuck. They become so afraid that they forget how to swim. Lola chased danger once. Maybe she was addicted to the high, maybe she was filling a void left by the lows. But sitting next to her that day by the sea, I felt as though she'd become the second swimmer. The one who was afraid to call for help if only because she didn't think anyone would listen.

I didn't owe her anything. But it wasn't a sense of obligation that caused me to reach out and rest my hand over hers.

"I don't hate you," I said, that realization somehow less shocking than the first. "But not because I don't care."

It was hard to see through the fractures of sunlight. But the gratitude that glimmered in her eyes was too vivid to be outshined.

Someone shrieked loudly in the distance, an energetic and carefree sound at odds with the energy we'd generated in the tower. Volunteers were beginning to set up for the night's festivities, wheeling out the wooden star and reindeer structures and filling the air with the promise of hot jam donuts and peppermint pretzel squares.

The annual bonfire was another of mine and Lola's relics—a constant that remained through every changing year of our friendship. In fact, maybe it was the spirit of the event that brought us together that day, both of us with open hearts and a desire to move forward. Not necessarily together. Just moving on.

I reached out to untangle a lump of knotted hair on her shoulder. "Are you coming to the festival tonight?"

"No." She smiled lazily, blotting her drying tears on the sleeve of her oversized hoodie. "I figured I'd stay out of your way."

"Well, you kind of screwed that up when you parked your ass outside of my bedroom window."

Her laugh chimed like the bells in the chapel on the hill, the bright sound rippling through the salty afternoon air. It was the first time since sitting down next to her—hell, maybe even since I'd walked in on her and Eli—that I felt like I recognized her as the person she was in my memories.

"Come on, Lo." I nudged her with my shoulder. "The bonfire's our tradition."

She sighed dramatically, spreading out her legs in front of her to lay back on her palms. She pulled at some thread at the bottom of her sweatshirt, watching as it slid out from the fabric and flew away with the breeze. "I don't know if I can face everyone, M. Look at me." She swept a hand over her frame—one that I was used to seeing swathed in the latest from Zara and Shein. "Lola Sinclair, crying in her best friend's ex-boyfriend's sweater."

I felt my mouth pop open as the realization hit me, my eyes once again trailing her outfit.

I knew that I recognized that hoodie.

She must have realized that I hadn't caught on earlier. Her sudden silence was deafening, her fleeting grin pulling into a tight, regretful grimace.

Loose-tongued and impulsive. That was the Lola Sinclair that I remembered.

"Don't come for them," I told her. "Come for me."

She stared up at me through her wispy bangs, the prettiest little wrinkle creasing her forehead. "Really?"

"Really."

Months ago, maybe even days ago, I would have done anything to get out of being seen with her in public. As far as I knew, no one knew about our secret. But there was always a chance, and that chance alone would have been more than enough.

But the sooner that I dealt with the inevitable—the sooner that we ran into each other in town or were seen together at an event—the sooner that I could stop fearing that inevitability.

That was freedom.

The sun always sets early on the coast, and by the time that my ex-friend and I parted ways to get ready for the evening, it was casting a pastel glow over the foreshore. Pink and orange rays warmed my path to the pier, a childlike kind of excitement brewing in my chest. Because it was only after I talked to Lola that I realized just how okay I was. Actually, I was better than okay. I realized that I felt whole.

And, when I did, there was only one person in the world that I wanted to tell.

It had been months since my first and last date with James in the campus gardens. We'd watched his favorite film and had his favorite food, and I'd promised him that I'd do everything I could to get out of the hole that I was stuck in. He told me he'd wait for me. He didn't have expectations, he didn't make me take any vows. There was nothing between us that night beyond a promise. A promise that I'd overcome my demons for my own benefit. Not for him, but for me.

That was the only way there could ever be an us.

That day had arrived, the one we'd both been waiting for. But now that it was here, I didn't know what I was supposed to say. I did it? I'm better now? I'm ready?

Juvenile. It all sounded so juvenile.

Besides, how was I to know where on earth my best friend and I stood? The messages were mixed—Noah's coy, teasing grins, Dex's proclamation that we were like brother and sister. James himself had assumed the role of a friend so very well. Maybe even a little too well. Was it presumptuous of me to assume that he still wanted more?

I could hope, and I could dream. But I couldn't let my heart overpower my head. Moreover, I couldn't lose sight of why I decided to be on my own in the first place. Not to hop from one man to the next, but to forge my own identity. To be content within myself. To stand on my own two feet without needing a man to hold my hand and tell me that I was whole.

When I told James what I needed to, and if—or more likely when—he let me down in his own sweet, gentle way, I needed to channel the strength I'd built in the time since I vowed to heal my heart. As I walked up the steps to the pier, taking a deep breath of fresh, sea-scented air, that's what I remembered. That even if he didn't want me anymore, that didn't mean that I wouldn't be okay.

I didn't know whether I totally believed it.

But I knew that I'd worked too hard to let a boy break me all over again.

I feel like the response to this chapter will be quite mixed! Actually, it was one of my favorite ones to write. I think it was a nice, clean ending to Madi and Lola's friendship, and I think that Madi deserves that.

What are your thoughts about Lola? They don't have to be good ones! I always say that I don't write my characters to be likable necessarily, but rather that I enjoy exploring different personality types—good and bad and everything in between.

Do you have any other thoughts/comments/concerns that you'd like to share with me (or the group)?? >

- Danielle