Hello, Again

Chapter 3 (Part 1)

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This hope is treacherous

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Amelia Barnett was a Practical Girl.

Amelia was a practical girl who didn't quite like getting her hopes up without a tangible reason, and was quite sure that half the broken hearts in the world existed only because people put too much faith in coincidences. She liked to believe that a Coincidence was an artificial construct of human psychology, that it was nothing but the result of an overactive mind trying to draw parallels, searching for patterns in this chaotic world, aligning random events with each other, with Fate, the stars and so on until nothing around us was confusing and inexplicably disappointing anymore. In other words, she was very uncomfortable with the idea that the universe just might have an elaborate plan – the very possibility frightened her.

Which is why the following sequence of events and whatever pattern they may follow would have not stirred her doubts even a little. You see, most events in her (and everyone else's) life did run on intricate patterns – however discordant, unlikely and nonsensical they may seem – and even at their most incongruous, these patterns let themselves be known to the human heart. Whether subtle or loud, these patterns always seemed to convey the same missive over and over again, which she (and everyone else) would hardly admit – life was mostly, if not always, about spinning in circles around the same people she (and everyone else) was fated to meet, crashing headlong into some and dancing around others for years on end, and maybe making the most of these Chance encounters

Some nights, this thought would tiptoe into her (and everyone else's) mind, and Amelia wasn't quite sure if the existence of this Fate was blissfully reassuring or imminently tragic.

...

On June 20th 2009, Amelia brought Jason to her apartment for the first time.

On March 21st 2011, Amelia met Adam McAlister at Sarah Montgomery's studio loft.

On February 21st 2015, Amelia attended an art exhibition with Emily at the Met.

In another lifetime, a lifetime where Amelia put some  store by the concept of destiny, these three events would follow each other in a journal with beige pages and well-worn cover, separated by dozens of other (equally trivial) entries that possibly told a love story in shorthand. But Amelia (as she was) didn't keep journals, and such thoughts were far from her head somewhere in the back of Kitsch!, where she reflected on impulsive buying as the smell of expensive perfume wafted in the air.

Hunting for casual dress shirts (as promised) she wondered what a broke college student like herself was doing at a chic SoHo clothing store. Hiding in the back of the store behind a clothing rack, she had spent the last quarter of an hour scowling at the price tags until her forehead hurt, pushing aside item after item as each of them soared right over her budget, and she couldn't quite decide if she was more frustrated with the economy or disappointed with herself.

The situation was hopeless.

Digging through a giant heap of gaudy and tasteless sheer blouses she had finally pulled out a dress, and couldn't quite believe how attached she felt to the feel of the fabric in the span of about three seconds. The dress was a nondescript indigo, soft and cottony to the touch, beckoning silently to be tried on. She debated with herself whether she could indulge – she had saved up just enough to be able to afford some outfits for her (brand new) internship, with possibly some left over for a coffee at Starbucks (at last), but somehow she'd let Abigail drag her to SoHo and into the ironically glitzy hipster clothing stores, and she'd spent the most of her morning hiding from shop assistants, looking for the cheapest items on sale, wondering sullenly if it was alright to show up for work in nothing but a scarf as long as it was vintage.