How to Date a Nerd

Chapter 33 - The Chapter Which Isn't Really the Ending

I didn’t notice Sarah sitting in the porch until I was about to knock on the door. It was already dark. She was quiet. And from her shadowy corner, it was hard to see her face.

“I w-wouldn’t change my mind, you know,” she murmured, her eyes downcast.

With a deep breath, I sat beside her, placing the purple box between us. “I know,” I said, leaning my head back and looking at the skies.

The stars were much clearer, much more vivid tonight. For the first time, I actually spotted the constellations Sarah had been trying to show me way back then. The Big Dipper, the Little Dipper. Even now, I couldn’t really tell how they’d look like bears. But Sarah saw them. And I believed her. I believed in what she was seeing. Her eyes could see wonders I couldn’t.

That was right. All my life, I thought to see was to believe. Now, I knew better. Sarah and I won’t see each other but she’d keep believing in me. As I, her. All the memories we’d made in this small town won’t be erased no matter what. I’d keep them with me, cherish them because they were the best ones I’d got.

“I’m just worried,” I added, lowering my gaze to her. In the dark, her eyes were so blue tonight I couldn’t seem to look away. “With Claire still out there, it’s possible that something bad will happen again. And the worst part, I won’t be here to look after you.”

She just smiled weakly, gently shaking her head. “If something’s bound to happen, it’s going to happen anyway. That night of the… accident—you were there, weren’t you?”

“And I couldn’t do anything,” I replied absently. Ouch. “…sorry.”

I got her point. She was right. Whether I was with her or not, things still went out of hand. Not to mention that the cause of all her troubles were people connected to me. Claire, Megan, Camilla, Nate and his bunch of whackos. Everything bad started to happen to her the second I set foot in this town.

“Five bucks,” she said, her hand reaching out to me. When I couldn’t react, she pocketed her hand and fixed her eyes on the skies. “You forgot? Every ‘sorry’ said costs five bucks.”

“Oh,” I blurted, feeling stupid. It’d been a secret game between us. I made it up since she seemed to have the pathologic need to say sorry all the time even if things weren’t her fault. Who knew I’d be the once who’d say that word the most nowadays? “Sorry…”

“Now you owe me ten,” she chuckled faintly then let out a deep breath. “For some reason, I’m not sorry anymore.”

“About what?”

It took her a short while to answer. But when she did, there was an unmistakable light in her eyes. “About everything. I don’t regret that all these things happened. That I lost my memories and got to make new ones. Of course, I still… wonder sometimes. I might not be able to remember what used to be, but I like them just the way they are right now. That’s my silver lining.”

“What’s my silver lining then?” None. Zero. Na-duh.

“You’ll find it soon enough.”

The summer breeze swept past us, ruffling the little garden in the front lawn. It carried Sarah’s long hair to her face. I had the strong urge to push it back. But I didn’t move a muscle and contented myself with just being next to her.

Behind us, from inside the house, I could hear Jer and Freddy chuckle together, Kidnap barking at the clanking of plates as Emma did the dishes. This was where Sarah belonged; in this happy normal family. Not with me.

Suddenly, Sarah stood up and took my hand. “I have something to show you,” she said.

I barely had time to tuck her present under my arm before she towed me to the narrow walkway to the right of the house. It led to the backyard garden. Once, on her sixteenth birthday, I had a landscaper—with Becky’s help—turn it into a garden with all sorts of flowers and shrubs, especially, Stargazer lilies. They were her favorite. From then on, we agreed to work in maintaining that garden every after winter.