I'll Never Finish This Book

TWENTY-SEVEN

March 15:

"W-what are you doing here, Rhodes?" Eli asked from behind the counter of the coffee shop near my apartment. He was working there now.

"I shouldn't stay long. I just had to see you."

"How'd you know I'd be here?"

I shrugged. "Saw the car. I've been kind 'a walking around the city hoping I'd see it...and you."

"Well, I'm glad you did." He tapped his coworker's shoulder, signaling to cover for him, and walked over to me.

"Sit down. Let's talk." He pulled out a chair for me, and we sat near the window. "How's everything been? I know you didn't end up turning in the book, and that worried me."

"How do you know?"

"Debra and George called me a while ago. They were worried about you. Something about not answering your phone."

I nodded, staring at some of the crumbs on the table.

"So, did you?"

"What?"

"Turn in the book?"

I shook my head.

He leaned closer to me from across the table. "Come on, El, why not?"

"I just...didn't want any of it anymore. College, the book, this city."

He looked regretfully at me as if blaming himself.

"Why are you working here now?" I asked.

"I've been trying to make some cash to get a place."

I shook my head slightly. "What about Emily?"

"I...I broke up with Emily," he spoke slowly.

"Oh." My heart stopped. "I'm sorry."

"No need. It's actually me who should be sorry.

"For?"

He leaned back in his seat. "For everything. For getting back with her when it was you that I wanted." He sat silently for a while. "She cheated on me again," he added hesitantly.

"Oh, that sucks. I'm sorry, Eli, really."

"It's fine. It's been a couple weeks."

"Where have you been living since then?"

"My car."

"I'm sorry."

"No, I'm sorry," he says softly, and it's laced with so much emotion that his voice doesn't even sound like his own.

I shut my eyes at the brokenness in his voice. "I know."

He reached for my hand and laced his fingers with mine. I squeezed his hand. The feeling of his skin against mine made it impossible to hold back any tears. He filled all the gaps that formed from his absence. I couldn't quite understand how, but he was able to take all the thoughts away with that single touch- until they crept back- they always crept back.

"If I could go back, I'd-" he began.

"You can't repeat the past," I interrupted.

"Are we not going to talk about how you said you loved me?"

"Let's not ruin this, okay?"

When he was gone, all I would think about was having him back. I thought that having him back would make me happy. That I would stop missing him, and it would make me feel better. He was there, and I was still unhappy. I forgot what it was that I missed about him the most.

That was the problem. Was I just missing the idea of him? Was I just into the idea of him loving me back? Was I chasing the way he made me feel and the person he helped me become?

"Where are you?" he asked.

I knew what he meant, but I said it anyway, "Here."

He leaned in closer, and I followed. "No, you're not." He looked at my lips as if asking for permission to kiss me. "You haven't been here for a long time," he whispered inches away from me. His eyes met mine. "You're far away."

The silence lingered around us and tried to pull me back into that feeling of home.

"Let me fix this," he whispered, his pained eyes holding back tears.

"You can't," I finally manage to say. "You can't just make it all go away," I spoke through the rampant thoughts in my head.

He sat back. "I wish I could change your mind," he spoke, biting on his lip to keep from saying more.

"I know."

***

I got to my apartment forty minutes before my new book was due. I still had nothing. Once again, I was going to lose it all, for good that time. The conversation with Eli played on repeat in my mind and didn't help the writer's block. I didn't understand why I couldn't get myself to go back to him. More than anything, I wanted to be with him. It was then that I realized he was always going to be tied down to her. Why else would he have kept everything from me? Why would he have gotten back with her, even after how it ended the first time? Despite what he said, he chose to hide her from me. It wasn't because he didn't want anything to do with her, but because she would always have that hold on him, at least for the time being.

Maybe I would go back to him someday, but I couldn't make that known. I couldn't have him waiting for me. I wanted to see if he would come back to me once more. If he did, then I'd know for sure it was me he wanted. I wasn't going to open myself up like that again without knowing for sure I was going to be met in the same way.

With a little under twenty minutes left to submit something, I typed out my journal entries. With every word I typed, I tried to recreate many different endings to the entries. I tried to write many different endings of us together. I tried making it so that we ended up together. I made it so that he chose me first.

I couldn't forget that he chose her first. He picked her, and the ending was the same every time. I typed out a note on the first page:

You never read much, but knowing that, I still want you to get through this book. I want you to try to make it to the ending.

This book contains all the things that I've wanted to tell you but could never say directly to your face, so I've created this fictional world to get that message across.

Some of the events in this book may be fiction, but the feelings are real.

The hold you have on me is so strong that I created a world for you.

She wouldn't have done this for you.

You can't seem to picture a life without her, yet she's already living a life without you in it.

I pictured a life with you; I pictured many lifetimes where you and I ended up together.

I pictured myself wrapped up in you, but you could never imagine me as more than the person you talk about her to.

You never realized how much listening to that tore me apart.

I wanted you to use those lips to do something more than recite words inspired by her.

Holding on to her like that didn't make you come off as romantic; It made you seem sad.

Holding on to you like this didn't make me come off as romantic; It just made me sad.

But here's the difference between you and me; you write to me about her, but I write to the world about you.