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I could have listed every time I hadn’t called Declan.

Instead, I remembered the times I had.

The speed with which he came.

The look on his face when I stopped to fix my shoe.

His hands shaking against my cheeks.

I had wanted his attention for so long that I’d barely known what to do with getting it.

For the first time, I wondered what it cost him.

“I’m not doing it on purpose,” I said.

“I don’t think you are.” She sounded sincere.

That made it worse.

She wasn’t calling me cruel. She was giving me a chance to stop doing something cruel without accusing me of meaning to.

It was difficult to defend myself against that.

“Maybe he needs to know you’ll be okay without him,” she said.

I looked at her.

She was pretty. Composed. Standing in front of me with an explanation for a person I had loved my whole life and apparently understood less than she did.

I didn’t ask what he’d said.

I already had more of an answer than I wanted.

“I understand,” I told her.

Some of the tension left her shoulders. “Will you think about it?”

I nodded.

The warning bell rang. Students hurried past us, someone calling for a friend to wait.

Megan stepped back to give them room.

“Thanks for hearing me out,” she said.

Then she went to class.

I stayed beside my locker for another moment.

All morning, I had been so relieved that he let me take care of him.

I hadn’t considered that sitting still might have been easier than making me feel rejected again.

That letting me fuss might have cost him less than watching me cry.

I could still feel the cloth in my hand. His face tipped toward mine. His voice when he thanked me.

I wanted to keep those things.