Here I Am, There You Are

Summers back in high school were always the best. It was warm, school was off for a few months, I got to spend all my time with my best friends. We did some fun things back then. The summer before college started was the best summer of my life. We went out and partied before the guys started recording their album and I started the next chapter of my life. Unfortunately, that was the last summer I spent with those friends. I had found new friends at college and contact with the old friends died down a little. But now, I was dating one of those old high school friends. I felt like I was going to have another great summer. A more adult summer, but a great one nonetheless.

It was a Saturday late afternoon when I went over to Jack’s place. I already had plans with other friends earlier in the day, which meant I was going to be late to Jack’s get-together. But I had already told him, and my other plans were planned sooner. So, when I arrived, everybody else was already there.

I was in a great mood that day. It was a beautiful day, the sun was shining, I was wearing shorts and a nice white top. I had just had a successful shopping trip with my friends, spending some money to treat myself to some new clothes, and it had been twenty-four hours since I had gotten some good news from work. On top of all of that, I was still with the guy I was madly in love with and wanted to spend the rest of my life with.

I entered his apartment with my own key, unsure if anybody would be able to hear the doorbell ringing. As I stepped inside, I saw a few people in the living room and a few more out on the balcony enjoying the sun. Jack, himself, was coming out of the kitchen, wiping his washed hands on his jeans. He seemed happy and relieved to see me as he approached me.

“Thank god you’re here,” he breathed out and pecked me on the lips. “I need to take a shit, will you entertain everybody?”

I snorted, trying to hold back my laughter, and put my hand on his face as a loving gesture. “Anything for you.” I kissed him again, not as chaste this time.

“Thanks.” He grinned at me and was about to walk into his bedroom.

I stopped him, however, softly taking hold of his arm. “I want to talk to you later. Remind me if I forget.”

“Oh.” He frowned, stopping in his tracks.

“No, don’t worry, it’s nothing bad. I just want to talk to you before I tell anybody else,” I assured him and let him go.

“Okay,” he nodded and pressed another kiss to my lips before finally getting to go to his bathroom.

I decided to make my presence known to the rest of the group. After putting down my bag against the wall that lead to the bedrooms, I went further into the living room, giving everybody a wave and a ‘hey guys’. They all greeted me back, making space for me to join their group. Alex was there in the middle of a story, telling everybody about his time off somewhere to focus on writing a few songs. I listened, noticing how supportive Lisa was of everything as she added her own parts to the story. That’s exactly what I hoped Jack and I were like.

I really did believe he was the love of my life. Despite being in relationships before and despite being in love before, it was never like this. This was that special kind of love. That kind of love that made you feel fuzzy just thinking about it. Although we had taken things relatively slow and still were, I was completely ready to say that I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. I would say it in my head as often as I wanted.

Our relationship was great. We still went out on romantic dates, making everything just a little special for each other. If we were just hanging out at each other’s places, we never got bored or fed up either. Jack could be watching Netflix while I was reading a book, but we’d still be there together. We had our separate things, and we respected that. We didn’t need to constantly be doing the same thing just for our relationship to work. Occasionally, we didn’t even see each other for a day or two, but not for much longer than that. I’d be busy with work or he’d go out with his friends. It’s not like he had to be there through every project and I had to be there to check on him when he went out. We had our balance, we had our trust.

Eventually, Jack reappeared without anybody wondering where he had gone. He was standing behind me while I was sitting on the couch. He put his hands on my shoulders and gave them a little squeeze, making me look up. “Do you want me to get you anything? I forgot to offer you something.”

“No, I’m good.” I shook my head and smiled up at him. “I can get something myself. I probably know your kitchen better than you do.”

“Alright, if you say so.” He shrugged and dipped down to share yet another brief kiss with me before going off to be around the group on the balcony.

“Why don’t you guys just move in with each other?” Lisa commented casually, not meaning to be intrusive.

“We’ve mentioned it before, but we’re good where we’re at now,” I told her with a soft nod of my head. Like I said, we were taking it relatively slow. There was no need to rush. Yet.

“Are you guys still okay?” she asked next with slightly furrowed eyebrows as she picked up her glass of wine.

“Yeah, we’re all good,” I nodded more enthusiastically this time. “There’s just no real urgency to move in together. Someday, though.”

“Okay,” she breathed out in relief, “I just wanted to make sure.”

After that, more normal conversations happened again. I sat there joining in, until I decided I did want a drink. So, I excused myself and went to the kitchen. I grabbed one of the glasses set out for anybody to take and opened Jack’s fridge. There was a lot of alcohol, especially beer, but I settled on a glass of coke. Ever since the incident on tour, Jack had been keeping me far away from alcohol. Even when I was contemplating on one glass of wine when we went out on a double date with Alex and Lisa, he refused to let me. I was thankful for that.

I grabbed an open bottle of wine I saw standing around and made my way out to the balcony to talk to some different people. Jack’s eyes fell on me and I waved the bottle a little bit to show him I had brought a drink for him as well. He smiled brightly and held up his glass that was completely empty and I came up to him.

“God, I love you,” he declared as I poured the wine for him. “It’s like you can read my mind.”

“Oh, I can.” I handed the bottle to one of Jack’s friends and tapped Jack on the temple. “I can hear every little dirty thought in there.”

“What am I thinking now?” He wiggled his eyebrows smugly and pulled on my waist to make me sit on his lap without making my own drink spill.

“Hmm…” I took a close look at him as if I could actually read his mind. Of course, I couldn’t, I wouldn’t want to be able to. Usually, I would say he was being disgusting, but I decided to take a chance this time. I gave him a sensual look and said, “yes.”

“Really?” He raised an eyebrow and put the hand that wasn’t holding his wine glass on my leg.

“Yes,” I repeated with a smirk and pressed my lips against his.

“Well, I’m going to be taking you home tonight,” he whispered against my lips.

“I’m already at your place.”

“Even better.”

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It truly is a miraculous thing. Love, that is. I thought Jack and I would never end. I was certain it was that way. He was my home. I really felt like I belonged with him. It’s why I told him what I wanted to talk to him about wasn’t bad, that it was nothing to worry about. But, in hindsight, it wasn’t the complete truth. I just had a biased view of it.

“So… what did you want to talk to me about?” Jack brought up the subject I had told him to remind me about.

We were on his bed, his guests now long gone and his kitchen all cleaned up. He was sat on the edge and I was straddling him, sitting in his lap. His hands were on the back of my thighs, partially to make sure I didn’t fall down, but mainly just because he wanted to touch me. My arms were circled around his neck and we were face to face. If there was one way to have an intimate conversation, this was definitely it.

“Okay, well, yesterday–” I started with a big smile.

“Hang on,” he interrupted quickly, looking at the floor for a second before looking back at me. “I just want to clear up exactly what we think ‘nothing bad' is.’ Because we might have very different views on that.”

I rolled my eyes. “I’m not pregnant.”

“Okay, good,” he nodded to show he was now ready for me to tell him what actually was up, “glad we cleared that one up.”

“Now, as I was going to say, I got offered a promotion at work yesterday,” I quickly got out before he could doubt everything and start questioning me again. It was better to calm his nerves by getting it out of the way than letting him overthink it.

“Really? That’s awesome!” He grinned, showing he was happy for me. “What job is it?”

I couldn’t contain my excitement knowing that he was happy as well. I sat up a little straighter and started telling him all about it. “Editor-in-chief. And, like, for the whole magazine. No longer just the fashion part. Like, all of it. I’ll have so much more responsibility, but at the same time it will also be less work. Everybody always comes to me now when something’s wrong, like they need me to book things for them, which isn’t my job. At this job, I’ll have to make sure that everything is okay, I’ll have to check everything, but I won’t be nagged when somebody doesn’t have the right contacts. I’ll even get to write again if I want.”

“That sounds amazing. Isn’t this the job you always wanted?” His hands went up to my waist, fitting perfectly.

I nodded with even more excitement, loving that he remembered my dreams. “Yeah. It seems surreal. I get to decide what eventually comes into the magazine! Also, totally unrelated, but it would mean almost getting six figures.”

“Six figures!” Jack gasped, knowing how big of a deal that was in the magazine business. I had always earned more than enough money, but this was huge.

“Yeah!” I exclaimed. But then I remembered what came next. My mood didn’t change, I thought it was just another technicality. However, it was the reason why I wanted to talk to Jack in private in the first place. “Just one thing. It’s in Vancouver.”

His face fell as he stared at me. “Vancouver…”

I stared back at him, swallowing the knot in my throat. For some reason, this wasn’t the reaction I was hoping on getting. I knew it was a serious thing to move for a job, I really had to think about it, but I didn’t think it would change Jack’s demeanour so much. “Yes, Vancouver. I would have to move there. But I have until Monday afternoon to decide.”

His eyes fell off me and shifted permanently to the floor. When his hands moved from my body, I knew he wanted me to get off his lap. “Vancouver…” he repeated again.

I got off him and sat next to him, suddenly overcome with sadness. When he reached to his own face and rubbed his eyes, I started filling with worry as well. He didn’t seem happy anymore. But what did I expect? For him to move with me? I mean, yes, I hoped so. It was a big step and a big move, and I knew that. Even if we had been married for ten years, I would have consulted him. But he was acting like we were never going to see each other again.

“You’d have to go all the way to Vancouver? When?” He finally started asking more questions, making me hope he just needed a little time to go over it.

“They want me to move there in three weeks. They’ll help me find an apartment and everything, so I don’t need to worry about that,” I said quietly, praying that maybe taking that stress away would help anything.

But it didn’t. At all.

“Can’t you get the same job here?” He looked at me.

“I mean, the job exists, but they aren’t looking for anybody here.” I didn’t want to ask the next question, dreading the answer. But I needed to know. “Don’t you wanna come with me?”

He opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He took a second and let his eyes close and he tried to hold back tears. I took hold of his hand and he gave me his answer. “I can’t. Everything I have is here. All my friends are here. I– I can’t– I’m not ready to move away yet. My whole life is here.”

I wanted to scream. Wasn’t I part of his life? But I was too upset to get mad. I couldn’t force him to move to a whole different country. Tears started prickling my own eyes, I was sure they were glassy and red. Then, an idea popped up in my head and I tried to dry away the tears that hadn’t fallen yet. “We– we can try long distance. Right?”

I expected him to at least agree to that. Yet, he just continued to look at me with tears in his eyes. “I don’t know, Rach. I barely get to see you as it is. We’re apart longer than we’re together. If you leave, it will become even less frequent. I’ll only be able to visit you when I’m home. I won’t always be able to fly out. And you’ll be too busy to come and see me every time I’m back. It… It just won’t work.” I breathed out loudly and my tears started to blur my vision as he continued. “Can’t you just stay? You don’t have to take the job.”

“You said so yourself, it’s my dream job.” When I saw that Jack’s tears were now travelling down his cheeks, I let myself release one of my own. I would never stop my own dreams to be with a guy, I had always promised myself that, but it was so tempting.

“Rach…”

“I don’t– Is this… are we really– are we ending this?”

Once again, he opened his mouth, but he had nothing to say. He just shook his head. That’s when my tears started to fall freely as well. Neither of us wanted this to end. This didn’t end because of a fight. This didn’t end because one of us felt differently. This ended because of external circumstances. If this had never come up, we wouldn’t have been fine.

I stood up, knowing there was nothing I could do. This was it. This was the way we broke up. I never thought we would, but here we were, going through it. There was nothing that could change this. We weren’t even going to wait until I left. So, now it was time to go.

I picked up my bag, which I had moved into Jack’s bedroom, and left the apartment without another word from either me or Jack. I didn’t let myself cry until I got home and had Olive cuddled close to me.

This wasn’t going to be a new chapter in our life as I had hoped, this was going to be a new chapter in my life.

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I didn’t see or hear anything from Jack the entire three weeks before moving away. Most of my furniture had already been shipped to my new rented apartment and I had found tenants for my own house already as well. I didn’t want to sell it just yet, so I was going to rent it out for the time being. Olive was definitely going to miss the garden, as was I, but I had to go.

My friend from work, Kat, was helping me load the last few things into my car. I was going to miss her. We used to carpool together every day. I would go to her apartment and we’d go to work together. Our jobs were very different. She was only just starting out. I had assigned myself to show her around, and I just took her under my wing from there. She was only a year younger than me, she just decided to take this career path a little later in her life. Honestly, she was the closest thing I had to a best friend. She was the first one to know about and to comfort me about my break up other than Olive.

And now I was saying goodbye to her too.

“Oh, I”m going to miss you.” She pouted as I closed the trunk of my car. “I don’t want to say goodbye!”

“I’m going to miss you too.” I made my own sad face and came up to her before hugging her tightly.

“You’re going to kill that job. I know it. They couldn’t have chosen a better person,” she encouraged as she had her hands on both my upper arms.

“And you keep striving, okay? I know it might seem hopeless now, but you’re going to get there. I heard a position opened up, so there might be a few people getting promoted.” I winked, secretly knowing that she was one of the people that was.

A silver car pulled up, and I knew this was our final goodbye for now.

“I love you,” she sighed and gave me one last hug.

I hugged her back. “I’ll miss you."

“Good luck.”

She got into her Uber and waved as she disappeared down the road. The only reason she had to leave now was because she had to go to work. She had only gotten the morning off, so we couldn’t hang out any longer. It was just a coincidence that we had finished packing my car at the exact same time. We really tried our best to get most of it done in the limited amount of time we had.

I took one last long look at my house before I approached the front door. There was just one more thing I needed. I called out Olive’s name and smiled at the pattering of her paws on the floor. She usually would be put in the trunk, but I decided it was best to let her be on the backseat this time with the other things I had to take along. This trip was going to take long, and I knew she would get impatient and annoyed, but it was the best way to take her and my car up with me to Vancouver.

I shut the door for Olive and got ready to get into the driver’s seat myself. There was no point waiting any longer now. I had somewhere to be. But before I could go, an all too familiar black car rolled up and stopped just in front of my house. I knew I couldn’t just drive away now. I had to wait for Jack to get out and stumble over to me.

He looked horrible. His shirt was wrinkled and crooked, his face was puffy and eyes red, his hair a frizzy mess. I felt the way he looked whenever I had a slight reminder that we had broken up, which was most of the time. Only, I pushed myself to take showers and get dressed properly. I was starting a new job, I couldn’t look the way I was feeling.

“Rach,” he cried when he was just a few feet away from me, “don’t go. Don’t leave. Stay.”

I shook my head and kept hold of my car door. “I can’t, you know I can’t.”

“Stay here,” he continued to beg, “I don’t want you to leave.”

It upset me even more to see him like this. I felt so bad being ready to leave right in front of him. I want to comfort him, tell him that it was going to be okay. However, when he stepped closer to me to try to convince me, I could smell the alcohol on his breath. I no longer wanted to take care of him. He needed somebody who could properly help him.

“Jack, you’re drunk,” I sighed and closed my door, but not before opening the window so Olive would have air.

“Just stay!” Tears started streaming down his face and he was unable to control the sobs that wracked through him.

“Give me your keys,” I mumbled and snatched them from his hand. He was in no state to drive like this.

I took out my phone and called the only person I knew would be fit for this situation. I nearly started crying myself when I explained the situation through the phone, keeping and eye on Jack who was now sitting on the front lawn, still bawling his eyes out. As I waited for help to arrive, he calmed down, but he was still obviously drunk. He was still muttering things under his breath, sloppily rubbing his eyes, and occasionally starting the waterworks again when he looked up at me.

Eventually, a large white car joined the bunch. Alex got out of it, quickly jogging up to me, seeing Jack sitting on the floor.

“Are you okay?” he asked me, ignoring Jack for the time being.

I nodded and started telling the whole story again, giving the car keys to him. “He just appeared. And he’s drunk, and I can’t leave him like this. Alex…”

“Hey, it’s okay,” he whispered and embraced me. “I’ll make sure he gets home safe. He just needs a little help.”

I didn’t want things to end like this. Our breakup was painful, it really was, but it wasn’t horrible. It was relatively clean. Neither of us was happy, but we weren’t mad at each other. There were no hard feelings. I just needed time away from him to try to get over him, which I didn’t think could happen. But, like this, it was messy. I felt guilty.

“Rach, really, don’t worry,” Alex reassured me when he saw I wasn’t certain about anything anymore. “I’ve got him. You’ve got to take care of yourself. Go to Vancouver, make new friends, find your new favourite coffee shop. Don’t worry about him. I won’t let anything happen to him.”

Once I nodded, he finally approached Jack. He said something along the lines of ‘come on, buddy’ before helping him up. Alex was saying stuff to Jack that I couldn’t hear as he started guiding him away to his car. I really thought that everything was going to be okay. But then Jack started fighting Alex off when he realised he was taking him away from me. Alex tried to keep a firm grip around him, but Jack just pushed and pushed.

“No!” He screamed like a child getting its teddy bear ripped away. “No! Rachel! No!” He managed to turn around in Alex’s grip, letting me see his tear stained face once more. “Please!”

“What?!” I finally got the courage to reply properly. “What do you want me to do?” When he went to answer, I stopped him. “And don’t you dare say stay.”

That’s when he knew it officially was over. He couldn’t get me to stay. I was leaving. He was defeated. There was nothing to do but let Alex steer him away. He was crying so hard, it broke my heart all over again. I never wanted us to end.

I got in my car and drove away before Alex could. I couldn’t stand being there any longer. It hurt too much.

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The exchange was on my mind the entire trip up to Vancouver. All I could remember was Jack’s appearance and tears. He was hurt enough to drunk drive, which was so dangerous. He knew better than that. I was mad at him, I was upset at him, I felt bad for him, I was worried about him, but mainly I was still in love with him. And I never got the occasion to collect my feelings. I had to focus on the road.

I was carrying my boxes into my apartment when I broke down again. It was all just a little too much. I hadn’t gotten much sleep at the stops I had taken overnight and my feeling were all over the place. Olive had been the only thing keeping me together that entire time, but now she was already in the apartment. I was still out in the hallway, just having brought the last load of stuff from the elevator to my front door.

There were tears constantly escaping from my eyes, but I wasn’t crying out loud. I didn’t want to disrupt the other apartment on this floor. But I didn’t get so lucky. The elevator had gone back down again and the person that had gotten in got off on my floor. I didn’t want to be rude, but part of me was hoping they would just ignore me.

“Oh, hey, a new neighbour!” A female voice greeted behind me, going to the door of her apartment.

I looked up, deciding that I had to be friendly. She had the most beautiful curly natural hair. It was obvious she took great care of it. My hair was nothing against hers, especially while it was in a greasy ponytail. I wiped away the tears on my cheeks and tried to give her a smile.

But she couldn’t not notice it. “Oh, damn, you don’t look all too great. You okay?”

“No,” I breathed out with a chuckle, hoping to make the situation a bit better, “but I’ll be fine.”

“Would you like some help moving in?” She offered.

“That’s okay,” I politely declined. I only had a few more boxes to go.

She shook her head and opened her door, quickly putting down her bag and closed the door again. “You look like you’ve got too much on your plate, I insist on helping.”

I accepted that time. It wasn’t that I needed the help, I just wanted to start with a good relationship with my neighbour if I had the opportunity. If she was not just doing it because she was trying to be polite, but because she wanted to help, then that was more than okay with me.

I opened my front door so we could get started. Instead, Olive came running out, immediately heading for my neighbour. I was fully prepared to grab her by the collar and take her back inside just to apologise. It had become a routine ever since I had gotten her. Not everybody liked dogs and she could be a little overwhelming.

But, my neighbour just crouched down and started petting her. “Oh, aren’t you a pretty little thing? Yeah, you’re so cute. Aren’t you? What’s your name?”

“Her name’s Olive,” I answered, smiling a little at how happy Olive was to get some head scratches. But it was short lived, because it reminded me exactly of how Jack would cuddle her. I held it back, though, and introduced myself as well. “And I’m Rachel.”

“Nice to meet you, Olive. And you too, Rachel.” She looked up at me. “I’m Sascha.”

Sascha took one of the boxes and went into my apartment. I followed her with my own box. We put both of them down with all the ones I had already brought inside earlier. Instead of going back out to grab more immediately, Sascha looked around and nodded in approval. All of my furniture was already inside and in the right rooms, just not arranged as I wanted it to be.

“Your place is bigger than mine,” Sascha pointed out.

“Is it?” I asked out of interest.

“Yeah. You have, what, like seven bedrooms here?” She over exaggerated. “And a proper kitchen.”

“It’s two bedrooms and a study,” I corrected, hoping I wasn’t coming off as entitled or something.

“Girl, I have one bedroom, and that’s it, this is like a mansion. You better be paying more rent than me,” she joked.

“My work helped me get this place because they transferred me here. It was a compromise I managed to make,” I shrugged. It would have been the perfect apartment for me to move into with Jack. We would have had the comfort of being able to leave and travel along with the size of my house. But I was by myself.

I must have looked upset again, because Sascha frowned. “You don’t look happy to be here, though.”

“No, no I am,” I backtracked, wiping my eyes again and sniffing. “This is my dream job. It’s just… nevermind.”

“No, tell me,” she encouraged. “I don’t give a shit. You were crying out in the hallway. If you’re here for your dream job, this must be something serious.”

I contemplated whether to brush it off or not. Part of me wanted to spill everything, but part of me didn’t want to bother her. Then again, spilling everything to a stranger might just be exactly what I needed. So, I started small, just so I could stop in case it weirded her out. “My boyfriend of one-and-a-half years and I just recently broke up. He showed up before I left to come here and it just really messed me up.”

“Oh…” She didn’t seem weirded out yet. “That’s a dick move. He’s an asshole.”

I shook my head, feeling my eyes water again. “He’s not an asshole.”

“He is if he broke up with you. I’ve only known you for a few minutes, but you seem like a catch.”

“No… we broke up with each other.” I took a deep breath. Maybe she could reason with me better if she knew the whole story. “It happened after I got the job offer. I just moved here from LA. I don’t really know what I expected to happen, maybe part of me hoped he’d want to move with me. But he wasn’t ready to move away.”

“Long distance?” She suggested.

“Nope. He travels most of the time, he has limited time at home. It would be difficult to ever visit each other.”

Sascha grimaced and gave me a look that showed me she was about to lecture me. “And you’re saying he’s not an asshole? Not moving with you, okay, I can still be persuaded to understand that. But not even attempting to try long distance? What’s the harm in trying? That boy is an asshole.”

“No, he’s not,” I continued to defend Jack. “He was hurt as well. He showed up drunk and he was begging me to stay. It hurt to see him like that.”

“Okay, no. Shut up. You’re proving my point. He’s trying to hold you back from getting your dream job? Making you choose between him and your career? No. He definitely is an asshole. He probably does some deadbeat job and can’t stand to see you actually achieving your dreams."

“No… he already has his dream job. He’s in a semi-famous band, has been since he came out of high school. We used to be best friends back then.”

“Wait, you’re telling me that boy doesn’t even need to be in LA for his job?” She completely ignored my statement about how long I already knew him. “Fuck him! He could have easily moved!”

I shrugged. She was putting things in perspective.

“Look, you’re allowed to grieve.” She changed her tone to show me support instead of just bashing Jack. “This was a long relationship, he was your best friend in your teenage years. It’s okay to need your time to get over him. But don’t you dare feel guilty. This break up isn’t your responsibility. He didn’t want to put in that extra effort.”

On one hand, I felt a bit better. She was right, this wasn’t all my fault. We didn’t just break up because I was moving. We broke up because he didn’t want to take the chance. He gave me an unfair ultimatum, whether he did so consciously or not. And it actually made me a little mad.

It was a horrible few weeks, but it was the day I met my best friend.