JesseI left Joe in charge of the store when I went on my lunch break on Friday. Then, I headed down the street to Audrey’s appropriated dance studio. I had stopped by a few times before now, but it had always been planned. Today, she wasn’t expecting me, but I was hoping to surprise her with a nice lunch that I had made for the two of us. The weather was beautiful outside, the sunlight warm on my face as I walked down the sidewalk. Definitely summer weather now, although I knew it was going to get hotter and more humid as the weeks went on.For now, it was nice. It was the perfect weather for a picnic.I smiled to myself as I thought of surprising Audrey with the idea. She’d probably giggle and tease me for being such a romantic. I just couldn’t help it around her, though. She made me want to be an old sap.I had to admit that I was falling for her. It wasn’t really a surprise, given our history. I had only managed to stop myself before because our parents had been together, and we h

JesseA couple of her tears slipped free, falling in tracks down her cheeks. She didn’t look at me. “You don’t understand, Jesse. I can’t just stop dancing.”“I know you can’t,” I said, nodding. “I don’t fully understand because I don’t have something like dancing that keeps me going, but I know you well enough that I know how much this all means to you.” I paused. “But Audrey, if you want to keep dancing, you need to give this time to heal up. You know that. With the way this looks and judging by the fact that you can barely move it, I’d say it’s a pretty bad sprain. That’s not something that you want to mess around with.”Audrey sniffed. “I just feel so helpless,” she said. “Like there’s nothing that I can do to help it.”“Sure you can,” I said gently. “First, you need to stay off your feet as much as possible. And second of all, you should be icing this.”“I guess.” Audrey sighed. She ran a hand over her face, scrubbing away the tear tracks. Then, she gathered herself and tried to

Audrey“Aren’t you working?” I asked, suddenly realizing that his lunch break was probably over by now.Jesse shrugged. “It’s a Friday afternoon,” he said. “I’m sure Joe can handle things. Chance has been doing a great job lately, too.”“Oh, okay,” I said, even though I still felt unsure.Jesse pulled the ice pack off my ankle and inspected it. “Looking better,” he said, nodding approvingly, but all I could see was the fact that it was still a purple mess down there. I winced, looking away. Jesse laughed. “Oh come on, you’ve seen worse than this. Remember that time I fell out of that pine tree and punched a hole in my arm?”I couldn’t help giggling at the memory of it. Of course, the sight of pine needles sticking out of his arm had been disgusting, but it was the way that he had marched inside while his dad had friends over for a Sunday afternoon football game and barbecue and held up his arm declaring that something was wrong. The faces on the adults, staring in disbelief at how cal

Jesse I tried not to grit my teeth as I left Audrey at her mom’s house with her injured ankle. But her words kept ringing in my ears. Can’t we just enjoy the time we have? she had asked me. The question went around and around in my head.The thing was, I wished that I could say yes. That we could just have a little fun and not worry about any of the consequences of that fun. But the truth was, I liked Audrey. And the more time I spent with her, the more I was going to get attached to her, I was sure.It was easy enough for her to want to just enjoy the time that we had without worrying about putting a label on things or whatever else. But she wasn’t the one who would be left behind here in Aberdeen at the end of her six months’ stay. Once her ankle healed up, she was going to go right back to Paris, to her life there, and I would be left here with a giant ballerina-shaped hole in my life.But at the same time, I knew there was no way that I could tell her that it wasn’t okay for us

AudreyI heard the front door open. Mom and Clayton were already in bed, so it must be Annabelle coming home after her shift at the bar. I hadn’t realized that it was already that late, but when I looked at my phone, I saw that it definitely was. I sighed and flopped back on my bed. It was late, yet I still felt ages away from sleep.Annabelle crept into the room, taking pains to stay quiet. I appreciated the effort, but I wasn’t asleep. And I knew that I needed to apologize to her for earlier. There was nothing that I could do about the Jesse thing at the moment, but at least I could try to take one weight off my mind for the evening.I sat up. “Hey,” I said quietly.“Hey,” Annabelle said in response, her tone frosty. That, in itself, told me just how hurt she was about what I had said earlier.I looked down at my duvet. “I’m sorry for earlier,” I apologized. “I know you’re just looking out for me. And I don’t want to make excuses, but I’m just frustrated about all of this. I want to