I graduated from the hole in-the-wall college with an Associate of Arts and winded going up North to get my Bachelors in writing. I guess I decided I had a lot of material to work with over the years. The University was home to me. I met people who truly understood my quiet nature, the way I examine the world, the way I described changing things through the years. Nobody gave a shit if you didn’t look like a supermodel every day and guys started trickling into my personal life more than they ever had before. Lip stayed on my mind. Then there was Peter.

Peter was an Engineering major who wanted to focus on acoustics. Peter was funny, Peter was sweet, Peter replaced Lip in my head.

Peter and I met at an alternative concert the college put on in the fall of our Junior year. Peter was friends with my friend who was friends with me. Come to find out, it was a planned placement, our friends knew we would be perfect for one another.

Peter met my parents and my parents adored him like a new puppy found under the Christmas tree. I met his mom, since his dad died a few years prior to our meeting, and she continually bantered Peter about making sure he kept ahold of the diamond he found.

Peter showered me with affection, never allowing myself to doubt his feelings towards me. The type of affection that leaves you knowing that someone truly cares about the thought behind something, rather than a materialistic value.

Peter always said the right thing and always gave his time to me and only me.

Peter was perfect.

Then there were semester breaks.

Summer breaks were always my favorite because they let me come home, work some boring ass job at the grocery store double-bagging old cereals and cans while getting to stay up late under the stars of my tiny hometown lane and write in hopes of getting published one day. Peter stayed up north during all breaks for internships, but we saw each other frequently, posting our candid’s our friend group snapped, wrapped in each other’s arms, not blinking because we were too consumed to care.

Peter had come for the past weekend. A weekend we both didn’t want to end, but ended regardless of our wants. It would be mine turn to drive the following weekend.

I was laying under the willow tree that sits in the far left corner of my yard when I heard the front door of Lip’s house open and close. A quick glance showed that strawberry hair, the weightless body he carried everywhere, and his sturdy walk. I looked away quickly. Lip started making his way over to pop-a-squat next to me. I acted like I didn’t see him because I didn’t want him to think to come over if he was merely going for the mailboxes that sit side-by-side, partners in mail delivery, at the end of my driveway.

I would have pissed myself if I hadn’t heard his boots crunching the dry ground walking closer and closer. I’m surprised I still didn’t piss myself when I realized he wasn’t heading for the mailbox, but heading to sit down next to me. We hadn’t sat this close since our last Christmas exchange years ago.

“Hey, Partner.” Lip said.

“Hey, Lip. Long time, no see. How are you?”

“I’m alright, hanging in there and making the best of every day. You?”

“I’m going.” I said.

“Just going, huh? I guess that’s better than stopping. What are you working on?”

I had written and rewritten the statement on the paper for weeks, but never got the balls to perfect it or shove it in its delivery hole. Too much of a chicken-shit to realize what I needed to do.

“Oh, this? This is just something I’ve been working on for a while. I just can’t seem to write it how I want it.” I closed the journal cover, hiding my writing from Lip’s wandering curiosity.

“I always felt that way whenever I had to write something for college.”

The temperature dropped a degree and silence grew for a moment. We used to talk as frequently as possible, hating that a few hours of separation would take us away from talking more. Now months of silence, even years of silence, seemed to be widening every time we breathed in that moment.

“So, now that we broke the ice, Partner-in-Crime, who is this Peter I’ve seen plastered on your social life?” Lip asked.

The old Lip I used to know peaked through in that moment and so did those beautifully-crooked teeth. They didn’t look so beautiful anymore.

“Since when did you start paying attention to my social life? And Peter is my boyfriend. We’ve been together since January. He’s a good guy. He’s the first boyfriend since Zach, actually. You heard about Zach at school, right? I mean you must have had to since you liked my Facebook post stating I was single again. Anyway, I had time in-between him and Peter to fuck around, but I stopped that once I went away and found where I belong.” I said.

“A little quick to judge, aren’t we?” Lip asked.

“How’s Katie?”

“Okay. Uh, Katie and I broke up. Well, she broke up with me. She said we were too different in what we liked to do, learn, see, whatever else she said. She’s shacked up with someone in her major and I’m just slowly trying to make her realize we are meant to be together. I know that’s stupid, but I can’t seem to let her go, ya know? I thought I was going to marry her.”

I heard the pain in Lip’s voice and saw the way his face stared at the ground talking about her leaving him. I felt the sting of the suffocated love feelings that faded long ago when I realized we were going different ways for good. The street light at the end of the lane came on, but we didn’t have to move our asses back home now.

“Remember when our parents used to joke about us getting married one day?” I asked.

“Ha, yeah. Wouldn’t that have worked out nicely?”

“Well, Lip, I really am sorry about you and Katie. I know how much you loved her. I mean, not really, but just from the shit I saw online and when she would be here over breaks, I knew you guys were destined for something.”

“Yeah. I just don’t understand why she can’t see we are soulmates. When you know someone is destined to be yours forever, you feel it so strongly and I just don’t understand why she doesn’t see that right now. Wrong timing, but I have to hold onto hope that we will be back together again and I also know I can’t. It’s fucked up, isn’t it?”

I didn’t think your statement was fucked up. I just thought it was fucked up that you believed that if you felt someone was your soulmate they better feel the same way too because life just isn’t fair then. I had learned that life isn’t fair way before this.

“What if I thought you were my soulmate?” I asked.

“What?” Lip asked. “Don’t be playing jokes right now.”

“I’m not. Why would you think I’m playing a joke?” I asked.

“Jamie, seriously? We used to make mud pies for the grasshoppers in your yard under this tree and you think that makes us lovers? We stopped talking once I got interested in someone. If you were my soulmate, wouldn’t you have stuck around to convince me?”

My blood started to boil and I could feel the hot tears welling up in my eyes.

“What about the time you kissed me twice in one week, Lip? Or how about that right after we kissed you and Katie became the best buds and started falling in love? I couldn’t have even tried to stick around because all you wanted was for me to sit on the sidelines while you got to play. Not once did it cross your mind that, oh I dunno, you really fucked me up with that?” I kept the tears back a moment longer.

“Jamie, we were kids.” Lip said.

“I’ve wanted you way before I was able to understand what wanting really meant. I’m not Katie, shit I don’t even look like Katie, I don’t even share any of her interests, yet we were the Partners-in-Crime. We raced around this neighborhood like we owned the damn lane. We told each other everything, we hung out whenever we got the chance, we struggled to sleep just 14 steps away knowing there was more we could do. So you’re going to sit here and tell me we were just kids when we did everything together as kids, and then some, while Katie just strolled on into your life? If you sit here and tell me you didn’t feel one spark of something with me than you are a liar because all I ever wanted is for you to feel the way I did and still do somewhere in here.” I responded.

I don’t know how after years of silence we were just now having this conversation. The heart-clenching pain of opening old wounds stung too much and old feelings started to seep in. My phone buzzed, showing Peter’s name light up. Stick to your guns is what went through my head as the tears started to stroll down my cheeks.

“Jamie, I have always loved you. You’re such a beautiful person inside and out, but I never felt that way towards you. I mean yeah I like you, and there probably was a time where I thought I really liked you, but I just never really have in that way. I’m sorry if me kissing you led you on or me liking someone else hurt you, but I never meant to hurt you like that. Why would you want me so badly if I didn’t feel the same way? You deserve someone to treat you the way you deserve to be treated, like Peter, not by someone who doesn’t feel anything romantic. I know that’s probably hard to hear, it was hard to hear it from Katie, but . . .”

“Can you just shut the fuck up about her, Lip? She’s gone. She left you. She won’t be back. Let her go. You’re such a liar by saying you never meant to lead me on. Who the hell thinks it’s okay for two neighborhood best friends to friendly kiss twice in one week? I barely got anything but a cheek kiss from my Dad once I was that age and kissing you. Now that I’ve heard your bullshit spill out of your mouth I can finally move on and let go. Am I upset? You can bet your sorry ass I am because what you said about knowing your soulmate is bullshit to me. You can’t expect someone you love to love you back the same ways. You know who I learned that from? You. That’s why I didn’t get my fucking hopes up after high school. That’s why I let people from the community college take my pants off. That’s why I got away from your fucking bedroom window starring me in the face all the time. Shit.” I said.

“What do you want, Jamie? You want to kiss me now? Break up with your boyfriend and realize how shitty I really am because you just assume I’m so shitty for not knowing how I was hurting you.” Lip said.

“No. I don’t want to kiss you. I don’t even want to look at you anymore. You know why? Because Peter never strung me along just to throw it all in my face. He never made me feel comfortable to only rip that away. He didn’t kiss me and then kiss someone else again. You know, maybe you and Katie will actually get back together. You two deserve each other, wait, let me rephrase, you deserve to feel what it felt like being replaced by Katie, only this case with her real soulmate.” I said.

The silence expanded between us and the tears stopped flowing from my eyes. The only sound I heard was the blood whooshing in my ears as my blood pressure started to drop.

“You know what, Jamie . . .”

“Save it for someone who gives a damn, Lip. Now get the hell out of my yard.”

Lip sat there for only a minute before pushing off from the ground and strolling over to his house. The front door opening and closing without a slam.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Once Lip closed the front door of his parent’s house that night, the streetlight down the lane burnt out, leaving me enveloped in darkness. I ripped the piece of paper out of my notebook and stuck it in your mailbox address to Partner. I didn’t see Lip again that summer, not even in passing or entering and exiting his front door. I don’t even know if he unfolded the letter, studied the few words on the page. I don’t even know if he threw it away or crumpled it far away. I went back to Peter in the fall and Facebook told me that Lip and Katie went back together too.