Page 80 - In Five Years

All at once my eyes sting up with tears. It is an unusual reaction for me, and I
blink, more in surprise than in an effort to stop it. Bella looks so hopeful sitting
across from me. Naïve, even. So full of the possibility she purports to feel. And I
have a giant secret I cannot tell her. Something profound, terrible, and strange

has happened in my life, and she doesn’t get to know.
“I guess I’ve had you all to myself for a really long time,” I say. “It’s not fair,

but the idea of you being with someone for real makes me feel, I don’t know.” I
swallow. “Jealous, maybe?”
She sits back, satisfied. Thank god I came up with something. Bless me for
being a lawyer. She buys it. This makes sense to her. She knows I have always

wanted the space closest to her, front position, and she has given it to me.
“But you have David, and it’s fine,” she says.

“Yeah. It’s just always been that way, so it feels different.”
She nods.
“But you’re right,” I say. “It’s dumb. I guess emotions aren’t always rational.”

Bella laughs. “I genuinely never thought I’d hear you say those words.” She
reaches across the table and squeezes my hand. “Nothing is going to change, I
promise you. Or if it does, it’ll be for the better. You’ll see me even more. You’ll

see me so much you’ll be sick of me.”
“Well then, cheers—I look forward to being sick of you.”
Bella smiles. We clink glasses. Then she waves a hand back and forth in front

of her face. “So you like him, sorta. Maybe. You’re jealous. We’ll leave it there.
Okay?”
I shake my head. “Sure.”

“But he really is—” She starts, and her voice trails off, her gaze with it. “I
don’t know how to describe it. It’s like I finally get it, you know? What everyone
always talks about.”

“Bella,” I say. “That’s wonderful.”
Bella wiggles her nose. “What’s new with you?”
I take a deep breath. I blow some air out of my lips. “David and I got

engaged,” I say.
She picks up her water glass. “Dannie. That’s decades-old news.”
“Four and a half years.”

“Right.”