A Bucket List for Ella

Chapter 22

Chapter 22

                After a long night of many hugs, an abundance of tears, and more ice cream than could possibly be healthy, it was time for me to go home.  The night post-Liam had lightened the load, if only a little.

            The minute I left Melanie’s, the reality of the world came rushing back to me, and it hit me like a train.  I slumped, now a common action, to a small pile in the elevator, taking it to the roof.

            The doors opened before me to reveal our building’s rooftop sanctuary, complete with beautiful plants and quaint picnic benches.  I ventured across the fenced-in roof to where the ocean was in full view.

            What did I do to deserve this life, I thought to myself.  Talk about getting the short end of the stick.

            Slowly I stepped up onto the cement ledge that enclosed the rooftop.  I looked down upon the city street below me.  Cars rushed by, a multitude of them in fact for such an early hour of the morning.  Every single person had a place to be, a niche, and me?  I was an outcast.

            And maybe I should have felt something, standing atop a building, tens of stories above the solid city street that would gladly welcome my body if I were to fall.  The normal feeling would have been fear, maybe adrenaline.  Maybe even vertigo. 

            Me, I felt nothing.

            So I took a step.

            The safety of the pavement beneath my feet, back on the solid rooftop, suddenly felt as though it had a purpose.  So did the ocean in the distance, the lamp post down the street, and the sun rising in the distance, the dawn of a new day.  In fact, everything had a purpose.

            Including me.

            And when I turned around, I saw him.  I was surprised that I hadn’t seen him sooner.  He was sitting on the table of a picnic bench, his feet planted on the seat before him and his body hunched over his knees.  Slowly I walked over to him and sat down on the bench at his feet.

            “Hear me out,” I warned, holding up my hands before he could protest.

            “Wha-  Ella,” Nico responded, in the voice of an adult scolding a child.

            “I need to explain,” I told him.  “I need you to know that I know I shouldn’t have kissed you.  It was wrong of me to have done that, and it was so stupid of me to have even made that bucket list, much less go through with what was on it.”

            “Ella, you made one small mistake; that’s hardly a sin.  As for the bucket list, I’m the one at fault here.  I had no right to take such control over your life,” Nico told me, looking down at me with apologetic eyes.

            “How can you be so forgiving about this?  I kissed you Nico.  You have a girlfriend.”

            “Actually, that would be had,” he corrected.

            I opened my mouth to say something.  I’m sure my eyeballs were as round as the sun, because Nico started to speak.

            “It’s not your fault.  When you kissed me that day, yeah, I was pissed, but not for the reason you’d think.  I wasn’t angry at you for kissing me – not entirely at least.  I was angrier because I didn’t want to feel something, but I did,” he explained, averting his gaze sheepishly.