(Part One)
Three words, eight letters.
They fall from her mouth. Heavy and final.
Her eyes are hard and wet, cheeks flushed and hands gripped into fists so tight, her knuckles are white and she's cutting into skin.
Three words, eight letters.
Funny how I love you sounds the same as "I hate you."
His head drops, chin falling to his chest as the words cut through the air. The slow beat of his heart burns in reminder.
He presses his lips together and nods.
Looks back at her one last time before he says, "Good."
She turns away then, stares out the window and doesn't watch him leave.
Good.
-----
She landed her dream job, by her own hard work. Night and nights spent rehearsing lines going over the script collective times-and not to mention bringing coffee for the director more than once in an hour. No matter how tempting it is to do it the easy way by putting a name in which will guarantee her the job, she resists. She has a point to prove and the satisfaction she feels at the end of the day when she leaves that office with her name signed on the dotted line and a handshake is worth it.
She'll deny it if ever asked, but it fills the hollowness in her chest only for a fleeting moment. She'll make do with hiding the rest of eternity behind her bright smile and empty laughter, and prays no one will ever notice.
It's several months into the job when she meets him.
Jet black hair and dark eyes hidden behind a pair of designer frames. He's smart and charming, confident but not overly so. He looks nothing at all like him, and so when he asks her with a hopeful smile whether she'd like to have coffee with him, she takes only the five seconds to remind herself that he isn't coming back for her, and answers, "Yes. Yes I would love to."
Coffee dates turn into dinner dates.
And dinner dates end with kisses on a sidewalk and the promise of more when she's ready. He smiles with understanding, and says so earnestly that he'll wait forever for her, and she almost believes him. Almost.
-----
Still, when she calls up Ariana, and recounts every detail of her new life, the excitement she tries to infuse in every word doesn't quite hit the mark, and her best friend sees right through it.
"Liz," she says, voice weighed down by exhaustion, "He doesn't know your past ."
"So?"
"So," she sighs, and it's that split second in which she hears her change her mind, give in, stop fighting, "So nothing. I'm happy for you."
She doesn't question it. Years ago she might have.
"Thanks."
She says nothing more.
"Ari?"
"Yeah?"
"You okay?"
The answer's no. She knows this only because she knows just as well what missing an old cast member does to you, not that either one of them will admit to it.
It sits there, unspoken between them. A topic by silent, mutual agreement to never be broached.
"I'm fine."
