My Heart Won't Let Me

Chapter 21

‘My Heart Won’t Let Me’

It was a crisp January morning when Ross and Rachel walked through the park, their hands intertwined. Rachel’s heart was pounding out of her chest as she stole a few glances toward her boyfriend.

Today was the day.

After mustering up her courage for the whole couple weeks, she decided that today she was going to tell Ross that she trusted him and that she was ready for more. She couldn’t wait any more. She had missed so many opportunities in the past couple weeks and she felt like she was going to explode if she didn’t tell him soon. She needed to tell him. Today.

“-and I’m thinking that maybe we can all visit Joey this summer. Ben is going to be with us for the whole summer break and we can take the kids to DisneyLand.. maybe we can ask Monica and Chandler too, I know Chandler has been dying to visit Joey, Monica wouldn’t stop talking about it..”

“Y-yeah, sure.” Rachel nodded absentmindedly, her mind miles away.

“Hmmm..” Ross eyed his girlfriend and immediately noticed that she looked distracted for some reason. He frowned a little. “Maybe we can ask Phoebe too.. What do you think?”

“Sure..” She replied almost robotically.

“-and maybe we can get a dog too, a big one. A Labrador or something..”

“Yeah yeah.. That’s great..”

Ross’ frown grew deeper at her replies.

“or a lion, we can get a lion instead. I heard they can be tamed.”

“Of course.” She sighed.

“Rach?” He stopped his track, she followed suit and for the first time that day, she looked at him.

“Yeah?”

“What’s going on?”

She shifted her legs, darting her eyes to the ground for a moment before she looked at him again.

“We should talk..” She murmured.

“Oh.” Ross swallowed, his heart pounding in his chest. “Y-yeah, okay..”

“Hey.. It’s a good talk, don’t worry..” She smiled a little, squeezing his hands.

“Okay.” He smiled back. “Our bench?”

“Yeah, our bench..”

“So....” Ross prompted as they both sat on their favorite bench under the tree. He then pulled her closer to him as a particular strong wind attacked them. She smiled thankfully in return.

“You know, I tried. I tried really hard to get over you. I went on dates, I forced myself to move on. I spent so many years trying to do just that and then suddenly I realized.. No matter how hard I try to get over you, my heart won’t let me.” She sighed, smiling as she brought her fingers to his dark locks. “When we broke up, it was like a big part of me died. I thought that this was it. I’ve found the greatest love of my life and I lost it. I lost you.. and to lose something as big as what we had, losing you..” She shook her head as she felt her chest tightened only thinking about it. “-it killed me knowing that we may never get another chance, you know? But... against all the odds, we somehow found each other again. We found each other again, do you know how lucky we are?”

“I do..” He squeezed her hand, blinking back his own tears. “We’re so lucky, I’m so lucky..”

She smiled at him, squeezing his hand back.