«I had all and then most of you, some and now none of you.»
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Sloane placed a carton box in front of her with a firm thud, making it clear she was not very delighted to be there. Aurora looked at her, obviously confused at the box sitting in front of her but also with a bit of hope. At the end of the day, a bunch of texts and missed calls — or more so a lot of rejected phone calls — Sloane had accepted to meet with her, to talk, or whatever. Although it looked like Sloane would rather be somewhere else than in her mere presence, Aurora couldn't really blame her.
She followed her with her gaze until Sloane was sitting in front of her, staring back at her with expectation. It was hard to read what was going on inside her head, but it was definitely not the joyful Sloane Aurora had been with back in the Netherlands. The situation was cold, and awkward, very unlike them.
As Sloane didn't show any sign of breaking the silence, Aurora cleared her throat and darted a quick glance at the box, then back at Sloane. "What is this?" Her fingers touched the top of the box carefully.
Sloane shrugged. "Your birthday gift." Life truly was evil. "We didn't get to celebrate properly because I moved to New York, then my trip to Zandvoort was very unexpected and hectic so I didn't have time to think about...I thought Austin was it so I just packed it." Aurora felt the lump already forming in her throat. "Open it." Sloane insisted as she always did whenever she gifted Aurora with something, though her usual cheery voice was now replaced by a harsh tone.
Aurora nodded and feeling Sloane's gaze over her, she opened the box with trembling hands. There was a beautiful book inside of it, hardcover with gold details and letters, the pages looked a bit wasted but it was mainly due to the material. Aurora ran a careful finger over the cover, it looked like a collectible.
"The Canterbury Tales." She looked at Sloane, feeling a bit overwhelmed.
"I remembered back in your flat in Naples, I think? Whatever, we were drunk and you talked a lot about books and stuff you were reading during university, and you said how much you loved that one. I found a special edition in a bookstore in New York and thought you might like it, don't know." She snorted like she was remembering something. "It was on display like a holy grail or something, the guy at the bookstore acted like I was purchasing his child." Aurora was surprised she remembered in the first place. "Also, I saw your beat-up copy of it back in your flat in Maranello earlier this year, you read that a lot," Sloane added, and the fact that she noticed all of it was sweet, if not for the coldness of her voice.
During the last twenty-four hours, Aurora had cried enough to probably provide liquid for an entire country and the whole situation happening in front of her wasn't really helping much for her to recover from crying. It was like a reminder that she was the worst friend in the world, and she had betrayed one of the best parts of her life.
Aurora blinked a couple of times to fight the sudden urge to cry, but she wasn't a stranger to the hard pain settling inside her chest.
"This is absolutely lovely, Slo." Aurora's lips tugged into a small smile, however, Sloane didn't even flinch with it. "Thank you so much. I love it." It was so hard for Aurora not to pour her heart out and blurt a bunch of incoherent apologies. That wouldn't even cause anything on Sloane and she knew it. "I wasn't expecting this, I thought you were ma—"
"I bought it for you." Sloane cut her off. "There was no use for me to keep it." Aurora nodded in understanding. "Though I never expected it to turn into some kind of gift at the last supper, to be honest."
