2 kids

Not the same.

Ashley.

"If you had the chance to go back, would you?"

I almost choke on my drink, as the liquid almost leaves my body through my nose. Noah has taken me back with this question. It's too complicated for just one answer to exist. The answer isn't straight or clear, it's a cloudy idea living in my head.

Time passes by and I still don't answer him, so he shakes his head. "Alright, let me rephrase that. Would you visit?"

I still don't know what to say.

There's no one in particular who I could visit. Even if I wanted to, there's no one who's waiting for my return, or visit. No one in particular who I'm missing and willing to travel all the way for. My friends turned out to be fake friends, or at least not the ones I had them for. I gave them a key to fake popularity that crumbled the second they didn't have their young and naïve Ashley present anymore. It didn't take them long to replace me and stop contacting me. They stopped replying to my messages very smoothly and elegantly. Like I never existed in the first place.

When it comes to my family...well, it's not worth travelling either. There's no one I have a close relationship with. For most they're just people who happen to be bounded by blood, but that doesn't make them a family.

The only one who I could have been willing to travel back for is right now here with me. And his sister isn't even in Florida anymore.

So no, there's no reason for me to even visit.

I shake my head. "There's not really any reason for me to do so."

"Not even a visit?"

I shake my head again. "Still no reason."

He doesn't seem to understand at all. And he's usually quick to understand things. "What do you mean no reason? Friends?"

I laugh sarcastically. "How were your friends Noah?"

He furrows his brows in confusion and doesn't answer me.

"Are you still in touch with them?"

Three seconds passes by, and he shakes his head.

"See," I take a sip from my drink. "It's the same with me." I place the glass back on the table with a quiet thud. "I don't even know if they're alive."

My words might have sounded colder than I intended, but they're true. They don't know a damn about my life here, and I can only imagine how they're continuing living the shitty way I used to live too.

"I thought you were at least in touch with someone," he says eventually.

I just shake my head, no longer in disappointment. "They can continue living their little toxic lives in their little toxic bubbles. I'm better off without them and they're better off without me. Turns out we weren't compatible at all."

A part of me is still curious to know what would have happened to me if we never moved to New York. Who or what would I possibly have turned into? Just imagining it makes me feel disgusted with myself.

Noah laughs at me. "But you wouldn't even go, let's say, as a vacation? Not with the purpose to meet anyone. Just chill."

I stare at him, then laugh. "In that town we grew up in?"

All Noah does is shrug and sip from his drink.

It's hard to imagine what he means under chill. I'm not sure I'd even be capable of chilling there. Not after all the hardships I've been put through. Not after all the bad memories and feelings I've only got left now.