Til There Was You - Dr. Harvey x Farmer, Leah x Shane Stardew Valley Fic

chapter 4 - leah

I wasn't upset with Emily for revealing to Jensen that I had slept with Shane. I figured that I would have to tell her myself eventually. It was a small enough town that if two people didn't get along or just didn't interact much, everyone could kind of pick up on it. Emily didn't have any ill intentions, and she had never been judgmental about my choices.

    Months had passed since I last saw Kel, yet I still struggled to move forward. It wasn't that I still had feelings for her, because I knew that I would never take her back, but it just felt like there was something keeping me stuck. I wanted to put myself out there again, because as I had told Jensen, there were lots of single and attractive people in town, but it was like there was an invisible barrier preventing me from fully embracing the idea. Had Kel really altered my perception of love that much? Did I feel like I wasn't worthy of being loved because of the way she treated me? It was frustrating not being able to pinpoint the exact reasons behind my hesitation.

    The first night I had arrived in Stardew Valley, I was desperately lonely. I had been lonely for a long time at that point, even though I had been living with Kel. She was hardly affectionate with me, and sometimes it had felt like we weren't even in a relationship. I really thrive off of human connection, and I was longing for something more than what we had.

    My stomach was filled with butterflies on the bus ride to Stardew Valley, and I couldn't tell if they were from excitement or if I was just about to puke. Kel and I had just gotten into the last screaming match we would ever get into, and in that moment, I realized I had reached my limit and needed to leave. I had been looking at properties in Stardew Valley for a while at that point. I guess some part of me had known that this was the beginning of the end. There was an adorable cozy cottage in the forest that was being rented out by none other than Emily's parents. Kel begged me not to go. I was all that she had. But I couldn't keep putting her before myself. I booked the home rental and left the same night without looking back.

    I've always loved to read classic literature in my spare time, so continuing The Great Gatsby was the best way for me to keep my anxious mind occupied on the journey. I pulled the cozy afghan that I had knitted over my shoulders and huddled into the corner of the bus seat. There was just enough starlight coming in through the windows for me to read...

    "Myrtle pulled her chair close to mine, and suddenly her warm breath poured over me the story of her first meeting with Tom.

    'It was on the two little seats facing each other that are always the last ones left on the train. I was going up to New York to see my sister and spend the night. He had on a dress suit and patent leather shoes, and I couldn't keep my eyes off him, but every time he looked at me I had to pretend to be looking at the advertisement above his head. When we came into the station he was next to me, and his white shirt-front pressed against my arm, and so I told him I'd have to call a policeman, but he knew I lied. I was so excited that when I got into a taxi with him I didn't hardly know I wasn't getting into a subway train. All I kept thinking about, over and over, was "You can't live forever, you can't live forever."

    I looked up from my book as the bus jolted to a stop. As I stepped off the bus, a mixture of uncertainty and excitement coursed through me. I knew I had reached a turning point by leaving Kel behind. The absence of her suffocating presence felt liberating. For the first time in a long while, I would be able to go wherever I wanted, whenever I wanted to, and I wouldn't have to answer to anyone. I wouldn't have to constantly wait by the phone to see if Kel needed me to get her out of whatever fucked up situation she had gotten herself into this time.

    All this freedom was overwhelming, and I realized that the first and only thing I wanted to do was have a drink. Or two. Or more. I've never been a heavy drinker, and I wasn't about to start now, but just for one night I wanted to feel the kind of freedom I had been missing out on for so many years now.