Choosing Hope

Oneshot

Carter Adams never meant more than a fling to me.

He wasn't supposed to be permanent. We were never supposed to see each other again.

...so how in God's name did I end up in this situation?

--

"...Are you listening, Carter?" I peeked over at him as I hurried into the emerald green dress I had worn last night. It matched Carter's eyes.

"Yeah yeah. You're leaving today and you want to end this as cleanly as possible." he scratched his wavy black hair, which was in a very severe yet oddly handsome state of bedhead, and yawned.

He studied me for a moment from where he was on the bed, an intense look of concentration on his face. "You know you're a pretty cold girl when you want to be, Anna."

"I know. And don't call me that; you know I hate that nickname." I spoke briskly, stepping into my shiny gold stilettos.

"Why, just because your ex called you that means I can't? I'm not him." he said, freezing me in place.

"My EX, has a name. And as stupid as you think I am for not being able to get over him, deal with it. We were together for  longer than you and I would ever have been, so please respect that he was a pretty important existence in my life."

"Ouch. That was harsh."

"You deserved it." 

"I still love you." Carter said, forcing me to look away from his piercing gaze.

"Don't say the L-word to me, Carter. I can't answer you back. You were just a temporary safe house for me. Someone I'd met in this crazy hell of a town at the hotel I was staying at for the summer. That's it." I said, shifting uncomfortably.

"...Fine. But trust me on this when I say that I have a feeling I'll meet you again someday. So you can tell me THEN whether you're still able to think of me the way you do now." he replied with a confident grin, as if he was completely certain that it would happen.

Let him think that. It's not like he would check into this hotel again, and I had led him to believe I wouldn't either. I hadn't told him that my dad lived here and I would come to visit every summer since my mother had died and I had decided to live with my grandma. I had no interest in living with dad's family, so we reached a grudging agreement where I would come once a year. I didn't want to stay at his house though.

I really didn't.

I took one last look at Carter's startling eyes, for some reason trying to capture every speck of colour in them and preserve the memory in my heart.

"Thank you. Goodbye." 

--

Those same green eyes stared back at me now with a mixture of surprise and fondness. His perfect bow shaped-lips formed my name in a silent whisper, jolting me out of my daze.

"Anna."

-

"What are you doing here?" I blurted, unable to hold back the question.

"I could ask you the same question." he retorted, his tone reverting back to the mischievous one I had heard him use back then.

He glanced at my emerald green suitcase, his mouth curving up into his trademark smile. "You still have that old thing, huh?"

I had picked out this suitcase with Carter, when he had whined about how my old one was a hazard to one's sight. He had made me choose this as my new one, and though I had considered throwing it away after we broke it off, some part of me had wanted to keep it. Whether it was a good or bad decision, I still wasn't sure.