Burning Bridges (Part I)

Chapter 1

I hate packing. It is bad enough when I have to do it for a two week vacation, let alone when I have to uproot my whole life and move to an entirely new city.
Do they have LED enabled jump ropes in Toronto? Ughhhh, what am I thinking, I don't even use half this stuff, it just takes up my much needed space in the closet. Well at least I packed my Kees van der Westen espresso machine. In fact, that is the first thing I packed. People have their obsessions and mine is coffee. So much so, that I take a coffee tour in every city I visit and in addition to that, I have taken a professional barista course, brewing course, sensory skills course and a roasting course. Little old me with my unhealthy attachment to coffee.

"Stop obsessing! Just take whatever it is you can't live without and I'll bring the rest when I come up there next month" says Jessie, my best friend since kindergarten.

I look over at her and see her standing exasperated over a pile of work out equipment, which is, by the way, her default expression. She is very much the no bullshit type of a girl. At 5'11' she is three inches taller than me and I always wonder why she never wanted to become a model. She has this rich raven hair that somehow shines in the dimmest of lights, has the same dark eyes to match and her skin is always so tanned and glowy it's like she doesn't even need the full, doll shaped lips. She'd still be like a unicorn even if she had a unibrow and Dumbo ears.

We were quite the pair growing up. She was the strong willed and unbothered one while I was more on the down low. I think that is what brought us together in the first place. One day when we were 5, there was this boy named Steve that was giving me trouble in the schoolyard because he had heard that my parents enrolled me in a martial arts class. First, he started hackling me and saying that I could never beat him, and then when that never elicited a reaction from me he started pushing me here and there. When I still wouldn't react he pulled my hair in front of the whole class in the yard one day and that is when Jesse entered into my life. I wasn't as tall then, but she was, she towered over Steve and said that if he wouldn't leave me alone she would tell the whole class how he cried when he fell of the see-saw. That little dude never bothered me again, and me and Jesse were inseparable since.

I kept going to my martial arts classes and had to use what I've learned only a couple of times so far, once in high school when I broke a boy's nose for being too grabby, and once in college when I doubled over a guy for almost the same reason. Jesse loved me for it, but my Sensei gave me an hour long lecture each time about how what I know is like a concealed weapon and should never be used to brag, and how I should never throw the first punch. My mom and dad were secretly proud nevertheless.

Anyway, I kept going to martial arts classes until about the time I finished college. When I started working I had less and less time and energy to go train for two hours five days a week. Now a days I stick to hiking, running and my improvised in-home gym for quick workout sessions.
Hence the pile that Jesse was looking at like it was a Rubik's cube she couldn't solve. I will miss her, my ride or die, and I will miss this little apartment in Seattle that has been my home for three years. I'll miss my colleagues that became my friends, Jimmy's Bakery on the corner of my street that has the best egg sandwich on this side of the continent, I will miss seeing old lady Gwyneth and her French bulldog Tudor every morning on my run, and most unbelievably, I will miss the rain.

"Listen. You have got to stop moping around and procrastinating like this. You have a great job, and you just got promoted to lead engineer, with amazing benefits I might add, but all that smart is kinda lost on you now." says Jesse and yanks me out of my own thoughts.

"Jessobel Flynn!" I know she hates being called Jessobel, but I also hate being called dumb.

"Uh-oh! Now you've done it Mila Hoffman" she says this and launches a hackie sack at my head.

"Ouch!" I say laughing "where did you find this thing?"

"In this crap pile that you keep just in case, but never use. I'm so glad you're moving because now I get to throw out all this shit that has been bugging me like crazy!"

" Hey! They are keep sakes, you know. Memories."

"Yeah, memories of all the duchebags you've dated."

"Hey! They weren't all duchebags!"

"Yeah?! Name one. Philip that was a peace-loving-plant-eating activist that rarely showered, or Brad who lived with his mother, or maybe, oh and this one is my favorite, Chris the man child that you took care of for 11 months because he was too lazy to get a job?!"

"Mhm, and you're the one to point fingers miss - I'm dating a married guy" I say and immediately regret it. I know how Jesse felt about him. She thought he was the one.
"Oh, not him... I didn't know he was married, you know that. He was lying from the start".

"I know, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to open old wounds" I go to her to hug her.

" Okay, but you have to promise never to mention him again".

"Promise. I love you."

"Love you to babe. And I am going to miss you so much. But I'll be there every chance I get, and you have to come back as often."

"I will, you know I will. Head quarters is is Seattle so I will be back at least every three months, and you can come in between."

"Of course I'll come! That apartment they hooked you up with is amazing! I have to make sure you don't start hoarding ugly stuff you never use. I don't want you chasing away eligible bachelors" she says and pinches my nose.

"No bachelors for me! I've had enough. I'm 26 and I need a break from dating. I might get a cat... and take up knitting... or pottery."

"I. Will. Kill. You. You know how hot Canadians are, right? You need to get yourself a hockey player asap and let him hit your puck. You need no-strings-attached sex, not start romanticizing a guy and fall in love in like 3 minutes."

"Ew, Jesse! Direct much?!"

"Yup Mila, baby, that's me deal with it. Now keep on packing. We have to be done by tomorrow night. My brother is coming on Saturday to help us move all the stuff you are leaving behind to my place. And you know Mike doesn't like his time wasted."

"Got it chief!" I army salute her and get back to my packing.

After some time I look at the clock and it is 2 a.m. We have been packing for 6 hours and most of the stuff is separated in to Bring-Toss-Donate boxes. I get up from the floor to stretch my sore limbs. I never realized that packing is such a feat. Jesse gets up as well, stretches, yawns and tells me she is dead tired and calls a cab. Fifteen minutes later we hug and say goodbye and I am left standing in the middle of my half empty apartment. I can't think about this right now, I need a shower and about ten hours of sleep.

The minute my head hits the pillow I am dead asleep and dream of nothing in particular.