Page 13 of When Forever Falls Apart

“I was thinking,” I begin, quickly swallowing a piece of toast smothered in jelly. A few crumbs drop into the cleavage of the white tank top I am wearing, but I ignore them and continue, “There are a few things I want to take care of today in the city. Do you guys mind if I crash for another night?”

“Mi casa es su casa.” Aston grins annoyingly.

Eva furrows her brows. She’s been overprotective since the moment I got here, fussing over me like I’m some broken baby bird. “You can’t avoid going back forever. What exactly do you need to do today?”

“Just stuff,” I mumble, lowering my gaze. “Work stuff.”

“I thought you quit?”

I shake my head. “A leave of absence. I mean, I tried to quit, but Esmerelda, my boss, insisted I take a break without making any rash decisions.”

Aston nods, then takes a sip of his coffee. He likes his Americano with an extra shot. I cringe at the bitterness of his choice.

“It makes sense. You love it there.”

“I did love it there.” My voice drops to almost a whisper. “But, you know, Myles is still there. At least, I think he is.”

A familiar silence enters the conversation. I bite into the remainder of the toast, the crunch echoing among our absent words.

“You can’t avoid Myles forever,” Eva points out.

My eyes slowly lift, acknowledging the reality of the situation. I wasn’t the one who told him it was over. It was Aston. I was, and still am, a coward. “Of course, I know that. I just… I just don’t know what to say.”

Eva sighs, then leans her elbows on the breakfast bar. “You can start with the truth. When Aston ran into him—”

I raise my hand, shaking my head. “You ran into him and didn’t tell me?”

Of all the ridiculous things Aston and Eva have told me, how the hell hasthisnot come up?

Aston closes his eyes, then opens them to glare at Eva. She shrugs, then crosses her arms as if to say,I warned you this would happen.

“About a month ago, I saw him at a dinner,” he answers with reluctance.

“A dinner?” My tone escalates as the knot in my stomach tightens. “Did the two of you have dinner?”

“No,” Aston rushes. “This is exactly why I didn’t want to tell you. You’re getting worked up over nothing.”

“Um, excuse me for wanting to know how my ex-fiancé is doing after I left him at the altar!” I stare back at him coldly,unapologetic for raising my voice. “God, Aston, you’re such a jerk for keeping this from me. I mean, how did he look? Did he ask about me? Where is he now? What happened to the production schedule after I left?”

Across from me, Aston presses his lips shut, waiting for me to calm down. “See, again. This is why I didn’t tell you. What does it matter how he looked?”

I glance at Eva, who nods in obvious agreement with me. “I asked the same questions.”

“Both of you are crazy,” Aston drags a cloth over the counter, distracting me with his obsessive need to clean the kitchen while we’re in the middle of the single most important conversationever. “For the record, he looked normal.”

“Normal?” I repeat in a high-pitched voice. “Like there were no dark circles around his eyes? A hunch in his back? Any obvious sign of depression?”

“Jesus Christ, Madelina. It’s not a romance novel you’re reading. He looked like a man who had kept himself well intact for the sake of showing his face again. There, happy?”

My shoulders slump under the weight pressing against my chest. No matter which way I try to spin it in my head, hurting Myles doesn’t get any easier.

Eva places her hand gently on my arm. “You did the right thing, despite what Myles may or may not look like right now. It was never going to be easy, but I promise one day you’ll wake up, realize Myles is better off, and accept you did the right thing.”

I’m waiting for that day, though I feel like it’s never going to happen. I nod out of necessity, then blurt out, “Right. Like with you and what’s-his-name?”

Aston stops wiping the counter, crossing his arms with a sudden coldness. “What’s whose name?”

“Olly… Oliver,” I stumble with a knowing smile. “God, he was hot. A soccer player, too.”