We Always Will Be

"You and I...we never were. But we always will be."

The motion of my head nodding caused the tear to dislodge from the corner of my eye. The liquid felt warm against my cheek.

Jack put his hand in his pants pocket as he paced in a small circle next to the fireplace. His other hand stroked the bottom of his chin. It was a movement I had come to love.

I knew he was right.

"I don't think I can be your friend," I said. Out loud, it was a simple sentence. But in reality, it was a few words that would end two decades.

"Are you my friend?" Jack removed his hand from his pocket and crossed his arms across his chest in a gentle motion. "I don't...most of what I do with you is not what I do with my friends."

"But it is what you do with your wife," I hid as much of the bitterness as I could from my tone.

Jack tilted his head and raised his eyebrows. He heard the bitterness.

"Jess," his voice had lowered. "You knew that when this started."

The bitterness came back again. "When did this start? Was it four years ago at my store? Or was it in eighth grade? You were with herthen, too. I've lost track of where you and I start and stop, Jack."

I paused. Jack did too. If this was our final stop, I didn't want it to end with something I would regret.

Everyone knew Jack and Amanda's destinies had intertwined at birth. It had been a running joke throughout elementary school. Their parents had been best friends and graduated from the same high school we attended. In sixth grade, they finally fulfilled their prophecy and became a couple.

By eighth grade, they had broken up a couple of times. I became friends with Amanda the same year and met Jack by proxy. He was the football star, and I was the cello geek. Amanda was the head cheerleader who ran the school, but somehow she had chosen to be my friend. She was one of my only friends.

Then came the breakup that brought the note. Their relationship took a "final" end, and they separated during lunch. When I got to my locker at the end of the day, a note fell out when I opened it.

Do you want to meet me before school tomorrow? - Jack.

A note, folded in the shape of a diamond, became the groundwork of the next twenty years of our lives.

That night, after reading the note dozens of times, I messaged Jack on an instant messenger program. I was convincedthe note had been put in my locker by mistake. Maybe someone else had delivered it for him and mixed up Amanda and me in the hallway. Or, it was a cruel joke. I wondered if Jack and Amanda were back together and had decided to have a little fun. He insisted it was a legitimate request, and that he wanted to meet me. But I couldn't bring myself to face the embarrassment if my suspicions turned out to be true.

The next morning came and went, and I avoided meeting Jack before school. That night I got another message online about how disappointed he was that I didn't show up. He made the request a second and third time that week, and finally stopped when I didn't meet him.

A week later, Amanda apologized to Jack and asked for another chance. They started their relationship again, and shewent back to spending time at his house. In doing so, she went through his instant message history while he was in the bathroom. When she discovered the details of the note, she disregarded the part where I had not fulfilled the request. My friendship with Amanda disintegrated over the diamond-shaped note.

After college, I ran into him at a restaurant. Amanda was out of the picture again, and also out of the country. When they decided to take a break, she decided to take a semester abroad. Jack and I spent the summer together but when Amanda returned and had changed her mind, I was back to second choice.

When Jack walked into my boutique, I had noticed the wedding ring but his marriage was a suspicion before I even saw his hands. I had stopped following him on social media after the summer fling and did not want to know if they had taken their relationship to the next level. But most men who shop at Curious Creations are there for their wives; they are either in trouble and need to buy a unique candle to make up for it, or they are shopping on time but still need one. The proximity to the parking lot makes my store a quick errand at the Galleria.

Jack never admitted if he had known it was my store when he stopped there for the gift. I had moved far enough from our hometown that it was not common knowledge that I was there, but it wasn't a secret that it was mine either. He spoke to me the way you would an old friend you had never seen naked. He had missed Amanda's birthday, due to a business trip,and because he forgot. He needed a candle with a surprise ring to settle his guilt. With my assistance, he picked Lilac Rush, a scented candle with a ring worth $100-500 inside.

"It's always going to be her?" I asked one more time. I had asked it several times over the last four years, but I knew this would be the last.

When Amanda got home from her first appointment with the black and white photograph, Jack had sent me a we-need-to-talk text. We had been talking for three hours.

Jack nodded.

I wiped my hands on my leggings and stood up. I bit my lip and took a deep breath.

"We always will be," I repeated.