If Only I Had Told Her

by Laura Nowlin

but I was holding the line again. I could make my move.

We were friends again.

Every day, we were together, talking and laughing like old times. I wasn’t going to miss my chance to show her that I could be who she wanted.

Still though, I was kissing her. My body was full of wonder and hope.

maybe, maybe then I would have had a chance to be her boyfriend.

had ruined everything.

even hope in his eyes, like I would have good news about Autumn.

It was one of the worst moments of my life.

“I don’t know what to do. She was my best friend.”

you and Autumn have grown apart, we understand, but I wanted to know if you’re okay with your friendship with Autumn.

I thought it was painfully obvious how I longed for Autumn. The idea that anyone could not see it stunned me.

Later, maybe they become close again, or maybe they become something more than friends. Maybe.”

‘Autumn is where she wants to be right now, and that’s okay. I’m still great, and I’ll be around if she needs me.’

While Autumn ignored me, I’d transform myself.

So though it hurt whenever I was near her, I ignored that and stared at her out of the corner of my eyes like an addict desperate for a fix. But I gave Autumn time, and I gave Autumn space, and I worked on myself.

Fantasizing about having spent a different sort of night with Autumn in that tent and then mulling over all my mistakes that have kept us apart did not improve my mood.

Autumn doesn’t want me thinking about her that way. I need to get control of myself.

You are here, in this moment, right now,

The reality is, what you imagined will never happen, and what you remembered is already done. In this moment, Autumn is your friend. Don’t fuck this up. But be ready for when she leaves again.

one last time before I break up with her,

It’s one of the things I love about her. She never does anything by halves; she never lets an opportunity pass her by.

Jamie had broken up with Autumn.

I mean, we’d all heard Jamie brag about how he and Autumn would be together forever.

Autumn and I were hanging out every day.

I’d missed her call because I was watching a movie with Autumn.

“You and Autumn are friends again?”

“We were never not friends,”

I’ve managed to not mention Autumn, despite how much we’ve been together this summer.

I was still in love with Sylvie, and when I originally fell in love with her, I’d already been in love with Autumn for years. So

I love Sylvie, but I can’t say that I will be in love with her every day for the rest of my life. I adore so much about her and understand her foibles, but I’m not devoted to her. She’s a partner but not a part of who I am.

My devotion to Autumn is engraved on my very being.

know I will always love her in the same way I know I’ll always need oxygen.

“I love you too,” I say, and it’s not a lie. It’s just not the whole truth.

my ability to brush off the snarky comment from that junior, my new teammate, made me seem cool.

“You’re…Finny, right?” Alexis said. “Finn, actually,” I said, but I took it as evidence that Autumn had talked about me to her friends.

that “Autumn” look as I’d come to think of it.

Sylvie, blond with a willowy ballerina figure and tall enough to look me in the eyes without raising her face, is Autumn’s physical opposite in every way. Except that they are both beautiful.

“Sylvie seems like she’s…herself? And I like that.”

Autumn is where she wants to be right now, and that’s okay.

I almost

always have a book I’m reading, slowly and steadily.

The best thing about Jamie breaking up with Autumn is that I don’t have to worry about him pressuring her into becoming a teacher.

I don’t think Jamie ever understood Autumn. Jamie.

Wuthering Heights is about

childhood friends in love. I wanted the plot to reveal that Autumn and I were meant to be together.

There’s some Heathcliff passion for you, Autumn. Now Jamie can get you pregnant, and I’ll give myself a concussion on a tree when you go into labor.

Autumn brings out the worst in me, and it’s not her fault.

Either Autumn and I are the two stupidest people in the world who somehow don’t realize we’re in love with each other, or she’s fucking with me.

If Autumn knows I adore her, what would she get from torturing me with her presence all summer?

topics. At school, I could pick out her laugh in a crowded hallway. In class, I could predict her feelings about books assigned and events studied.