Until Embry Met Eli

the end

December

"You're not gonna bring a million of your books home with you, right?" Louise asked, peering over her shoulder as she applied lip gloss for the third time today. "It's not like you're gonna be able to read all of them while we're gone."

"I just want to have options. I don't know what kind of mood I'm gonna be in," I replied. Ignoring Louise's comment, I continued browsing my bookshelf debating which novels I was going to bring home with me for a month and half. I placed some in my ready-to-go suitcase, already preparing to head back home for Christmas break. In just a week, Louise and I would be going back to Walsh.

"Whatever," Louise said brushing off her statement. "Why are you even packing, we still have like a week left."

"Why not?" I never liked waiting till the last minute to pack anyways. "When are you gonna pack?"

"The morning of, probably," she said while carefully examining her lips in her mirror. I laughed at her response, well knowing she was going to throw whatever clothes she could grab from her closet seconds before she had to leave.

I carefully organized the rest of my novels on my shelf, rearranging them now that some of them were missing. I even managed to start going through my dresser and deciding what winter clothes were going to be most useful while I was gone.

Between folding shirts and cleaning out the bottom of each drawer, the strange sense of déja vu came over me. It felt like I was just packing in my childhood bedroom to come here. The beginning of the semester had seemed so far gone. Only three months ago, Louise was practically forcing me to download the school's dating app not even twenty-four hours of living here. Yet it felt so much longer than that.

I began shifting through my backpack in hopes to clean that out as well, coming across the copy of Dreamcatcher that Eli had bought me. I smiled again at the cover, recounting the ending to last night.

Eli and I continued to lay next to one another for a couple hours after we finished reading, going over every moment about our first date at the café. Although I could hardly bare the idea of having to walk into Offbeat without Eli beside me for my next years at WPU, just remembering the memories we already had with one another was enough.

I still clutched onto the cover, replaying Eli's touch throughout my head. All I wanted was to take myself back to that moment, yet leaving out the part where I cried and discussed the boy I kissed who wasn't even my boyfriend to begin with.

I wanted to text Eli, but I didn't know if I should wait for him to reach out to me. Although we didn't want it to be, there was an awkwardness that seemed to linger between the two of us, even if we both had forgiven one another. Regardless, unsure where the future was going to take us, Eli insisted that we treat this week as any other. For the time being, I was going to pretend as if Eli wasn't leaving come the end of this semester.

"What are you smiling at like an idiot," Louise said with a laugh, throwing one of the pillows form her bed towards my direction.

"Hey!" I exclaimed, picking up the same pillow and throwing it back at her. "It's nothing, just some book Eli gave me."

"Has he texted you at all?" Louise questioned in a concerned tone.

"No, but that's okay," I told myself out loud. "Hopefully he will today," I responded while placing Dreamcatcher into my suitcase.

Louise ended up picking me up from Eli's last night, as I managed to tell her everything the two of us talked about with the smallest amount of tears possible.