A Glimpse of the Dream by L. A. Fiore Page B

devastated I’d be? Or were they pissed at me, believing that I had also moved on? I had always known they were more Kane’s family than they were ever mine.
    It was a week and a half after I returned to Boston when I finally heard from Kane, making it nearly a month since his last call.
    “Kane?” My voice shook, and my stomach twisted in knots.
    “Teagan.”
    He sounded funny, distant maybe. And what was up with the Teagan? He never called me that.
    “Kane, where have you been? I’ve been calling you for a month.”
    “Sorry,” he said, his words clipped like he was angry, like this was a conversation he didn’t want to have but had to.
    “Is everything all right?”
    “Teagan, I’m sorry to tell you this over the phone, but I’m not moving to Boston.”
    It took a minute for those words to sink in and another for me to react. Devastation hit me first, and then I felt dead inside. I’m not moving to Boston. Who would have thought that so short a phrase could have such a catastrophic impact? And, even though I didn’t want to hear it, I needed to: “Why?” My voice cracked.
    An uncomfortable silence fell. Never had silence been uncomfortable between us. Dread filled my belly. I knew what was coming and, even knowing that, hearing the confirmation from him shattered me. “I met someone. I’m sorry, I really didn’t mean for it to happen.”
    The first time I’d ever seen him flashed into my head—the boy who offered comfort to the broken girl who had just lost her parents—and that image was followed with the one of him standing at the airport security check after having just asked me to marry him. And now his smiles and kisses, his laughter and hugs, would all be for someone else. Camille had been telling the truth.
    “Doreen.”
    “Yes. I’m sorry, Teagan, I can’t marry you.”
    I looked down at his ring, which I hadn’t taken off since he’d put it there. The symbol of our life together, a symbol I drew strength and comfort from. The words barely passed the lump in my throat. “You don’t want to marry me?”
    “I’m sorry.”
    I had never understood the expression “going numb,” but now I did. At that moment, I felt absolutely nothing, not sorrow, not anger, not pain. I felt nothing except broken. My next words came out automatically, because my brain was struggling to make sense of a situation that made no sense. “Do you want your ring back?”
    “No.”
    “Are you happy?” That question was directed at my best friend, not my lover, because despite everything, I wanted him to be happy.
    “I am. And you’ll be again too.”
    “No, Kane, I won’t, not now. Be happy. I really do hope you’ll be happy.” I wasn’t going to say it, but I felt it, even if he didn’t anymore, and this would be the last time I could. “I love you, Kane.”
    My thumb pressed the “End” button, the action so final. Not just the end of the call but the end of us. I sat there, staring down at my phone, the tears welling up and over my lower lids, because I didn’t know where to go from there. He had been my life; all of my happiest moments were with him, my whole world’s happiness was him. And he had found someone else.

    Simon found me looking out at the Charles River, watching the sunrise. It had been two days since Kane’s call, two days since learning that the future I’d wanted so much to have with him wasn’t to be. It hadn’t really hit me yet, because there was a part of me that just didn’t believe it. Every time I thought of him moving on, the image of him on one knee on the side of the road flashed in my head. I truly believed his actions had all been genuine: his love for me, the sincerity of his proposal, and the absolute certainty in his expression that what he was asking, what we were committing to, was what he wanted.
    “Teagan?”
    Simon stepped up next to me, touching my chin with his fingers and forcing my gaze to his. He always had a smile on his face, but not now.