People rushed through the airport, some running with suitcases scraping along behind them and others just holding tickets and looking around frantically like some magical fairy was going to appear and tell them which gate their flight was at. I shook my head and looked back down at my psychology book, my headphones blocking out all the noise around me as I tried to focus on taking notes for a test that was coming up and calming my nerves.

How was I doing at that?

Fucking horrible.

I found myself just sketching small cartoons and animals in the margins of my text book. The movement of my pencil and the way it flowed across my paper was the only thing really keeping me from jumping up out of my seat and catching an Uber back to the college.

Uncle Leo wanted me home next weekend, but my boss at the nightclub Dakota and I worked at demanded we had all staff on hand for some special event that he was hosting. So Dakota offered to take my shift this weekend, so I could head home. I was missing two classes to fly home today, which was Friday, and fly back late Monday night.

It was a weekend early, so I would miss this party that the club had planned, but at least I would still get to see everyone and hopefully satisfy them all with my presence until I came back next month for Macy’s birthday.

I hadn’t told any of them I was coming.

I wanted to surprise them.

That, and the fact I’d worked myself into a frenzy, figuring out what I was going to say to Ham, and how I was going to make sure he heard me. I didn’t want to give him the opportunity to run. I was going to have my say, no matter how much it was going to hurt, and he was going to hear me.

Enough bullshit.

I’d spent the last two months wondering why I wasn’t even worth a phone call, or a text, postcard, or fucking carrier pigeon, and wondering how we went from what we had, to where we were now.

Opposite sides of the country—no contact what-so-ever.

My hand gripped the edge of my thick textbook, and I bit down hard trying to stop the tears from flooding my eyes. Crying wasn’t going to solve anything. I was so sick of crying.

It wasn’t just like a lost teenage crush.

I felt like I’d lost my best friend. He was there when I needed him, and he was there when I wasn’t sure what I needed at all. He was one of the reasons I’d decided to stop letting people walk all over me, and one of the reasons I wanted to be stronger. To fight harder, so I could be like the other women in the club who stood by their men fearlessly.

I’d thought about that the past couple months I’d been here. I’d asked myself whether I’d failed to be the woman he wanted. And then I realized I was fighting too hard to be who I thought he would want me to be. I was trying to be those women who were ten years older than me, who had been through things I could have never imagined, and who had built themselves back up from the ground, well before they met their men.

I was trying to be stronger for him.

But I needed to be stronger for me.

The last couple of months had been hard, and there wasn’t a day that went by where I wished I could see his smile, or where I wished I could tell him about my day. And even after two months, I still had those thoughts, and it hurt every single time.

But these past couple of months had also forced me to be independent.

Ham wasn’t here to encourage me to go to class, or to help me decide which ones I should take. My uncle wasn’t here to organize people to pick me up and drop me off different places or have someone sit at the library with me at night. The club wasn’t around when I was lonely, giving me an excuse not to make new friends, or join social groups or get a job.

Everything was up to me, and even though there was still a part of me, that introverted girl who’d rather sit at home, read a book, and just have a couple of people close to me, I was going out, and I was making friends. I was passing my classes, and I was finding strength within myself.

And I was doing it for me.

I was fighting for me, to be the woman I wanted to be. Not the woman who would make the perfect old lady. Or the woman I thought Ham wanted to stand beside him.

Was it possible to feel empowered, and still so broken both at the same time?

How was it possible to still love someone who hurt you so bad?

A tap on my shoulder made me jump, my textbook flew off my lap and onto the floor. My hand went straight to my heart, and I looked up to see a face I recognized. His mouth was moving, but my music was still blaring loudly in my ears. I reached up and pulled my headphones out, my heart still pounding against my chest.

“I’m sorry,” Crew laughed as he crouched down and picked up my book off the floor, trying to straighten the pages which had been crumpled in the process. “I said your name before I touched you, but obviously you didn’t hear me.”

I took a deep breath, letting it out with an airy laugh. “And here I thought I was pretty aware of my surroundings,” I said with a shake of my head.

Crew just grinned and took a seat beside me, handing me my textbook and dumping his duffle bag on the ground with a loud thump. Crew lived in Dakota’s and my dorm. We’d met more than a few times, as Dakota had been out on a couple of ‘not very serious’ dates as she would call them, with his roommate Dion. Both the boys were at U of A on football scholarships, and they both had the kind of bodies you’d expect to find on a football player.

Tall, broad, athletic.

Abs for days.

Not that I’d stared for a few seconds too long when I saw Crew walking down the hallway in his towel from the shower. And fortunately for me, I didn’t have to feel guilty about staring because Crew was as gay as the night was dark. Even though by looking at him and talking to him, you’d never guess.

“You heading somewhere?” Crew asked casually.

“Nah, I just really like to hang out at the airport,” I answered with a smirk.

He nodded enthusiastically, pointing across the vast space. “Me, too. That lady over there has been on her phone for forty minutes asking her daddy for money to upgrade her to first class.”

I followed his finger, tilting my head curiously. The woman was wearing a dress that was far too short and had hair that hung down past her shoulders which looked like it had been bleached so many times she was lucky it was still attached to her head. “She looks a little old to be still asking her father for money.”

When I turned back to look at him, he winked with a wide grin. “I’m almost positive it’s a different kind of Daddy she’s talking to.”

I couldn’t hold in the laughter, even though it should really make me cringe. Like the lady had heard me and known I was laughing at her, she looked over, hitting me with a narrowed glare, quickly shutting me up.

Crew coughed, trying to hold a laugh under his breath. I elbowed him in the ribs, and the both of us stilled until Daddy’s girl looked away.

“So, what are you doing here? Heading somewhere?” I asked, teasing him with the same stupid question he’d asked me.

He grinned, his face lighting up and the dimple in his left cheek making me suddenly want to pinch them. “I’m from Houston, flying home to see my mama.” The way he said mama was so sweet and southern, with the hint of an accent I hadn’t picked up on before. “She makes the best chicken fried steak you’ll ever eat. I’ll probably come back twenty pounds heavier for it, and football practice will be like torture.”

“Maybe try not to eat too much of it then?” I suggested, smiling and rolling my eyes.

He placed his hand over his heart and gasped. “And offend my mama? No way.”

Even though I knew he was being dramatic, I couldn’t help but think that Crew wasn’t the type you’d think of as your typical mama’s boy. He was handsome, a little rugged, with a side of boy next door. His short blond hair spiked up on top of his head, and he had the lightest brush of bristles across his face which made him look older than he was, and the red tinge in them I found kind of cute.

Not only that, but he had style. The leather jacket he was wearing wasn’t fake like I saw a lot of the kids on campus wearing, and he had it paired with a pair of black jeans, a plain gray T-shirt and a few chains here and there. Yep, he really knew who he was.

He just so happened to be everything that not long ago I would have found myself wishing would take notice of me, but that seemed so far out of my reach.

This time, extremely far out of my reach given I had the wrong body parts to satisfy his needs.

He leaned in close to me, sinking low in his seat so his mouth was close to my ear. “You know that guy across there has been giving you the eye, hoping you’ll notice him for at least the past hour?” He kept his hands in his lap but pointed with his finger.

The second I looked, a young man with black rimmed glasses and casual clothing instantly met my eye. He smiled, but I quickly looked away.

“Um… ouch,” Crew noted, screwing up his nose.

“It’s not him…” I started but his face instantly cracked, and he snorted out a laugh, the both of us knowing the words that were going to come next, and just how cliché they were. “That sounded stupid, sorry. Long story short… I’m still trying to put myself back together. And honestly, it’s been really hard.”

The smile dropped from his face, and he nodded a gentle and nonjudgmental understanding. “For what it’s worth, I hope he knows what he’s missing out on.”

I hope he knows too.

The muffled sound of a lady’s voice came over the speakers, calling a bunch of numbers that I assumed was a flight.

Crew must have better hearing than I did because he stood and picked up his bag. “That’s my flight.” he grinned. “We’ll catch up when you get back?”

I nodded. “Absolutely.”

He gave me a wave and took off, his long strides carrying him quickly into the distance. I exhaled a long breath, and slumped into the uncomfortable hard plastic airport chairs, feeling like I escaped a situation that made my body twist and turn and just all around feel uncomfortable.

But why?

Things had been okay until he expressed some kind of interest in me.

Then I suddenly turned into this weird, awkward girl who couldn’t form her words properly to talk without it coming out all cliché and fundamentally insulting.

It happened every single time.

Well actually, no, not every time.

Not with Ham.

He never let me get that far. He always took control, made me feel comfortable, turning the butterflies in my stomach into beautiful and electric fireworks.

With him, it was easy.

It was never awkward.

My body knew him. Knew his voice. Knew his touch. And none of that ever made me nervous. It made me excited, and happy.

God, why did everything always come back to him?

I couldn’t even have a guy hit on me without comparing him to Ham.

Everything came back to him—the happy moments, the sad moments, the times where I was confused and not sure whether I was up or down.

He was the most joy I’d ever experienced.

But he was also the most pain.

Something needed to change. Anything.