She was silent. How foolish was she to think that their summer would be frozen in time. That the leaves would never turn brown. That their Special Spot by the pond would never freeze, trapping all its fish and creatures underneath. Time doesn't stop, it doesn't wait for you, it takes and it takes and it takes. And now, it's taking again.

"Baby..."

"Don't." She was short with him. She knew it wasn't his fault. She knew that none of this was his fault. But she still hated him, she hated him for doing this.

His body pulled back, tensing up on the picnic blanket. She didn't look at him, her eyes locked on the sky, its pink and orange blending into a beautiful, complicated mosaic.

"You know we can't make this work, not with me across the world." His voice was soft, and gentle. She noticed it was almost the same voice he used with his younger sister, the "I-don't-want-to-hurt-you" voice.

"...You're fiddling." He gestured to her hands wound loosely in her lap, the fingers dancing against each other with anxiety.

"...I can't help it." Her voice cracked on "help," the tears smashing through the hard wall she had been keeping up the entire night, the entire past week. Before she could pull them back in, she was crying, sobbing, even.

He pulled her to him, shushing and cradling her against his chest, "It's okay, it's okay."

It wasn't okay. None of this was okay. The love of her life was leaving her. Her person was leaving her. Your person isn't supposed to leave you, they're supposed to be with you until the end. That's how the story goes. It's how their story should go, but it ends here.

"You really can't...can't visit?" She whispered between the tears.

He held her tighter, "Even if I can, is that really worth it? To see each other for a day once every other year?"

She didn't answer. He didn't care as much as she did. Perhaps, she wasn't even his person.

"Can we just...pretend? Just for one more night?" As she had done a hundred times before, she pushed her problems down, down, down into her.