Every “Ocean’s Heart,” day—which is what we call a beach holiday—our whole town comes together, we bake cookies, bring food and random trinkets to play with… and each house has a bowl, you can write whatever you want it in. This year, all of my friends and family, gathered around eating cookies and started to write our letters for my bowl—for _me_ to read. Each house had a bowl, assigned to each person.

My friend group of 3 girls—including me, sat together in a wide circle with others.

“What if you have a love letter?” Mia—my

redheaded best friend—whispered.

“OO! Maybe from Josh?” Aurora, my other Bestfriend chimed in. Aurora was the model in our friend group, she looked like she’d be on a famous TV show—_oh wait_—she was.

“Shhh.” They were being too loud—_or_ I was too paranoid.

Later that night, our trio had a sleepover, and we looked at all of them.

“I found it!” Aurora said, pointing to the sky and jumping up from the ground.

“Lemme see!” I pleaded.

The three of us gathered around.

“I’m glad I met you. But I can’t be friends with you anymore…. I found a girlfriend. I know you’d be glad! Now you don’t have to deal with me anymore! So I wanted to tell you this way, that way you had time to think. Let me know when you see this.”

_Signed Josh. _

Tears rush down my face.

“Honey,” Mia says, as both girls wrap me in a hug.

“I just can’t believe this. I thought—that maybe he liked me?”

“That jerk! He played you!” Aurora cried.

“I can’t believe it,” Mia mumbled, hand on her chin.

My tears started blurring my eyes.

“Why do I care?”

“Why do you care?” Aurora whispered kindly.

“I like him,” I said, finally admitting it myself.

“You just now realized this?” Mia said softly.

“Yes. But he has a girlfriend!” I halfheartedly say, with false jazz hands.

“Let’s look through these other notes.”

After a couple of minutes—and a couple, “Hm,” “Ha!” “Hmmmm,”s, Mia finally threads the silence.

“Look!” Mia said excitedly.

“What?” I wipe my tears.

“A love note.”