“I’m sorry.” His voice was flat and empty. “I didn’t want to do it like this, but I don’t think we should see each other anymore.”
Time stopped. Blake’s words swirled around her, threatening to drag her under yet refusing to sink in.
Farrah’s body reacted first, her heart slamming against her chest in double time while her brain struggled to process the implications of Blake’s statement.
“What?”
“It was fun while it lasted, but the year is almost over and I—I’m not interested anymore. I’m sorry,” he repeated.
“You’re lying.” He had to be. There was no way. No way she could’ve been so wrong.
The past seven months flashed through Farrah’s mind’s eye like a movie playing at two times speed. Their first run-in in the stairwell. Their first kiss. Their first time having sex. The first time they said “I love you.” The secrets they shared, the places they explored, the nights they spent in each other’s arms.
She struggled to breathe. The air thickened into a dark, ugly ooze, making it impossible for oxygen to reach her lungs. There were so many thoughts running through her mind she couldn’t focus, so Farrah grasped at the easiest one to swallow.
Blake was lying. She’d looked into his eyes and seen the love there. She’d felt it. You couldn’t fake that kind of emotion.
He stiffened. “I’m not.”
“You are.” Farrah didn’t know who she was trying to convince more, him or herself. “You said you loved me.”
“I lied.”
Farrah inhaled sharply. True or not, those two words sliced through her like a knife.
Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Do. Not. Fucking. Cry.
“You’re full of shit.” Her voice trembled with uncertainty. “Look at you. You’re shaking.”
Blake clenched his hands into fists. His knuckles turned white. “Farrah.” His voice sounded like a bomb going off in the silence. “I got back with my ex-girlfriend over the holidays. I didn’t know how to tell you. I love her, and I made a mistake here. With us. But I’m trying to fix it.”
A sob escaped. The temperature dropped another twenty degrees, and a strange roaring filled her ears. The fist around her heart squeezed, and right as she was about to explode from the pain, it released its grip and shattered everything in its wake.
I need to get out of here.
Yet Farrah’s feet remained glued in place as she tried to comprehend what was happening. The Blake in front of her wasn’t the Blake she knew. He was so stoic, so unsympathetic, she wondered whether this was a nightmare or if the past seven months had been a dream.
“I’m sorry.”
That broke the spell.
“Stop saying that!” Blake’s eyes widened. Farrah gripped her necklace tight with one hand until the metal dug painful grooves into her palm. “It was all a lie then, this past year.”
Blake looked away.
“Why? Why did you pretend you cared? Was it some sick joke? You wanted to see whether I’d be gullible enough to fall for you? Well, congratu-fucking-lations.” Tears burned her eyes. “You won. Blake Ryan, the champion. Your father was right. You shouldn’t have quit. No one plays the game better than you.”
A tear slipped out and scalded her cheek. Farrah wiped it away angrily. She’d already given him too much. She wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of seeing her cry too.
Blake may as well be carved from marble for all the emotion he showed. “I’m sor—”
Her blood bubbled with rage. “If you say ‘I’m sorry’ one more time,” she hissed. “I’ll go to the kitchen, come back, and cut your balls off with a rusty knife. In fact, I may do that anyway. You’re a fucking asshole. I’m sorry I wasted all this time on you, and I’m sorrier for your girlfriend. She deserves better.”
Farrah summoned the strength to stand. She walked to the door, praying her legs wouldn’t give out before she reached the hallway. She gripped the doorknob and turned around for a last look at Blake.
Other than the slight tremble in his shoulders, he sat there unmoving, face blank.
Blake Ryan. Her first love. Her first lover. Her first heartbreak.
Farrah closed the door with a soft “click.” Her feet moved. One step, two steps, and so on until she reached her room. The ringing in her ears pounded in sync with her steps.
She prayed Janice wasn’t there. She was.
Lady Luck hated her today.
Janice glanced up when Farrah entered before she dove back into her book. A second later, her head popped up again. Her brow furrowed with worry. “Are you ok?”
“Yes.” Farrah smiled so hard her cheeks hurt. “I’m fine. I’m great. I’m—I’m—”
The alarm mounted on Janice’s face.
“I—” Farrah’s anger faded like a flame losing oxygen.
No. Don’t you dare fucking leave.
She grabbed at the remaining tendrils of fury with desperate hands. They were the only things left holding her together, but she may as well have tried to grab sand. They slipped through her fingers until there was nothing left.
“I’m—” Pain rushed in to fill the void. Incredible, soul-crushing pain, the kind that forced her to double over it hurt so much. The dam she’d erected to keep her tears at bay collapsed, sending streams of liquid grief down her cheeks.
That was it.
Farrah curled up into a ball on the floor. She hugged her knees to her chest and sobbed—huge, wracking sobs that shook her body but made nary a noise. Her stomach ached. Her sides ached. Her heart ached so much she was sure she was dying.
All the while, her brain tortured her with memories.
“Whatever happens, we can get through it together.”
“I love you.”
“Never forget how much I love you.”
It seemed so real, so sincere. Farrah didn’t just love Blake; she trusted him. She trusted him enough not only to give him her virginity but her heart. Turns out he’d been playing her this entire time.
I am such an idiot.
Farrah buried her face in her knees, struggling to breathe between sobs. Her mouth dried and her eyes burned, but she couldn’t stop. It was too much.
Everything—the pain, the embarrassment, the shock—it was too much.
Janice sat next to her on the floor and, even though the two girls hadn’t spoken more than a dozen words to each other since the year began, she placed her arm around Farrah’s shoulders and stayed with her until Farrah ran out of tears to cry.
Chapter Thirty-Two
1 month later
The day had come. FEA graduation. Their last night in Shanghai.
Blake didn’t shed a tear at his high school graduation, but a lump formed in his throat as Wang laoshi ended his speech and the ceremony segued into the retrospective portion of the evening. The lights dimmed, a giant projector screen slid down the wall, and the opening strains of Emil Chau’s classic song “Peng You (Friends)” filled the auditorium.
Images from the past year flashed across the screen. There were Blake and Luke, sweaty, grinning, and flashing cheesy thumbs-ups after their orientation week scavenger hunt. Then a semi-candid shot of FEA’s first night at 808—Sammy and Olivia dancing together, Farrah sticking her tongue out at the camera, and Courtney on stage, clutching a drink in each hand with her face screwed up in laughter.