She wiped her fresh tears away "I feel like the bad guy. He is right but I do not want him to be. Brennan is amazing. He is funny and kind and considerate, but I do not love him."

I tightened my arms around her and moved her hair out of her face

"I do not think I will ever be able to." She continued "We both agreed that we do not feel a fraction of what you and Stone feel for each other."

"You can’t compare your relationship to others. That is where the trouble starts." I tried to sound sure of myself, but I was not.

The truth was that I could not imagine anyone feeling anything close to what I felt for Stone.

I kept my tone optimistic as I spoke again “If that is really how you feel then you need to tell him. Maybe you can work it out."

"Can we talk about something different?" She asked, fed up with the conversation "How about your birthday?"

I repeated "My birthday?"

"Yeah. Your birthday." She said again before mentioning "I already have you a small something, but I wanted to know if you wanted anything else?"

"When is my birthday?" I asked, cluelessly.

Lana frowned "You do not remember when your birthday is?"

"Of course, I do. It is the same date every year. It is also Halloween so I cannot forget about it." I laughed at her "I know the date. Just not the day."

"It is not this Friday but the next." She answered before questioning "So what do you want for a present?"

"Nothing." I responded honestly "I want to keep it as lowkey as possible. Let's just go and see a movie or something like that."

She crossed her arms and made it clear that the cinema was not an option

"What about what we had planned a few years ago?" Lana mentioned, "We said that when we both turned nineteen, we would try to sneak into nineteen different bars and sing nineteen different karaoke songs and kiss nineteen different guys."

My eighteenth was something similar except I only attended eighteen bars and I only kissed eighteen guys.

"I think Stone might have something to say about the last one." I commented, thinking about how he would react to the news.

"Something to say?" Lana scoffed before giggling "The morgue would get nineteen bodies that night."

I rolled my eyes "That is a bit dramatic."

"Actually, thinking about it," She corrected "Stone would hunt down and kill every male in California before any kissing happened."

"Well, it is a good thing I only want him then.” I joined in with her laughter "He can get my nineteen kisses. More, if he is lucky."

The light from her eyes was once again gone and she tried to keep smiling.