“Okay, yeah. I do. I know you like me. What else do you need to hear?”

Wes lets out a laugh, as though he can’t believe the absurdity of my question. He stands up and turns to leave, then stops and turns back around.

“I need you to say you like me, too, Gabriela. But only if you really do.”

There’s something about hearing a guy say your name aloud like it’s his favorite word in the whole world. Just for a second, I could picture it. Me and Wes. At prom. At grad night. All winter and spring and summer long. Maybe Parisa would get used to it. Maybe I’d never screw it up and hurt him six months from now. But for some reason, I can’t bring myself to tell him what he wants to hear. It feels too scary and monumental and life changing. I can’t get swept up in this moment and confess my love, only to wake up and regret it in the morning. So, instead, I give the most generic and, well, honest response possible.

“I don’t want to ruin our friendship.”

He nods, disappointed. But he doesn’t storm off like I expect him to. Instead, he sits back down.

“I don’t want to ruin it either. But that’s just it. I don’t think we would. Maybe we’d just make it better.”

We stay together, in tortured silence, for what seems like forever but is probably only a few minutes. He clears his throat and starts to speak.

“You know that day freshman year when I—”

“We don’t have to talk about it.” I’m quick to cut him off. It’s too embarrassing, and I’ve worked so hard to get the image of him soiling himself out of my head.

“No, we do. It wasn’t the cafeteria spaghetti and meatballs. I’d been sick to my stomach all day because… it was the day I found out my mom had cancer. The thought of losing her—it just, I don’t know, did something to my insides, I guess. My parents had a lot of hope when they told us, but for some reason I didn’t. For some reason, I just knew it wasn’t going to end well. And I could, like, feel my organs disintegrating. That’s what it felt like that day. We were really close. My mom and me.”

I nod. A lump is lodged in my throat, and it actually hurts. The only way to make it go away is if I let myself cry, but I don’t know if that will make Wes feel worse or better.