I sniffled and hugged my friend, letting her hold me for a moment before I reached for a box of tissues and settled myself on the sofa. “Will you spend the night?” I asked after a little while of our silence.

“Well, I can’t very well drive home, now can I?” She held up her glass to me.

There weren’t many things left on my list to do. Even if Nic was right and I didn’t need to complete it to feel like I was honoring her memory, I still felt like I needed to finish it. But it didn’t have to take priority. I also didn’t need to keep carrying it around with me. Heaven knows I’d memorized it by now.

Sometimes I’d reach for it when I was missing her and it was a way to get myself thinking about something else. Something I needed to do.

Instead of obsessing over the piece of paper, I started to tear through unpacked boxes, looking for a photo album. Any one of them. I finally reached it at the bottom of one of the heaviest boxes I’d brought over from upstate.

I knew which it was by the cover, it was a small one. From our camping trip around the time I was in grade school. I’d forgotten how much we looked alike. Except her hair was always perfect, her blond shinier and she was always smiling.

I should smile more.

I cried that night. And the next. I took some personal time off work, and it was the best decision I’d made in a while. On Tuesday, I took a day trip upstate to hang out with my dad and the two of us went through some more of her things, remembering the best memories and laughing over them.

Eventually, I cried over August too. Admitting to myself how angry I was at him and how much I missed the man I thought he was all the same.

I spent two days watching romantic comedies, taking bubble baths and leaving my apartment a mess because I was tired of cleaning the life out of it.

I was due to come back to work on Thursday, but Frankie came to my apartment early with coffee and a plain bagel.

Pulling the door open, I groaned. “Do you usually bring a peace offering when you fire employees?” I was allowed time off, but I felt like I’d been really pushing it the last few days.

“I’m not here to fire you.” He let himself in, holding his matching sized coffee.

I sunk my teeth into the bagel and swore I heard a tooth crack. “Did you get this from the cart vendor on third avenue?”

“Yes.”

I chucked the stale bagel in the trash. The coffee was worth the risk.

“How’s Nic, does she hate me?”

“I’m sure she’s great. I gave her the day off.”