Read I Still Remember for Free Online

was as much self-preservation as it was cowardice, because I failed to say goodbye.
    “I promise.” This conversation should not take place while we’re both naked in Amy’s backyard. “I really have to go now.”
    As I scramble for my clothes, sadness overtakes me. What if twenty years is not enough to forget the hurt I’ve caused her? What is this, anyway? Because, I may want to bring Amy breakfast in bed tomorrow morning, but as far as I know she’s still a twice-divorced heterosexual woman—and nothing has changed at all, except for the few grey hairs sprouting from my scalp and the deepening laughter lines Joe, my make-up guy, always makes fun of.
    Amy watches me leave. She’s still naked, not making any effort to cover herself up. I bend down to kiss her on the forehead—and to commit the scent of this afternoon to memory.  

    It was the beginning of summer after our high school graduation. Amy and I both knew we’d be going our separate ways at the end of it, each to colleges miles away from one another. But we had one last summer of lounging by the pond, talking about boys—in Amy’s case—and trying to muster up the courage to tell her how much I loved her—on my part. We had big plans to visit each other during breaks, and the Christmas reunions we’d stage would be epic.
    Because I couldn’t bring myself to tell her, I felt more like a fraud every day. One afternoon, something inside me broke. I was sitting by the edge of the water, eyeing Amy as she ducked above and below the surface. When she pulled herself out, a million water drops clinging to her skin and reflecting the summer sun, the vision I had of her was too much.  
    No one knew how I felt, and I couldn’t tell my best friend. Insecurity, teenage hormones and the overwhelming sense of not having a clue as to who or what I was, knotted into a ball in the pit of my stomach. It sat there growing every time I looked at Amy. And I looked at Amy a lot those days.
    “Brett’s bringing his friend Paul tonight. You know, the handsome one from basketball.” Amy plunged herself down next to me, spraying my skin with water drops. “Surely, he must be good-looking enough for you, Eli.”
    I resented the fact that she just didn’t see. That she felt the need to set me up with boys I wasn’t even remotely interested in. That she assumed I was just like her. At the same time, I knew it was wrong to feel that way. And I wanted her so much. I wanted to kiss her and tell her to forget about Brett and Paul. We spent all of our time together and we got along so well. Why was that not enough?
    But I knew it didn’t work that way.
    “I have to go.” I started getting up, for once almost more repulsed by Amy’s half-naked body than turned-on.  
    “Now? Why?” Amy arched up her eyebrows. “You are coming tonight, aren’t you?”
    “I’ll see.” Suddenly, I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. “I’ll let you know,” I said more to myself than to her, as I made my way out of Amy’s yard.
    When I arrived home I told my parents I had changed my mind and did want to enrol in the summer school programme my college offered. They’d been keen for me to attend, and shipped me off a week later. Six weeks before I was supposed to. I saw Amy one more time before I left.

    Throughout my dad’s birthday party, my mind is on Amy. On how her fingers dipped so eagerly between my legs during the massage, and how, despite the undeniable intimacy we shared, everything else has been left unspoken.
    I have to skip town early enough the next day to make it to the newsroom on Monday. I feel as if time is slipping away from me again, just like it did that last summer. The same kind of pressure builds in my gut, and by the time the party ends, I’m torn. It would be so easy to sneak off the next day, and pretend it never happened. To not have to face any consequences and just move on.
    But I saw the fire in Amy’s eyes—a fire I might have been too young