Read The Vision for Free Online Page B

leaving my building behind.
    â€œSoooo,” he finally drawled, teasing. “Is that where you met your boyfriend? At work?”
    Immediately any ease I’d felt evaporated. I sensed Jack looking at me but couldn’t meet his eyes.
    â€œNo,” I said, watching my feet scuff along the sidewalk. “We met in a class I took at Lennox U.”
    I flushed at the idea that Jack knew about Lucas. He couldn’t know what had happened between us, but I did and somehow, being here with Jack now made all of that seem so wrong.
    â€œOoh, a college guy.” Jack was still teasing, but it sounded a little forced. “I thought he looked older.”
    I didn’t answer, wishing I could say it was nothing, but that would be a lie. And I didn’t want to lie to Jack. “We broke up,” I said finally. “Before I left.”
    â€œI’m sorry.”
    â€œThanks,” I told him, finally looking up. “But I’m not.”
    He held my gaze for an extra beat and I could feel something pass between us. Jack smiled a little but didn’t answer.
    We were in the preserve by then; leafy trees, still fully green, shading the path. I thought he might ask more about Lucas or the class, but he didn’t and I was glad. Instead, Jack told me about his visits to the Midwest, the schools that he’d seen, until he stopped near a clearing, watching me with an expectant smile.
    â€œDo you know where you are?”
    The leaves of the Japanese maple towering over us were just starting to turn purple at their edges. In another month they’d be bright orange, and when you were up in the tree, the sun filtering through them as it sank low in the sky made it feel like you were inside the sunset. “Of course,” I told him, shielding my eyes to search the branches.
    â€œIt’s gone,” he said.
    I looked at him, eyes wide, surprised how sharp my disappointment was.
    Jack smiled gently. “I felt the same way. Even climbed up to be sure.”
    I squinted back up into the tree like he might be wrong and the old wooden platform that we’d used as a fort would be there, waiting for us. It had been ancient when we’d found it, leftover from when the preserve had been private land. We were nine that summer.
    I looked back at him and shrugged as if it didn’t matter. “Bummer.”
    â€œYeah,” he agreed, circling to the other side of the tree.
    â€œI wonder how long it’s been gone,” I said. “I don’t think I’ve been back here since I was ten or eleven.” The summer after Jack had moved across town.
    â€œYou came without me?” Jack raised his eyebrows in mock disapproval.
    â€œNot much,” I said honestly, thinking how dull it had been sitting up there without Jack to play chess or pirates or I Spy with. “It wasn’t the same.”
    He nodded, swinging our bookbags to the ground and sitting on the big flat rock a few feet away. I walked over to join him.
    We were quiet for a minute, then he said, “That’s how I felt this summer, you know.”
    I looked at him and he flashed me a small smile before looking back at our tree.
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œIt wasn’t the same with you gone,” Jack said.
    My breath caught. I wanted so much to believe it, but Jack and I hadn’t been close since the summer we found the fort. Eight years ago. I told him that.
    â€œI know. But …” He looked over at me, serious and a little uncertain. “I’ve always felt … I don’t know, still … connected?” He gave a small, embarrassed laugh. “That probably doesn’t make any sense.”
    â€œNo,” I said quietly. “It does.”
    He scratched at the rock as he spoke, his voice soft but steady. “At first I didn’t even realize you’d left. It sounds terrible. I mean, what kind of friend am I or how much connection can there be if I