He Left Me in the Rain for My Best Friend Chapter 03

He Left Me in the Rain for My Best Friend Chapter 03

Two days later, I returned home alone.

The second I saw my mother, all the hurt swallowed me whole.

I broke down crying.

“Mom… I don’t want to go to college in Boston anymore…”

The three of us had made our college application lists together.

Almost every school we chose was in Boston.

That city had once felt like a dream.

It had motivated me again and again.

Now, just like Caleb Sterling, it had faded in my heart.

But it was too late.

The applications had already been submitted.

There was no changing them.

Mom held me and stroked my back with aching tenderness.

“Okay. Wherever you want to go, I’ll support you.”

The next day, Mom left me breakfast and went to run her food truck.

I was soaking my hands in disinfectant and scrubbing them hard with a brush when I heard someone knocking outside.

It was Caleb Sterling.

“Why didn’t you answer your phone or reply to my messages? You could’ve at least told me you were safe…”

He spoke with anger and helplessness, but halfway through, he saw the flowers in his hand.

It was like he suddenly remembered he had come to apologize.

“I’m sorry. I was wrong. Don’t be mad, okay?”

“From now on, trips will be just the two of us. Ivy won’t come with us anymore.”

I didn’t take the flowers.

Awkwardly, he placed them on the cabinet.

Then he took out a cloth pouch.

“Ivy spent a whole day making this silver bracelet for you by hand. Her period cramps were so bad her lips turned white, and she even smashed her fingernail with the little hammer.”

“You can be mad at me, but don’t take it out on her. She’s worried about you, and she blames herself. Her eyes are swollen from crying.”

I closed my dry, aching eyes.

I wanted to ask if he was blind or just heartless.

His apology was careless and empty.

But his concern for Ivy Harper was as deep as ever.

I remembered one time when I didn’t know Ivy had started her period.

I handed her an iced drink.

Before it reached her, Caleb took it from my hand.

He said nothing.

He turned and went back into the convenience store to exchange it for a room-temperature bottle.

Ivy smiled gratefully.

Then she kept chatting with me like nothing had happened.

I rubbed my fingers, numb from holding the cold Coke, and my chest felt heavy.

It was only a small thing.

I couldn’t ask.

I couldn’t care.

The second I opened my mouth, everything would sound wrong.

Just like how Caleb suddenly started keeping painkillers in his backpack.

Even on finals day, he carried them with him.

Because Ivy Harper had irregular periods, and her cramps were severe.

She had to take medication.

I saw Caleb secretly practicing writing with his left hand during evening study because Ivy Harper was left-handed.

On a piece of scrap paper Ivy had thrown away, I saw one sentence traced over and over.

“Sometimes, the order people enter your life really matters.”

All those tiny, unspeakable moments flashed through my mind.

Looking at Caleb’s irritated face, I took the bracelet.

Then I threw it into the trash with the flowers.

I tied up the trash bag and handed it to him.

“Take this downstairs for me. Thanks.”

He raised a hand and braced it against the doorframe.

“I already apologized. What else do you want me to do? Just say it. I can’t read your little girl mind, and I hate pointless fights and silent treatment.”

“Oh. Right. I forgot.”

His words reminded me.

I spoke coldly.

“Caleb Sterling, let’s break up. You don’t have to read my mind, apologize, or force yourself to comfort me.”

His eyes widened in disbelief.

His voice was very soft.

“What did you say?”

In the power balance between us, he had always been brilliant and outstanding.

I had always been the humble one, the one trying too hard, the one who loved more.

So he naturally believed I was only making a scene out of jealousy.

I was only trying to make him care more.

Breaking up was impossible.

It shouldn’t have come from my mouth.

“Elena! You can’t break up!”

Ivy Harper ran up from the stairwell one floor below.