Before the College Application Deadline My Boyfriend Unplugged My Mouse Chapter 10

Before the College Application Deadline My Boyfriend Unplugged My Mouse Chapter 10

I met Miles Whitaker during my sophomore year.

He was a visiting law student from a university in London and was one year ahead of me.

We first met while I was covering a mock trial for the campus newsroom.

My digital recorder had died, and my spare batteries were dead too.

Sweat beaded across my forehead as panic set in.

Miles was sitting near the witness stand. He slid his own recorder toward me.

“Use mine for now.”

I refused automatically.

“No, thanks. I’ll figure something out.”

He did not insist. He simply placed the recorder on the corner of the table.

“I’ll leave it here. Whether you use it is up to you.”

For a moment, I could only stare at him.

That was when I realized that helping someone did not have to mean taking away their choice.

Over time, Miles and I became close.

He knew I had a dairy allergy, so whenever he brought me coffee, he always checked first.

“Is oat milk okay, or should I get it black?”

“Oat milk is usually fine, but black is safest.”

He nodded and never got it wrong afterward.

When I worked on an article into the early hours of the morning, he never said, “Why do you never listen?”

He would only send me a message.

Miles: [I left something to eat outside your door. You don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to.]

When I suddenly decided to apply to graduate school in London, he did not say, “I’ll go with you.”

Instead, he asked, “How involved do you want me to be?”

I smiled at him.

“Aren’t you afraid I’ll go too far away?”

He smiled back.

“Just because you go farther away doesn’t mean I can’t move closer.”

Miles was nothing like Nolan.

He never reached over and clicked the final button for me.

He stood beside me and waited for me to choose.

By the time I graduated, I had been accepted into a graduate program at a university in London.

Miles had also secured a position with a law firm in the same city.

He spread two maps across the table and asked me seriously, “Natalie, do you want to see if we can put our futures on the same map?”

Something in my chest melted.

“Yes.”

Several years later, I flew back to the States for my high school’s alumni weekend.

The school had been renovated.

The old computer lab had been converted into a digital learning center.

I stood at the end of the hallway, looking at the door, and felt nothing stir inside me.

Someone called my name from behind.

“Natalie Wells.”

I turned around.

Nolan stood several steps away.

He was dressed in a dark suit. He looked thinner than he had in high school, and there was a heaviness in his expression that had not been there before.

The moment he saw me, his eyes reddened.

It’s been a long time”

I nodded.

“It has.”

His gaze fell to the ring on my left ring finger, and the color slowly drained from his face.

“You’re engaged?”

“Yes.”

His throat moved.

“When?”

“This winter.”

He looked as though he wanted to smile, but could not manage it.

“Congratulations.”

At that moment, Miles came down the stairs carrying two cups of coffee.

He handed one to me.

“No dairy, lightly sweetened. It got windy, so I switched yours to hot.”

I accepted it.

“Thank you.”

Nolan stared at the coffee, his eyes growing even redder.

Of course he remembered my dairy allergy.

He had simply forgotten it when it mattered years ago.

Miles looked at him and gave a polite nod.

“Someone you went to school with?”

“Yeah,” I said. “We went to high school together.”

Nolan’s fingers suddenly curled inward.

“That’s all I am?” he asked quietly.

I looked at him calmly.

“That’s all.”

The light slowly faded from his eyes.

Miles did not ask any more questions. He simply placed an arm around my shoulders.

“The ceremony is about to start.”

I nodded.

As we passed Nolan, he suddenly spoke.

“Natalie.”

I stopped.

His voice was painfully hoarse.

“Since that day, I’ve never made decisions for anyone else again.”

I did not turn around.

“That’s good.”

He gave a bitter smile.

“But the person I wanted to make it up to most doesn’t need anything from me anymore.”

I tightened my grip on Miles’s hand.

“Then stop trying to make it up to me.”

“Go live your own life.”

The lights came up inside the auditorium.

The emcee began reading the names of the distinguished alumni.

When the applause started, I glanced back once.

Nolan was standing in the doorway.

He did not come inside.

He looked the way I had all those years ago, standing in the computer lab and staring at the red error message after the countdown hit zero.

Being one step too late meant being too late forever.

But that regret no longer belonged to me.

That summer, I had chosen a new path and hit submit on my own future.

This time, the final click was mine.