He Chose My Best Friend, Now He Wants Me Back Chapter 17

He Chose My Best Friend, Now He Wants Me Back Chapter 17

Early the next morning, Ben was back, waiting before the bookstore had even opened. He hadn’t slept. The sound of the lock clicking shut echoed in his mind.

He was sure she would come down.

But the bookstore door remained closed. A small wooden sign hung from the knob, written in her neat script:

“Out sketching. Back in a week.”

A week.

Just like that, she had effortlessly erased him from her life for seven days. All his frantic regret, all his urgent apologies, were blocked by that one small sign.

He walked back to the inn, defeated. As he was about to pack his bags, the clerk at the front desk stopped him.

“Mr. Kline? Ms. Ellis left a package for you this morning.”

A thread of hope shot through him. He nearly snatched the package from the clerk. It was a dark brown leather-bound notebook—her favorite one.

He rushed to his room, shut the door, and opened it with trembling hands.

It was filled with her handwriting.

On the first page, a joyful, messy scrawl:

“Our wedding vows start today!”

He turned the pages.

“I remember our first winter in Chicago, when you shoved your frozen hands into my pockets. From that day on, I swore I would give you a warm home.”

“I promise to fix every appliance you break, even if I have to spend all night on YouTube.”

“I promise to always remember our first-date anniversary, even though you always pretend to forget just so you can surprise me with a hidden gift.”

Every page was filled with fragments of their eight years together. The nights they’d shared a single slice of pizza. The walks along Lake Michigan at dusk. The small, warm moments he thought were long forgotten had all been carefully recorded by her, ready to be read at their wedding.

Each memory was a gentle cut.

At last, he turned to the final page.

The handwriting was different here—calm and neat.

“I once wanted to write the rest of my life with your name. It took me a long time to accept that you had changed. And even longer to finally let go. Ben, I don’t blame you anymore. I’m returning these old vows to you. I’m writing my own story now.”

Tucked into the last page was a Polaroid.

In the photo, Mara stood on a cliff by the sea, wearing a simple white dress. The wind lifted her hair and the hem of her skirt. She wasn’t looking at the camera, but out at the vast ocean, and on her face was a smile he had never seen before: real, radiant, and free.

Ben stared at the photo.

Holding the notebook filled with the future he should have had, his legs gave out. He slid to the floor. Burying his face in the pages, he finally let out a choked, tearing sob in the empty room.

The girl who had once wanted to build a home for him had already built a new world for herself.

And he was locked out forever.