Chapter 3The Third Wheel's Departure

"Chloe, do you think Ethan has been acting weird around me lately?"

That night, after we got back from the hike, Maya showed up at my door in her pajamas.

She was holding two cups of hot cocoa from the vending machine downstairs, wearing an expression of perfectly calculated distress.

I let her in.

She sat cross-legged on my bed, took a sip of cocoa, and let out a dramatic sigh.

"It's just... he keeps looking at me, but then he won't say anything. Sometimes I joke around with him, and he just smiles but doesn't play along."

She looked up at me, her eyes slightly glassy. "Do you think he has feelings for me?"

I took a sip of my hot cocoa. It burned my tongue.

"He's my boyfriend."

Maya blinked, acting as if she had suddenly been jolted awake, waving her hands frantically.

"I know, I know! I didn't mean it like that! I'm just... confused, you know?"

"Do you think I should distance myself from him? But we've always acted like this since we were kids. If I suddenly change how I act, it'll make things weird, right?"

Since we were kids.

Those words rolled off her tongue so easily, but they hit my ears like lead weights.

Maya and Ethan grew up together. They lived in the same neighborhood, went to the same elementary, middle, and high school.

They drifted apart during the first three years of college, only to reconnect right before graduation. Because of me.

During our sophomore year, Maya transferred to my university and became my roommate.

She was bubbly, gorgeous, and sweet to everyone.

She was the one who told me that the guy from the neighboring dorm, Ethan, kept looking at me. She was the one who passed notes for us. She was the one who posted, "My roomie finally got a boyfriend!" on Instagram the day we made it official.

And then she and Ethan were reunited.

And everything just naturally fell into place.

Dinner for three. Studying for three. Road trips for three.

I never thought there was an issue.

Until this trip.

"Chloe, you're not mad, are you?" Maya leaned closer, grabbing my hand. Her palm was clammy.

Her tone was soft, laced with a careful, pleading sweetness.

But when I looked into her eyes, I didn't see anxiety. I saw validation.

She was checking to make sure I wasn't going to snap. Checking to make sure I was still the same reliable, passive Chloe who always said "It's fine."

"No."

After I said that word, I suddenly remembered the stranger on the trail asking me that question earlier today.

Are you their photographer?

Yeah. What exactly was I?

"Oh, good!" Maya exhaled deeply, flopping backward onto my blankets.

"Oh right! Tomorrow is our last day, and I really want to go to that cute little artisan village downtown. Could you look up the bus routes for us?"

I said sure.

After she left, I didn't look up any bus routes.

I opened my airline app and stared at my modified flight itinerary for tomorrow.

2:15 PM departure. Out of state, heading straight back home.

I wondered what time she and Ethan would finally notice I was gone.

My phone buzzed. It was a text from Ethan.

"Are you asleep?"

I stared at those words for a long time.

What did he want to say?

Yesterday he asked, "Are you okay?" Today he asks, "Are you asleep?"

It had been four days, and the number of times he initiated a conversation with me could be counted on one hand.

Meanwhile, I had personally witnessed him exchange at least fifty sentences with Maya just today.

I didn't reply.

Three minutes later, another message came through.

"We're heading to the artisan village tomorrow. Do you want to come?"

We.

I didn't know if that "we" included me.

But I knew that tomorrow, at the artisan village, it would only be him and Maya.

I typed out a reply: "I want to sleep in tomorrow. You guys go ahead without me."

Send.

He replied almost instantly: "Okay, get some rest. Do you want me to bring you anything back?"

My thumbs moved almost by pure muscle memory: "No thanks."

Then I added: "Have fun."

The chat went dead silent.

I locked my screen, and the room was plunged into darkness.

Outside my window, the faint, distant crackle of fireworks popped, briefly illuminating a small square on my ceiling.

I remembered the beginning of our freshman year, right after Ethan and I started dating. He used to walk twenty minutes across campus just to save a seat for me in the library.

When it poured rain, he would give me his only umbrella and walk back to his dorm completely soaked.

On my birthday, he would call me at exactly midnight, and the very first thing he would say was always, "Chloe, happy birthday. You're stuck with me for another year."

And then what happened?

Then Maya showed up.

His attention began to splinter. Like water hitting a rock in a stream, it naturally diverted and flowed around me.

It wasn't a sudden, violent shift. It was just a slow, gradual drift.

Every single time, he drifted just a little bit further away.

Just enough that I could almost convince myself it was perfectly normal.

The affection he showed me dwindled, but it never completely vanished.

He still held my hand occasionally. He still said goodnight. He still asked, "Are you okay?"

So I kept lying to myself: He still loves me. They're just old friends.

It's just a friendship.

But friends don't wear each other's jackets. They don't share a single pair of earbuds. They don't tenderly tuck hair behind each other's ears in the wind.

They don't stand by and let the entire world mistake the person they claim to love for a completely irrelevant third wheel, over and over again.

My flight was tomorrow at 2:15 PM.

I wasn't going to say goodbye.