Free Letting Go by Molly McAdams

sophomore years?” When I nodded, she continued. “Well, on one of those nights during freshman year when we were at the alley, it just hit me. I realized he pretty much never touched you when we were at a party or bowling, and it was weird because it was so unlike you and Ben. So I waited until we were alone—you and Jagger were trying to mess each other up on your turns or something—and I asked if he was okay.”
    I didn’t realize I was leaning toward her and holding my breath until she stopped talking, her eyes misting. “What did he say?”
    “He said what he always said. ‘I have my girl and my friends, why wouldn’t I be?’ So I told him that he was acting weird, and how it seemed like he was avoiding touching you—I also might have threatened bodily harm if he was hiding something from you. Anyway, when I said that, it was like he suddenly got what I was talking about. He looked over to where you and Jagger were, and said, ‘I have the rest of my life to hold her, but I can’t do that to him.’ ”
    Her words had been choked as she fought back tears, and my chest ached when I realized that the rest of his life ended up only being another year or so.
    “I had already seen how Jagger looked at you, and when Ben said that, I knew he saw it too. I don’t know if they ever talked about it, but he knew.”
    Long minutes passed where the only sound was our hitched breathing as Janie pulled me into her arms and held me while we cried. When we pulled away from each other, she wiped at her eyes and shrugged.
    “The way he looks at you, it’s so obvious. I’ve always thought you must have known. I just thought you ignored it because the two of you were such good friends, you had Ben, and because Jagger never did anything about it. This past year, though, when you started pulling away from us and clinging to him, we all thought for sure you knew at that point. I’ve just been waiting for the day you call me to tell me you two were together.”
    “How can . . .” I shook my head and tried to swallow past the tightness in my throat. “I just don’t understand how everyone seems to be so okay with this. It’s like nobody cares that Ben is gone. Everyone is just expecting me to be with Jagger now that Ben died.”
    “Grey, no! That’s not it. We just want you to be happy, and Jagger makes you happy. But no one is expecting anything . Ben was a huge part of your life; we all know that. But that doesn’t mean you can’t love someone else.”
    “That sounds a lot like what my family was saying,” I mumbled, and she bit down on her bottom lip.
    “Well, Graham and I talked about it a lot over the last year.”
    My eyebrows rose, but I don’t know why I was even surprised anymore. “But you’re all okay with it so soon.”
    “I think it would be different for everyone. Every situation is different. Some people, months are what they need, others, they need years. For you? It would be one thing if it had only been months. I probably would have thought you were just trying to make the pain go away. It might have even been weird around the year mark. But it’s been over two years now, and that’s different. And this is Jagger, he knows you, and knew Ben, better than anyone. He knows how you feel, he knows that you’re hurting, and he’s hurting too.”
    My fingers easily found the ring hanging from the long chain, and I played with it absentmindedly. I couldn’t believe everyone had known, when I’d never had a clue that Jagger felt more for me than a friendly bond. I still didn’t know how I felt about everyone telling me they thought I was ready to move on with someone else, or how to feel about Jagger’s confession. But as I gripped that ring, a familiar twist of guilt hit me—thinking about Jagger . . . hell, thinking about anyone in that way felt like I was cheating on Ben.
    If he hadn’t died, we would be married, and I would never have entertained the thought of someone else, just like I