LIVE OR DIE. I USED to think it was so simple—a choice, really. Live authentically or die pretending. I thought once I chose to live, I’d finally start my life. What I didn’t know is that it’s not a choice you make just once; it’s a choice you have to keep on making. Because life doesn’t wait until you’re perfect, or better, or out of pain, for you to be alive. You have to choose it every minute of every day.
That’s what I was thinking about as she turned away from me.
I went back into the house because I couldn’t stand to watch her leave. I ran up the stairs to my room before my parents could ask me any questions. My heart was pounding. There was something more I needed to do, something I still needed to say, but I didn’t know what.
My eyes drifted to the photo sitting on my desk, to the discarded envelope still on my bed. I jerked open my desk drawer and rifled through it, throwing its contents on the floor, until I was holding it—the necklace I bought for Maia.
I raced down the stairs with my fingers working to pry the necklace out of the little plastic bag. As I swung the door open, I heard my mom calling my name, but I ran, not even bothering to close it behind me.
The car was sitting at the stop sign on the corner.
“Wait!” I yelled, waving my arms over my head. “Maia!”
The car started moving again, then stopped abruptly, the taillights glowing red in the dark. The door opened, and Maia stepped out of the car.
It felt like I was running through water; my legs just couldn’t get me there fast enough. When I finally reached her, I was out of breath, and she was standing there, waiting for me.
“Here,” I said, holding out the necklace. “I wanted you to have this.”
She let me place it in her open hands—and she cradled the locket in her palm, smiling at it like it was something living, fragile. Then she undid the clasp and held one side of the necklace in each hand, bringing it around to the back of her neck.
“Will you?” she asked me.
I had to step in close and reach around her to latch the chain, and as I smelled the citrus in her hair, I wished so badly we could just return to the way things were. But I knew we couldn’t.
I backed up a step, and tried to memorize the way the locket looked against her skin. We put our arms around each other once more, and her lips brushed my cheek, as we stood there under the streetlight.
I watched the car drive away, getting smaller and smaller in the distance. And I realized then that Maia was never the right person at the wrong time, and she wasn’t the wrong person at the right time. We were both the right people, in exactly the right place, at exactly the right time.