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Despite housekeeping cleaning the room while we were gone, I found myself fixing things up before Emilia got in here with her stuff. I fixed up my suitcase and a few of my clothes that were folded on the chair, I fixed up my things on the nightstand, my toiletries in the bathroom. I was just stepping out of the bathroom when she knocked on my door. I released a breath and made my way over but waited a second before twisting it open.

She stood there with her backpack in one hand while she dragged her suitcase behind her with the other. Her gaze met mine. "Hey."

"Hey. Come on in." I stepped aside, taking her suitcase from her.

She stopped, watching me. "You don't have to do that," she mumbled, brushing past me and entering the room.

"What?" I asked, closing the door behind me.

"Pretend to be so nice," she said under her breath and then turned to me. "What side do you sleep on? Still on the left?"

I was a little surprised that she remembered that. I nodded. "Still on the left."

She glanced at my hold on her suitcase. "You can just leave it, Adam."

I looked away and ignored her, lifting her suitcase up and leaving it on the small seat beside the one I left my bag on. Then I turned to her, holding my hands up in surrender. "I left it."

She set her backpack on one of the chairs by the coffee table and then stood there awkwardly. "Huh, your room is the exact same as mine," she remarked.

"Uh, I'm pretty sure every room here is the same unless it's a suite, but yeah, sure."

She placed her phone on her nightstand. "Look, I can get ready in the other room if that's easier. At least for tonight."

I paused, scratching my brow. "You can if you want to, I mean... If you're more comfortable then sure, go ahead. But you can get ready here if you want."

She sighed softly. "Fine. Let me shower first then. That way, I can get ready while you're in there."

I nodded and then went and sat on my side of the bed while she walked to her suitcase, taking out her clothes for tonight and then putting them aside.

She pulled her hair up in a bun and then grabbed a bag, a toiletry bag, and proceeded to carry everything into the bathroom before the door closed and locked with a soft click.

I fell back on the bed, throwing an arm over my eyes. That was so awkward, it was genuinely, physically painful to experience. This wouldn't be awkward at all if we weren't having such a hostile and hateful phase in our relationship...

I mean friendship.

Emilia and I have shared a room before, multiple times, actually. When our families went and stayed at a lake house together over spring break, we shared a room. I've slept in her room so many times. But we haven't shared a bed since we were around the age of seventeen. After that we both felt strange, it felt wrong. We've laid together to watch a movie, sure, but if I ever slept over at her house, I slept on a blow-up mattress.

Except for that one time.

Now, I'm seeing her after five years and we have to share a bed? I don't see that happening very smoothly.

I was taking my clothes out for the night when the door opened and she stepped out, getting startled when she saw me right there. I met her gaze and then shifted mine lower, glancing at her clothes.

She was wearing a matching set of an electric cerulean blue blouse with a matching long skirt that had a slit going up her right thigh. The blouse was cropped, showing off a bit of her midriff and the sleeves were a little loose and flowy with a shallow v-shaped neckline. There were two straps tied around her waist, bringing the blouse in at its hem, cinching her waist.

My eyes came back up to hers and she remained still.

"What?" Her brows shot up.

I shook my head softly. "Nothing." I grabbed my clothes.

"What is it?" she persisted, blocking my way to the bathroom, still standing in that spot.

"I said nothing." I shrugged, taking a step forward. She watched me in confusion, sinking into the door. I moved my free hand forward and her eyes snapped down to my hand immediately. My knuckles grazed her skin as I grabbed the doorknob beside her waist and twisted the door open.

She caught herself before she fell back and straightened up.

I nodded towards the right. "Move."

She slid over silently.

I stepped into the bathroom and locked the door behind me, setting my clothes on the counter. I forced myself to throw out all Emilia-related thoughts as I turned on the shower and stripped out of my clothes for the day.

Taking a shower, I let the warm water put me at ease as much as it could before I walked back out into the battlefield that is now my own room and once I did that, I saw that Emilia was fixing up her hair, being done with it. She had pulled it up into a bun at the top of her head but her curls were a bit frizzy around her hairline, a few long pieces framing her face.

Getting dressed in the bathroom was suffocating, so I left as soon as I opened the door. I stood by the TV cabinet and took out a water bottle from the mini-fridge underneath and cracked it open, drinking some to get some air in.

Emilia went into the bathroom and when she came back out, her hair was a little less frizzy and much more tamed overall. She matted it down with water, I knew that much. While I grabbed a pair of socks from my bag, Emilia grabbed a pair of heels from hers and then went and sat at the coffee table to pull them on.

She glanced at the bed once while working her foot into the heels and then her eyes drifted over to me. She raised her brows at me wordlessly.

"I think we should talk," I mumbled, pulling my shoes on.

Surprising me, she replied, "Yeah, I think so too." I watched as she stood up and came in front of me. "What do you want to talk about?"

"The past," I mumbled. "I want to clear a few things up."

"No," she answered, "I can't forgive you for that and I don't expect you to forgive me either."

"If not the past then what do you want to talk about?"

"The present."

I raised a questioning eyebrow.

"I want to pretend like nothing happened while we're in Marbella. That doesn't mean I want us to act like the best friends that we used to be." She didn't have to emphasize it, I knew our present very well, I was living in this hell too. "I just want us to put the past behind us and at least act friendly. We kind of have to if we want to survive sharing this room. Don't you think so?"

"We're incapable of acting friendly with each other while feeling the way we do. Don't you think so?" I asked, mocking her.

I wanted to mock her because she was being ridiculous. She didn't want to solve the problem, she just wanted to pretend like it didn't exist so the wedding could happen smoothly. And that was not the solution because we would fail to act friendly since we hated each other.

"Then what the hell do you suggest we do? Other than working things out."

"Emilia, why don't you just want to move on the right way? Why are you holding onto this?"

She hesitated, her hands forming into fists at her sides that she released when she caught me looking at them. "Because I can't let it go," she gritted. "What happened still eats at me. I can't move on from it because I haven't even accepted it. All right? So just leave it alone. I don't want to talk about it." She rolled her eyes, moving to walk to her suitcase but I grabbed her hand, pulling her back. She froze the moment my hand touched hers and I felt it. Her whole body stiffened, I witnessed it. But when she turned back around to look at me, her hand still in mine, unlike last time, she didn't yank it away.

At least not yet.

I touched her and she let me. That was progress and it had to count for something.

"Pretending like it didn't happen won't change the fact that it did, Emmy." I corrected myself when her gaze hardened. "Sorry. Emilia."

She didn't reply.

"Just how pretending like we're okay with each other won't change the fact that we're not. And I'm pretty sure everybody who knows what happened, which is everyone except aunt Janice, will see right through our charade if we try it."

She paused and then let out an exhausted sigh, her shoulders going slack and dropping. "Then what do you want me to do, Adam?"

Right then, the way she looked at me... It completely broke my heart.

She looked so... so tired, so defeated, so... hopeless.

I did that to her. I made her feel this way. I hurt her. And nothing I could do would ever make up for it; I could never take it back.

"I can't forget it," she shook her head, "I can't get over how bad it hurt." Her voice got softer with each word she spoke.

I swallowed, my hold on her hand tightening. "Emilia, you don't have to."

She looked at me. I pulled her forward and she stumbled a bit as I took her other hand in mine. She rolled her eyes, blinking away from me.

"Emilia."

She sighed, facing me.

"You don't have to forget it, you don't have to get over it. We don't have to talk about it now. Or at all on this trip. Or at all this year. But I just want you to let me back in. Even though I don't deserve it, I still want it. I want to be a part of your life again, even if it's only at family gatherings. I just want you to consider and open your mind to the idea of talking about it someday. Not today, not tomorrow. Just someday."

She stared at me. "You're so selfish, Adam. You threw me away when I wasn't on the same level as you, when we disagreed about something. And now, because you know we'll have to see each other again, you want to work things out. Why? Is the guilt eating at you now? Do you just want to clear your conscience?"

"I just don't want to see you hurting every time you look at me."

She seemed a little shocked to hear that answer.

I let go of her hands, remembering that I was still holding them, and stood up, towering over her. She tilted her chin up to look at me and it felt different. I felt different when she looked at me tonight, I felt weak in the knees. "I don't want to hurt you. I know I'm doing it without intending to, without trying to. But I don't want to. It's tiring for me too, Emilia."

She stared at me, her eyes scanning my face, stopping at my lips.

And I don't know if I chose the best or the worst time to admit this to her, but the words were out. "I miss you."

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