He meets her on a summer's day in August. She's like no one he has ever met. She wants to know who he is and he overplays it. Too excited to think straight. Then she gives him a second chance and they're sharing the embers of his cigarette.
Marissa takes his breath away. It's lust and longing and an incomprehensible feeling. He wants so badly.
Her. This life. Everything.
.
They are two kids sitting by an empty poolside. Seth's there too but it's easy to forget when he's looking at her. The same way it's easy to ignore that he found her blackout drunk in her driveway the night before.
She confides in him about her family and he shares stories of his own. Later she tells him he should stay and gives him a mixed CD. He can't remember the last time someone gave him a gift.
There's something between them, they both feel it. It's real and it's palpable and it's what makes her want to stay the night.
It's what makes him say no, because he knows she deserves better.
.
Things fall apart when she finds him with another woman. She acts like it's a betrayal. But it's not like they owed each other anything. And she chose Luke anyway.
He tells her this by a vending machine in Mexico. She denies it and they try to clear the air but it only gets more tense, more fiery. He struggles to hide that he cares.
It's even harder when he finds her passed out in an alleyway, with her life hanging in balance.
.
They come together on a Ferris wheel. He's not a romantic but when she kisses him 50 feet in the air, it's picture perfect.
They are so happy for the first few weeks. The kind of happiness which is once in a lifetime. It's unfamiliar to him but being with Marissa is instinctive.
.
At Christmas, there's crying and cops and drinking. It's a nightmare and he won't relive it again. So he tells her.
He's angrier than he wants to be. He can see that it scares her and for a moment he is ashamed of his temper. She comes to him though. Holds his hand and promises that she will change.
He's not sure whether to believe her because all his life, he has only known empty promises. But the next day she goes to therapy, and it's more than his mother ever did.
.
He kisses her in a storm of confetti, on his last breath and just in time. He replays her face when she sees him. The smile. The unadulterated joy. The love.
"I love you," he tells hers. There's that smile again.
He means it with all his heart.
.
She leaves him while standing in that drab corridor in Harbor. He screwed up, but couldn't she see what he saw? Couldn't she trust him?
It can't be so easy for someone to come between them.
It can't.
.
He isn't sure where it all went so wrong.
Oliver was a start.
Then he slept with Theresa.
And Julie slept with Luke.
And after all that, he's surprised that they find their way back together.
But really, he's not.
She stood by his side and helped Theresa even when it was painfully awkward. And if he dared to admit, it clearly broke her to see them together.
He struggles to admit it but he misses her and everything that embodies. He misses date nights on a Friday. Kisses by her locker. Stolen popcorn at the cinema. The feeling of her curled up against him in the poolhouse. The look in her eye when she caught him staring, as though he's the most important person in the world.
He loves her, and he isn't sure what to do with that.
In the end, he gives into it.
For a moment, it works. They're happy, and they're rebuilding and it almost feels easy.
That is until Theresa comes back and tells his girlfriend she might be pregnant with his baby.
Life couldn't get worse.
.
The summer is awful, which in many ways is an understatement.
She calls him late at night, says nothing but he knows it's her. He could put a stop to it but he doesn't.
It's selfish, he knows, but he can't.
.
He comes back and she hugs him at sight. He's a little dazed from the feeling.
He's uncharacteristically optimistic. They can go back to how they were. Put the past behind them and it would be just how it was in the beginning.
Maybe if he had stopped to think for a second, he might have noticed her hesitation. He might have remembered those late night calls and all the misery that came with it.
Maybe then it would have been less of a shock when he finds her kissing another guy.
.
It's a brutal fight and it pours out of him before he can stop.
He feels appalling afterwards. Even worse when he goes to apologise and she tells him she, their relationship, means nothing to him. That maybe it never did.
He wants to scream again. How could she think that? She has to know. She really, truly does. She mattered, they mattered. It was all so painfully real that he can't think about it for too long without it cutting deep.
He thinks if it was Seth in his shoes, and Summer sitting across him wondering what it all meant, he would have told her that.
But that's never been him.
Instead he mumbles an apology and goes to bed wishing he had said more.
.
Lindsay leaves and he feels depressed. Then Seth conjoles him into a weekend with Summer and Marissa. He expects only awkwardness to come out of it. At the end, he's a little embarrassed at how quickly he forgets about Lindsay.
But she claims that she misses him. Everyday. And they reminisce about the past over french fries and cheese burgers.
It's like going back to the beginning. Except they're older, they know each other better and strangely, it feels carefree in a way last year never did.
.
She's a rock for him and he wonders why it's taken this long for him to see it. This is the person he fell in love with. Her kindness is overwhelming. She supports him so readily. Helps Trey beyond all expectations. It's seamless the way she slots back into his life. Like it's meant to be.
This time when they get back together, it's different.
There aren't any false promises. There's affection and giddiness and all the hope of a brighter future.
.
It all changes after Miami and he can't figure out why. He assumes the worst, because of course his life would be so cruel that the girl he loves cheats on him with his brother.
She denies it, and it takes him longer to believe her than it should.
When he finds out the truth, he feels like an utter fool.
He couldn't even have fathomed what the worst might be.
.
She shoots Trey and saves his life.
He wanted to kill him and now he would give anything for him to live.
Her choice eats at her soul but she finds herself accepting it without regret.
He wanted Trey to leave, but then he wonders where he went.
It's a strange dichotomy.
They both know something between them is broken, even as they deny it.
They've also never been surer of their love for one another.
.
There's an inevitability about their break-up. It's been weeks in the making. Months even.
In spite of all that, it's fucking painful.
She's clearly crying, and he's lying when he says it isn't about Johnny and Trey. It so clearly is.
He feels pathetic for lying (and for doing this over the phone). She probably deserved his honesty, but it's like she says. They were never that good with words anyway.
It's all a tragic mess. He wishes he could have been enough for her. That they could have made it and that he never left her alone with his brother.
But he's never been a wallower. So he lets himself be distracted by Sadie.
.
They're distant and they're cold.
She's drinking without shame and fucking the one guy she knows will piss him off. He could act like it's on purpose, but he knows she would never be so petty. That could only mean - well, he doesn't want to think about it.
It's strange to be so far apart when she's the one person who's always felt closest to his heart.
He gets into Berkeley and for a fleeting 24 hours plans a future with a girl he's barely known for a month. And then Sandy scares him with the facts. And he sees Seth about to blow everything up with Summer. And she finally talks to him, properly, sounding far sadder than he could have imagined.
Everything is a mess. Nothing is as it should be.
.
Standing in that empty house, the ghosts of their past dance with them. In the beginning, it felt like anything was possible. Anything could be overcome.
Maybe it still can.
You never know, right.
She's apologetic but he tells her not to be. He wouldn't have done it any differently.
Except maybe Oliver.
She laughs and so does he. It's a breath of release because for once they're on the same page.
They could never regret this.
.
He fucks her in the airport parking lot as a goodbye. They're in the backseat of his car and her top is off, their jeans unbuttoned and it's all kinds of perfect. They sit there for a few minutes after. Her nose pressed into his neck, his fingers playing with her hair. They act like they're not exes who until a few weeks ago could not even look the other in the eye.
She breaks the silence first, telling him she will be late. They get dressed with little comment.
He walks her up to security, insists on carrying her Louis Vuitton carry-on. He's staring at the sign that says to get boarding passes ready, when she stops and faces him.
She gives him a crooked smile conveying everything which is bittersweet about this moment. Frankly, it's more bitter than it is sweet.
I love you, he almost says. But it wouldn't be appropriate. He hasn't said it in months and he has always found it hard to share his feelings. Even when absolutely certain about them.
"I guess this is goodbye," he attempts instead.
She smiles back, looking sadder still, and nods reluctantly.
"It's not forever," she states.
"I know."
"And I'm not—" She pauses. She was about to say she's not leaving him but it's glaringly difficult to justify right now. "We can still talk."
His eyes are a little glassy and fuck, his throat feels like it's stuck in a vice.
"It must be possible, right? Modern technology and everything."
She laughs, wipes lightly at her right eye. "I'll figure out a way."
She places a hand by his right collar, a little above where his heart would be. He thinks she will kiss him. A full heady kiss that leaves them both breathless. Instead, she settles for his cheek. It's soft and steady and painstakingly final.
.
He gets her letter in the mail a few days later. It talks about their past, their present and a tentative future.
She tells him she loves him. Only him. He wishes he had told her at the airport. Even more that he had said it before, back when it would have really mattered.
He reads her final words on repeat. She says she would try again. In the future when he's ready and she's ready and the timing's finally right. Maybe someday.
Someday.
He holds on to that.