HIS ONE TRUE LOVE

HARLAN

“I’ll take my whiskey neat, please.’’ I told the waiter at the bar while I waited for my shitty best friend who was most likely going to show up late yet again. Fridays were always my favorite day of the week, the mixed buzz of the bar was intriguing, like we all had something worth celebrating or mourning. Today I was in mourning.

Low lights, soft jazz bleeding from the speakers, whiskey glasses catching the glow. Faces etched with different expressions that exposed their emotions. The waiter passed my whiskey and I thanked him. I stared at the amber liquid like it could offer the answers I so desperately needed.

A ring box sat heavy in my hand. It was in her favorite color… black, velvet and untouched. I thumbed the lid open and stared at the marquise diamond inside like it was some sick joke the universe was playing on me. The biggest and fastest decision I had ever made in my life but still the one I was most sure of. I had never been more certain of anything my whole life, she had engraved her name into the beat of my heart and my heart would not beat for anyone else but her. I knew she was the one from the very second I met her, knew she was meant to be mine.

The ring caught the light, its reflection bouncing off in different directions. It was still gleaming, still hers, still perfect, like it had been waiting all year to humiliate me again.

“You’ve got good taste, man,” the waiter said, pausing as he passed another glass of whiskey to me. He nodded toward the ring. “She’ll say yes before you even finish asking. Trust me.”

A laugh broke out of me, a laugh that was more pain than wit, sharp and humorless. “She never got to see it.”

The guy paused, unsure if he’d misheard. “What do you mean?”

“She left.” The word tasted bitter in my mouth, like ash. “Before I could tell her. Before I could ask her to be my forever.”

His brows shot up, caught between curiosity and pity. “What happened?”

I dragged my hand through my hair, smirked like it was all a joke. “That’s the crazy part. Nothing happened. She just took her laughter, her perfume, her toothbrush, the album she made me buy twice because she liked the cover art—and left me with this.”

I reached into my jacket and pulled out a slim, worn envelope. I unfolded the paper inside with more care than it deserved. The handwriting still screamed at me in thick, capital letters.

I’M SORRY.

That was it. That was all.

The waiter leaned in slightly, his eyes wide. “That’s… that’s all she left?”

His face said it all… the shock, sympathy, the awkward realization that some wounds are too big to tidy up with deceptive comforts.

I folded it back up, slid it into its envelope, tucked it back into the pocket over my heart where it had lived for twelve months.

“Today makes it one year since she walked away,” I said quietly. “And I still can’t make sense of it. I still don’t know why she left.”

He hesitated, then asked, “Why carry it around? After all this time?”

I swallowed, letting the whiskey burn the answer first.

“Because,” I looked down at my glass, the whiskey rippling faintly as if it knew the answer before I did. “Because one day I’ll see her again and when I do, I’ll ask her why. She’ll have to tell me, I deserve that much.”

The silence was heavy, broken only by the faint clink of glasses and the lazy saxophone on the speakers.

A familiar voice caught through the silence, one I could recognize in my sleep.

“God, Harlan, stop depressing the poor man.”

I turned just as Sophie walked in, her perfume loud, her smile louder. She reached out to grab the waiter’s towel and smirked. “You really let him guilt you into listening to his sad tale of unrequited love?”

The waiter looked flustered. “It’s fine, I don’t mind.” He gave her a polite, almost bashful smile.

Sophie, her head full of ginger curls, tilted my way with a scornful look of disapproval before wrapping her arms around me from behind in a hug that smelled like roses and rebellion. My best friend and unwanted conscience.

“You’re unfashionably early,” I muttered, prying her arms off.

“And you,” she countered, eyeing the ring box I hadn’t bothered to close again, “are fashionably pathetic.”

I sighed, snapped it shut with a click that echoed too loud in my head. “It’s today. It's a year today.”

Her expression softened, just for a flicker, before she smacked my arm. “I’m pawning that ring. I’ve had enough of your sulking. It’s been a year, Harlan. You need to start living again.”

“You wouldn’t understand,” I said, a little harsher than I meant to. “You’ve never been in love.”

She gasped, her hand flying to her chest in mock offense. “Excuse you. I happen to have very high standards. At least I know better than to fall for a heartless human being who disappears and leaves you with nothing but a flimsy note.”

I squinted at her, then hooked her into a headlock. She wriggled and yelped, before sinking her teeth into my arm.

“Ow—Jesus, Soph—” I shoved her off, and she grinned like the menace she was.

Her smile was cheeky, triumphant even. “You deserved that.’’

“You evil head of—’’

The waiter coughed back a laugh. “She’d make a wonderful girlfriend.”

Sophie smirked at him. “Tell him that. That’s why I’ve been begging him to go to his brother’s engagement party tomorrow. I need to meet this guy I’ve been crushing on.”

Now that’s suspicious.

My head turned, waiting for an answer. “Who?”

“Your brother’s friend, William,” she said with a little too much nonchalance.

“He’s not good for you,” I said flatly.

“Not your call,” she shot back, chin tilting up in challenge.

I scoffed. I always loved when Sophie was being pig-headed, she was defiant in that cute little way that always made me want to protect her. Usually from herself.

“I would love to help you get your first heartbreak and one way ticket to a mental asylum, but sadly, I wouldn’t be driving all the way to Maryland for their shindig.’’ I felt my heart tighten.

Sophie pouted, “But it’s your brother’s engagement party. Come on, Harry.”

“Firstly, I hate when you call me that, and secondly, you know why I can’t go.’’

I love my brother, that’s for sure. He is the best big brother anyone could ask for, and I was beyond grateful for him, but I wasn’t exactly a welcomed member of the family. No, I was a product of something his mother considered a nightmare, and she was right by all standards. This mess was all because my father couldn’t keep it in his pants, he just had to have an extramarital affair, and then he had me.

He loved my mother, still does, but for whatever reason I chose not to concern myself with, he chose to stay with Laura, his legal wife and my brother, Max’s mother. Laura took her anger at her husband out on me and never spared an opportunity to let me know there wasn’t a place for me in that family or in the precious inheritance she couldn’t stop being nervous about.

My father never dared to love me loudly, to openly show me the affection he very well felt in his heart. So he resorted to money, to ease his own guilt, like giving me a s**t ton of it could make up for the lack of fatherly love and affection I had learned to live with. I was not a hypocrite though. I welcomed the guilty funding, it made life way easier for me and I got to build a tech empire at 21, one he was very proud of, an empire that had Laura seething.

It was my fault, being born, existing, breathing. Laura made it all my fault, like her husband didn’t actively participate in my conception. She hated me and made it crystal clear, which was why I moved to New York and set my business up over there. I was better off without being reminded I was unwanted and unwelcome.

“Harlan, you can’t keep avoiding your family. I know you love your mother, but the Fords are also your family, you can’t just stay away.” Sophie’s voice softened.

“Oh I can, watch me.” The whiskey burned as I downed it in one go.

My mother was very much alive, married again and living all the way in Korea with siblings I had barely seen since they were born. Family was exhausting and I was freaking exhausted.

“I already called Max and told him we'd be coming, and he was very excited.” Sophie turned slightly away from me before I could grab her head again.

I groaned. “Soph—”

“Here’s the deal,” she cut me off, holding her hand up like a lawyer about to make her closing argument. “I’ll let you sulk all night without judgment. Hell, I’ll even help you stalk social media for your mystery heartbreak if you agree to go to the party tomorrow and make me your plus one. I might even pitch the Heimer’s deal to my boss if you help me get a dance with William.”

I arched my brow. “You’re negotiating with me like I’m a toddler. Waving the objects of my desires at me.”

“Only because you are acting like one right now.” She stuck out her hand. “Take it or leave it.”

The corner of my mouth twitched despite everything. I let the pause stretch, just to annoy her, then clasped her hand firmly. “Fine. You make a good bargain.”

“Damn right I do.” She smirked, victorious.

We shook on it, sealing the deal, even as something inside me twisted tighter.

And just like that, the universe’s sick sense of humor clicked into place. I didn’t know what I would be walking into tomorrow, but for some reason, I was sick to my stomach. Maybe it was because of Laura, or maybe my father or maybe just the idea of smiling at people I didn’t even know or like, but I could not help feeling the world was shifting its pace and I could barely catch up.