Chapter 29

Chapter 29
That night, Lily had a group call with Chloe and Miles. It was their tradition since college to have a call at least once a month, as long as all three of them were free.

They caught up on what everyone had been doing in the past month.

Miles was the one to bring it up. “Ethan is back. Did you guys see the group chat?”

Chloe’s expression darkened as she slammed her beer can on the table. “Saw. Everyone was tagging us, asking for his location. If I see another @Chloe, I’ll hit someone. Ethan is still the same,” she scoffed, rolling her eyes. “He came back after 5 years and didn’t tell anyone. We found out about his grand return home from someone else, the same way we found out he had left.”

Lily didn’t respond. She continued sketching the new floral arrangement, her hands slightly trembling.

Chloe noticed her silence. “Lily, you good?”

“I’m fine,” she said quickly. “It’s just surprising. I thought he left for good.”

She didn’t tell them she had gone to look for him at the restaurant. Or how disappointed she’d been when she didn’t see him there.

Miles set his phone on the floor. Around him was an open suitcase and neatly folded clothes.

“Where are you going this time?” Chloe asked, leaning back in her seat as she sipped her drink.

“The Annapurna Circuit in Nepal. This might be the last time you’ll hear from me for a while— at least 6 months. I wanna be off-grid for a bit.”

“I thought you wanted to go to the Kalahari Desert,” Lily said, glancing up.

“I was.” He paused. “Till I saw a picture. The mountains are calling me.”

“Have fun. In other news, I should be back from Italy in a week.” Chloe said. She had gone to Florence— the birthplace of the Renaissance— to find inspiration for her next art piece.

“Call me when you arrive. We’ll go out for a meal.”

“Sure. Sure. Just make sure to prepare a bouquet for me like the one you caught at the wedding.”

“She caught a bouquet at a wedding?” Miles laughed. “Wow. the universe has spoken.”

“How do you even know that? I never mentioned it.” Lily asked, raising a brow.

“Saw it on someone’s story. And I recognized our pretty princess.” Chloe teased. “We have a future bride among us. I just need to get you a boyfriend first.”

Miles picked up his phone. “Lily getting married first makes a lot of sense. As for you, Chloe, I can’t even hope to attend your wedding.”

“Well, I’ll definitely settle down before you,” Chloe replied

“You’ve made it your mission to break as many hearts as possible. How will you ‘settle down’?” Miles mocked.

“And you keep getting entangled with scumbags.”

Chloe and Miles continued their bickering. Lily smiled and kept on drawing.



The following weekend, her parents called her to go home for Sunday lunch. She had tried to refuse, but her mom had nagged on the phone for over thirty minutes until she finally agreed.

When she walked through the door, she heard laughter and voices coming from the living room. Her parents’ voices and someone else’s. A man’s.

She walked into the living room and saw a man sitting in the chair, facing away from her. She slowly stepped forward. The man’s back looked familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. 

“Hello, Father and Mother.”

Her mom looked up and smiled, “You wouldn’t believe who came by, your best friend Ethan.” She gestured to the man.

Lily turned to face the man. 

Her heart skipped a beat.

To think the person she had been trying to find would be waiting at her house.

Ethan

He was back after 5 years. 

He stood up, his electric blue gaze holding hers.

“Hi,” he said quietly.

His boyish features had matured— sharper jaw, broader shoulders. He was taller too, she felt dwarfed in his presence. The picture she had seen earlier hadn’t done him justice— blurry due to the angle and shaky hands of the person who had taken it.

Lily stood transfixed. She had finally seen the face she had been longing for all these years. 

Relief, joy, and anger. 

“Oh, welcome” she curtly replied and then walked over to sit beside her mother. 

Ethan said nothing more and took his seat, they were opposite each other.

Her parents continued the conversation from where they had stopped. Ethan talked about London, school, part-time work, the places he had been, and his company.

In his second year he had started a game company. Currently, they had 3 games on the market, with 2 out of the 3 dominating the charts on Play Store. He had decided to move his company operations back to the States with the intention of going public.

Lily looked at him. They hadn’t needed to be worried about him. He had been living a good life in England. Each time Miles went there he made sure to look for him, and Chloe too, even though she acted like she didn’t care. The few times she visited, she would try her best to find him, too to no luck. 

And he was sitting in her parents’ house like nothing had happened. 

Lily clenched her fists.

“Lily.” Her mom called, startling her out of her thoughts.

“Yes, mom?”

“You know you and Ethan are engaged.”

“What?”

“When you were 5, you said you wanted to marry Ethan, and he proposed, so your Aunty Wendy and I arranged it.” her mom laughed. “What are the odds? Ethan is single, and so are you. What if—”

Just then, Lily’s phone rang, interrupting her mom. She looked at the caller ID— Chloe.

“I need to go,” Lily said, standing up.

“Won’t you stay for lunch?” Her father asked.

“I’ll come back next weekend.”

“How about Ethan takes you?”

“No need Mom. I drove here.”

“How about you give him a ride then?”

Lily stared pointedly at her mother. “I don’t think we’re going in the same direction.”