Love Like That

“Then I’ll come to Ireland,” she said, meekly. “I don’t mind being the one to travel if you don’t feel able to. I loved Ireland. I can come to you again.”

“That’s not what I mean.”

Keira knew what he meant, but she didn’t want to believe it. She wasn’t about to let Shane give up at the first hurdle. Their love was greater than that, more important and special. She’d have to convince him otherwise, even if it meant sounding desperate or becoming, in Bryn’s words, too reliant.

She listened to the sound of Shane take a deep, sad inhalation. “I’m needed on the farm, with my family. Ireland is my home. I can’t move anywhere else.”

“No one’s talking about moving,” Keira replied.

“But we will be, soon enough,” Shane said. “If we want our relationship to work, at some point we’re going to have to live in the same country. I can’t move there. You won’t move here.”

“I could,” Keira stammered. “I’m sure I could. At some point.”

She thought of the beautiful country she’d fallen in love with. She could certainly live there if it was necessary to be with Shane.

“On a farm?”

“Sure!”

The cute farmhouse filled with love and family was a wonderful draw for Keira. Her own family was fragmented, with Bryn always busy, her mom living miles away, and her father completely absent from her life. What wasn’t there to love about the instant family Shane could provide her with?

“With my family? My sisters? My parents?” Shane questioned her. “And all those sheep?”

Keira remembered the sheep dung she’d found herself knee deep in. She thought of Shane’s six sisters, who were all lovely but all still living at home. It would be a squeeze. Hardly the life she’d expected for herself. But neither was sleeping on Bryn’s couch. If she could put up with living with her own sister then she could definitely put up with living with all six of Shane’s! And wasn’t life supposed to be about overcoming the challenges it threw at you? Wasn’t it about embracing the crazy?

“Shane,” Keira replied, trying to sound soothing. “We don’t need to work this stuff out right now. Life changes. Who knows, all your sisters might get married and move out. Your parents might decide to sell the farm and sail around the world on a yacht. You can’t predict the future so let’s just stop worrying about it.”

“Please listen,” Shane replied, his voice cracking with emotion. “I’m trying to end it now so that it doesn’t become even more painful than it already is, later down the road.”

The word end repeated in Keira’s mind, like a hammer on steel. She winced, the painful lump in her throat growing even bigger and harder than it already was.

It dawned on her then for the first time that Shane’s mind was made up. He wasn’t backing down. Nothing she said would change his mind.

“Don’t do this,” Keira replied. Suddenly she was crying, sobbing loudly, uncontrollably, as it finally sunk in that Shane wasn’t going to back down. That he really was breaking up with her. Her One. The love of her life.

“I’m sorry,” he replied, crying too. “I have to. Please understand. If we didn’t have this ocean between us I would want to be with you all the time. I may even want to marry you.”

“Don’t say that!” Keira wailed. “You’re just making it worse.”

Shane exhaled loudly. “I need you to know how much you mean to me, Keira. I don’t want you to think that I just got cold feet or something. If we weren’t at this impasse I wouldn’t be doing it at all. It’s not what I want. Not even slightly. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Keira replied, her tears falling bitterly from her eyes. She understood loud and clear. The man of her dreams, a man who loved her and made her laugh every single day, was giving up on her just because things were a little complicated. The man she’d fallen so deeply in love with during the most transformative month of her life was giving up at the first hurdle. He wasn’t going to put the hard work into their relationship after all. The thoughts swirled bitterly in Keira’s mind.

“So I guess this is goodbye?” she said, coolly.

Shane must have picked up on her sudden dejected tone. “Don’t be like that,” he said. “We can stay in touch. We can be friends. There’s always social media. It’s not like I’m cutting you out of my life entirely.”

“Of course,” Keira replied, heavyhearted, knowing that even with the best of intentions, once-loving relationships rarely if ever successfully turned into platonic friendships. It just didn’t work that way. Once love was lost, it was gone, at least in Keira’s experience.

“Are you mad at me?” Shane asked, his voice sounding small and fragile.

“No,” Keira replied, realizing it to be true. Shane’s reasons for ending it were noble. He was putting his family first. They were exactly the type of qualities she needed from a partner, so it would be a bit unfair of her to begrudge him it. “I think you should go and be with your family now,” she added. “Give everyone a hug from me, will you?”

“Okay,” Shane replied.

Keira wasn’t sure, but she got the distinct impression from the way he said it that he knew she wasn’t expecting to ever speak to him again. He sounded crushed.

There was a long moment of silence.

“Goodbye, Keira,” Shane said finally.

Before she had a chance to reply, the call went dead. She removed her phone from her ear and stared at it in her hand. How could such a small chunk of metal and computer chips cause her to feel like the entire world had fallen away beneath her feet? How could one conversation turn her life upside down? She felt like every ounce of happiness she’d ever felt had been sucked through the phone’s speakers and spat out into some black abyss, never to be seen again.

And worst of all, Keira couldn’t even be angry. Shane hadn’t been a jerk like every other boyfriend she’d broken up with had. There was no cheating, no lying, no screaming matches or deliberate below the belt punches. Perhaps that was why it hurt so much more. Perhaps it was because she’d let herself get carried away thinking Shane could be the One, that anyone could be the One.

Her tears still falling, Keira left the bathroom and threw her phone onto the couch. Bryn, who was standing at the breakfast bar brewing coffee, flinched with surprise.

“What’s wrong?” Bryn asked. “Are you crying?”

Ignoring Bryn’s questioning, Keira grabbed her fall itinerary off the side table – glancing briefly at the list of events she’d planned for her and Shane, places where they were supposed to make precious memories to tell the grandchildren – and ripped it clean in half.

CHAPTER TWO

Bryn scooped her arm around Keira’s shoulder as the younger of the two sisters wept bitterly.

“You’ve done the right thing,” Bryn soothed. “I know it won’t seem that way right now, but trust me. You were getting in way too deep. You’re twenty-eight, Keira, it’s not time to settle down.”

Her words did little to comfort Keira. Who exactly was Bryn to talk? Her life had been a series of disastrous relationships. She had no idea what kind of love Keira and Shane had found, and now lost. Sobs made her whole body shake.

“Come on,” Bryn added, “Let’s go get a coffee. I’ll call Mom. You know how great she is with all this stuff.”

Keira couldn’t disagree more. Her mom, unlike Bryn, seemed to be in a rush to get her to settle down and have babies. She’d gone so far as to say that there was little point in Keira putting so much energy into her career when she’d be giving it all up in a couple of years anyway to have kids.

She shook her head. “I can’t, I have to get to work.”

Bryn pulled a face. “Babe, you are a wreck. They won’t want you there in this state. You’re no good to anyone.”

“Thanks,” Keira muttered. “But I can’t not go in. First day back after a break. New senior position. Elliot’s going to be in the office. He’ll be expecting me to step up my game.”

While she was speaking, Bryn reached over and plucked Keira’s phone from her hands.

“Hey!” Keira protested.

Bryn tapped some buttons and then triumphantly placed the cell on the coffee table. “Done.”

“What?” Keira cried, horrified, snatching it up. “Did you just request a sick day for me? I’ve never taken a sick day! You’re so unprofessional. I can’t believe you’d do that.”

But when she scrolled through the most recent actions on her phone, she saw that it wasn’t work whom Bryn had contacted, but instead Nina, Keira’s friend and editor at the magazine. She read through the message that Bryn had sent her.