Emma had long mastered the art of loving Oliver in silence. It was easier than shattering two decades of friendship with one clumsy confession.
Only once had she seen something unfamiliar flicker in his eyes—not the usual warmth of friendship, but something deeper, unsettling, almost painful. Emma sensed it immediately; they had always understood each other without words.
“Something wrong?” she asked, setting her book aside.
His lips trembled, as if he meant to say something important—then changed his mind.
“Nothing,” he replied, abruptly turning toward the window.
Silence hung between them, thick and uncomfortable.
“Right, I’d better go,” he said finally, rising from the chair.
She didn’t stop him. Just nodded. What was there to say? Back then, neither Emma nor Oliver was free.
***
They had known each other forever.
At fourteen, they swore to be friends until death. At eighteen, they mocked their lovestruck classmates. At twenty-five, Oliver stood as witness at her wedding. At thirty, Emma dragged him out of a pub after his divorce, drunk and broken.
Their first meeting—her seven, him nine. The neighbourhood kids were playing cops and robbers, and she, the smallest, tripped and fell behind. The older boys jeered: “Crybaby!”
Then Oliver, usually quiet, punched the loudest one so hard he landed in a puddle.
“Don’t touch her again,” he muttered, wiping blood from his lip.
They never parted after that.
Shared childhoods—street fights, first cigarettes behind the garage. Then school, sneaking off to the tuck shop between lessons. Later, different universities, but the same habit—calling each other at midnight to share something important.
They were true friends. The kind who survived first loves, weddings, even arguments.
Emma had a decent, dependable husband—Richard. He and Oliver never got on. Oliver’s wife, Victoria, was beautiful, sharp, but saw Emma exactly once—at the wedding. “That girl isn’t from my world,” she’d said. So the dream of family friendship never materialised.
But they remained each other’s person. The one you call at 3 a.m., whispering, *”I can’t do this,”* knowing they’ll listen. Maybe even show up with tea—or something stronger.
That kind of friendship is priceless.
When Richard left, taking half the furniture and her belief in *”happily ever after,”* Oliver was there. He stopped her from drowning in wine, endured her outbursts, listened to the endless *”How didn’t I see it?”*
Richard had left for a young intern. Cliché, but Emma was the last to know.
“Didn’t you notice?” her friends asked.
No. Because on those nights Richard was *”working late,”* she was eating takeaway with Oliver. Laughing at his jokes, complaining about work, feeling like… herself.
Oliver knew about the split first. He arrived within minutes of her choked *”He’s gone.”*
“I’m so tired of pretending to be okay,” she sobbed, staring out the window.
“I know,” he said.
And she realised—he *did* know. Always had.
With Victoria, it was different.
She left in a rage, slamming the door: *”You’ll never love me like you love her!”*
Oliver didn’t argue.
When he told Emma, she scoffed: *”That’s ridiculous. We’re just friends!”*
*”Just friends,”* he repeated, and something in his eyes made her breath catch.
*”She didn’t understand you,”* Emma said, pouring him another whiskey. *”The real you.”*
*”Do you?”*
She stiffened. Remembered a diary entry years ago: *”Imagine telling him. His recoil. The awkwardness. Then polite texts once a month. Group gatherings where you avoid eye contact.”*
She couldn’t lose him. Risk the one constant in her life. He was the only one who truly *knew* her—who’d never walked out, even when her temper made her unbearable. Of course she valued that. And she’d do anything for him.
Almost anything.
But friendship isn’t love. *What if it fails?* *What if history repeats?* How would she live without him?
*”We’re nothing alike,”* she’d think when he argued with waiters about steak temperatures.
*”I’m not good enough for her,”* he’d decide, watching her roll her eyes at his favourite action films.
Neither noticed how their bickering birthed private jokes no one else understood. How their clashes sparked something their *”proper”* relationships lacked.
They loved in secret, as if breaking their childhood oath would ruin everything.
***
The moment came at Heathrow. Emma was leaving for Paris—new job, new life. Possibly forever.
“You forgot this,” Oliver said, holding out the scarf she’d left at his flat.
“Keep it,” she murmured. *”Something to remember me by.”*
His gaze flickered with something she’d seen a hundred times—but never *allowed* herself to recognise.
*”I don’t want memories,”* he said fiercely. *”I want* you.”
Two words. Twenty years of waiting. One life finally making sense.
*”If you get on that plane,”* he whispered, *”I won’t survive it.”*
Not *”I’ll be sad.”* Not *”I’ll miss you.”*
*”I won’t survive.”*
She smiled. Not immediately. First, she let herself *see*—really see—what that look meant. Then, like dawn breaking, she understood: she was happy.
*”Funny,”* she said softly. *”Words like that are worth missing any flight for.”*
*”So you’ll stay?”* He pulled her close. *”Truly?”*
On the way home, she thought: *”I used to have everything—husband, home, security. But not the one thing worth burning bridges for. Not love. Without it, everything else is just… empty.”*
