Still, I realized, it wasn’t like Sam had met Louis since we were all teenagers. That was a weird thought, knowing how good of friends Louis and I were now. “You and Louis didn’t seem that similar at school,” Sam muttered. “But I guess... he’s probably changed?”
He sounded a bit skeptical which, to be fair, made me laugh. It must have been at least twelve years since he’d last met Louis. Everyone changed in twelve years!
“We were similar in some ways,” I pointed out. “Maybe you just didn’t see them because you liked me.” My eyes twinkled. Sam had never been jealous of my good grades, as far as I knew, but he’d certainly been jealous of Louis’.
And in return, Louis had envied Sam’s natural talent for athletics. Of the two of them, my own skills were much closer to Louis’. For all I had learned to love sports for Sam’s sake, I’d never been good at playing them.
“He wanted to be a doctor. I wanted to be a lawyer. His family were big on academics, just like mine.” There had been no cozy chats for me with Louis’ mom. She’d liked me well enough, but we’d mostly talked about whatever we were reading.
Sam scrunched his nose up. I expected that whatever came out of his mouth next would be something I’d have to defend. Some point about Louis that would no longer be correct, if it ever had been. But Sam surprised me; rather than saying any of that, he gave a small shrug.
“Well, he must have changed if you dated him and still speak so highly of him,” Sam informed me. It made me frown. I didn’t think I’d said anything particularly flattering about Louis. Sam, of course, seemed to read my mind. “You said he’s similar to you,” he pointed out. “That’s high praise, in my opinion.”
It made me blush and giggle simultaneously, lifting my glass once again. The wine felt cool against my lips. Drinking more was unlikely to make me any less giggly.
“You’re biased,” I pointed out. “I’ve got as many flaws as I have strengths, just like anybody else.”
That was what I had been getting at. “Louis and I had a lot of the same strengths, which sounds good on paper. But relationships work better when two people have different strengths and weaknesses. That way, they can cover more different scenarios.”
Warming to my point, I patted Sam’s arm. “Like us,” I carried on. “You came to me with help writing your speech because I’m good with words and notes and structuring thoughts. And I called you when the window smashed because you’re steady in a crisis, know how to do DIY and you’re strong enough to lug a mattress around.
“If I’d called Louis, we’d both just have gotten one another panicked about water damage and not known where to get wood to board the window up with.”
I hadn’t realized that I’d said the last part aloud, but Sam chuckled.
“Well, I’ll take all the praise,” he teased. “But yes, I suppose I see your point. Our problem never was the fact that we didn’t complement each other well.” It was weird to have this conversation. Sam and I had never spoken about what went wrong. The only conversations we’d had about what went great were the ones we had while still together.
And Sam was right. We had been good together. We just hadn’t been as flexible as necessary. Choices had to be made and neither of us had been happy with them. But after it, we hadn’t really talked about it.
That was ten years ago. A lot had happened. Yet, seeing Sam again, it felt like we hadn’t been apart! But also like there was so much more for me to relearn about him.
And of course, that led me to think about the way Sam had kissed me. Familiar but yet so different. And maybe it was the wine going to my head, but I wanted to lean in and kiss him again. So much so that I had to bite my lower lip not to.
“I’m sorry for hurting you, Helena,” Sam said gently, drawing my attention back to the conversation.
My eyes widened. It was honestly the last thing I had expected Sam to say. At first, my mind could hardly process the words at all. Had Sam hurt me?
It took a moment to understand what was going through my head. “Breaking up hurt,” I confirmed. Of course, it had. Separating from someone that you loved would always be painful. I’d been devastated, convinced that if I couldn’t have Sam then I didn’t want anybody.
“I never blamed you for it. You couldn’t have given up hockey, it was too much a part of you.” And I hadn’t been able to see, at the time, any way for us to continue without one of us giving up our dreams.
Was that still true? My head was swimming too much to get a good grip on the answer to that question.
“I suppose I forgave you for your part in it a long time ago,” I added. “Probably sooner than I forgave myself.” But I had, eventually, stopped blaming myself for the wrongs that had been my part.
I hoped that Sam had forgiven me, too. “But I am still sorry.” Maybe that was all Sam had meant. Even if we forgave each other, we could still feel regret.
Sam smiled softly. It felt good that he didn’t just tell me that I shouldn’t have blamed myself. I had
