Present Day

Yuri walked alone on the beach, her gaze lingering on the horizon.  The morning was surprisingly clear, the water shimmering in the distance as it appeared to be an endless expanse too large for her to comprehend.  Seeing the perfectly rounded contours, she found it amazing that long-ago people believed the earth to be flat.  Of course, people generally believed what they were told, even if it went against what they thought to be true.  It was a trick they used often in their advertising business.  If you hear something over and over again, you eventually believe it to be true.

The same could be said for her personal life.  However, in Yuri’s case, it was mostly her telling herself half-truths, ones she’d come to believe over the years.  The breakup with Jessica was her fault, that wasn’t a half-truth.  While it was hard to overcome her insecurities at the tender age of eighteen – nineteen – she knew she was using them as a crutch, as an excuse.  It was easier than living with the possibility of Jessica cheating on her, or worse, Jessica leaving her for someone else.  Ten years after their breakup she still told herself she wasn’t good enough.  Not for Jessica, not for anyone.  So her one-night stands became common practice.  No relationship meant no chance of a breakup.  Even though she didn’t truly believe she wasn’t good enough, she’d told herself so often, for so many years, that she believed it.

Even no, twenty years later, it still nagged at her.  Insecurity was no longer the reason for her single status.  No, that was attributed to her not meeting anyone who could give her the same feeling that Jessica had.  She was a confident woman now, a successful business owner.  She was content in all aspects of her life.  All but one.  A week ago, she would have said she was content in her personal life as well.  But that was before she’d seen Jessica again, before they’d slept together…and before all those long-buried feelings surfaced again.  At least for her, they surfaced.

But Jessica’s note conjured up those old insecurities again.

She’d read the note a hundred times.  She read the words and she read between the lines.  She tried to put herself in Jessica’s place, tried to imagine what Jessica was thinking as she wrote it.  Was she running away as her mother suggested?  Did she still harbor feelings for Yuri?  Or was she simply putting an end to it before it ever got started again?  Was she afraid Yuri wanted to take a chance on their relationship again?  Or perhaps afraid Yuri didn’t, and the note was to save face.

Or maybe her old insecurities were true this time.  Maybe Jessica really wasn’t interested.  It was a day of .  Nothing more, nothing less.

She stopped and turned, looking back as the morning sun was now glaring in the sky, heating the summer air around her.