"You're not happy, not even close, but you could be."

She's right, but I can't bring myself to agree.

Two vanilla spice lattes, a pair of bagels with cream cheese, phone calls from both of our parents, a bag of popcorn, several broken nails-both the painted kind and the metal ones that do not want to be hammered into a brick wall-and let me not forget several broken pieces of Balinese sculpture later, phew! The boxes are in their respective rooms or unpacked and broken down, leaning against the wall in the hallway by the door.

Most of my clothing is in my closet. My closet! Having a closet again is such a novelty and having Kat's closet in close proximity is thrilling, even though I swim in half of her stuff. Some of my books are on the shelves, though I'm in deep debate whether to arrange them by color to create a rainbow like I've seen on Pinterest in lieu of the hodgepodge they were in my old place.

There's a semblance of order, at least, when I come across a box I haven't opened since I moved out of my parents' house and into the dorm.

I pull up on the flaps to find my high school yearbook, a few framed photos, my Track & Field jersey, my diploma, tassel, a few keepsakes, and old journals and diaries. I don't dare look at the yearbook or photos and there's no chance I want to read my nave and old broken-hearted musings.

I'm about to close the box and toss it down the garbage chute when Kat enters.

"I want it to be known-you can write this down if you want-I hate unpacking. No, I take that back. I hate packing, but I really, strongly, extremely dislike unpacking. It's such a chore," she agonizes, sitting down next to me and then looking around my room. "Whoa."

"What?" I ask, tempted to kick the box away so she doesn't glimpse the contents.

"You're almost done."

"Just in here. I'll help in the kitchen and stuff," I say.

"I've only emptied three boxes, Navy. They contained dirty laundry. I'm hopeless."

I raise my eyebrows in disbelief. It's been hours and the feeble winter sun dips ever lower behind the buildings.

"I'm so indecisive. I want everything to be just right. I can't decide if I should hang my sweaters or fold them. If I should get a new comforter-the one I have now camouflages with the floor. I was also thinking maybe we should get plants and then I was looking up which ones don't need a lot of water because you know I'll forget to feed them. Oh, and I'm worried about Mew and the heating grates. What if he gets a paw stuck?"

"I thought I was the over thinker."

She puffs an exhale.

"What did you do with your sweaters before?"

"That's not the point."

"No, it's not." I inhale a deep breath. "You have commitment issues."

"Yeah," she says sadly.

"Takes one to know one."

"That may be my problem, but I don't think that's yours." She taps her foot against the box containing my past.

My phone beeps from across the room. I ignore it. It beeps again. I'm more than happy to delve back into her commitment issues and not leave her alone with the box, but she says, "Are you going to check that?"

"Nah."

It beeps again.

"Someone really needs to get ahold of you," Kat urges, rising to her feet and making toward my phone.

I scoot past her.

"Sheesh," she says, sitting back down.

"It's my mom."

"Checking in?"

"Of course. It's only been three hours. She needs to make sure I haven't run off and eloped."

She laughs. "She'd probably be okay with that." Kat is well versed in my mother's intense desire on marrying me off to someone wealthy. We're what my mother calls very comfortable, but my father who still hasn't retired from the Navy (yes, like my name) isn't what you'd call rich.

I grew up among the Cape Cod and Boston elite, though always on the edges. Like a D-list celebrity. My mother made it her job to be the perfect wife and hostess to keep up appearances, but they never quite reached zenith she aimed for. While I don't intend to marry for money and if things continue as they have, probably won't marry at all, she doesn't see that it's not up to a man to give me a better life. In fact, if I break it down, men are the source of my problems and not the solution.

I glance over and Kat holds a spiral notebook from the box. She turns it over and reads the cover, printed in the faded bubble letters of a seventh grader, "The Boyfriend Book. Ooh. I've never seen this before."

I swipe for it, but she holds it over her head with her long arms.

"What do we have here?" She flips through the pages. "When we first met I thought you were a lesbian, but then I took note of all the books you read. Gay erotica is plentiful nowadays, so I ruled out homosexuality. You hooked up with a couple of guys in college, so I knew you weren't asexual. But all joking aside with the man-hate, I've never been completely sure if you liked guys, but this this changes things." She waves the notebook.

She's teasing, but I don't want her to read it. I try to grab it again, but she's too tall and nimble. She dashes out of my room and down the hall, sequestering herself behind her bedroom door.

I chase after her, calling, "Kat, come on. That thing is stupid. And old. I was in seventh grade. And eighth, ninth, tenth..."

She's quiet when I lean against her bedroom door, my palms sweaty over what she'll read in there. Theories, couplings, ratings, private musings. I stumble when the door opens. The last golden light of day spills onto the wooden slats on the floor.

She points at a line in the book and I know, with certainty, the name her eyes have landed on. "Wait a minute. Navy Carrington, what aren't you telling me?

Chapter 4.

Party Animals An unpleasant knot twists in my belly as Katya reads the entry. "Is this the Carrick? As in the Sexy Beast? As in the guy who swept you off your feet yesterday? The guy I just met? Well, I didn't meet him formally, because you didn't introduce me, instead running off like a scared rabbit. Correct me if I'm wrong, but Carrick is an unusual name, am I mistaken here or is he a member of the-"

I cut off her lengthy line of interrogation. "Yes. The same. Carrick Kennely."

"As in The Kennelys or a Kennely?" she follows up.

I sigh. "The, capital T Kennelys."

"I suddenly regret never taking you up on those invites to your house for Thanksgiving and Christmas."

"Those were my mother's invitations."

"Ouch," she says, feigning insult.

"I'm kidding. I would have loved if you came home with me and experienced the complete and utter dysfunction, but you had exciting and exotic locales to visit."

"But this development is juicier than the private island in the Pacific, the boating adventure off Antarctica, and the numerous tours through Europe."

"The difference is your mother isn't a crazy, bossy pants," I tell Katya, recalling the stunning, yet sweet woman I've met several times over the years.

"Oh, but she is. Trust me." Kat shivers.

"Touche."

Kat pauses and then says, "Tell me everything."

I waver, reaching for the incriminating notebook.

"Did you have a thing for him? For Carrick?"

I make a non-committal shake/nod/turn/twist of the head because I cannot lie.

"Was this, like, an arranged thing between the Carringtons and the Kennelys?" Before I can do the weird bobble headshake again, she says, "Or was it like the Montagues and Capulets? Forbidden love because of a longstanding family feud?"

"Nothing like that," I say, backing her toward my room.

Kat taps her finger against her chin. "High school sweethearts?"

"Hardly."

"I'm dying here. What was it?"

"Nothing. I was friends with his sister."

"And under penalty of breaking up the friendship she cock blocked you. Er, him?" Katya guesses, stepping through my doorway.

"No, there was no blockage of any sort."

Cock block, she mouths, teasing me with her eyebrow, elevated to as until now unforeseen heights.

I make a swipe for the notebook again, but she grips it to her chest, rushing to the far side of my room.

"You know the details of every single one of my romantic endeavors, ever. Well, almost," she says.

I give a very distinct shake of my head.

"Please, pretty please tell me." She bounces excitedly on her toes.

"It's over. In the past."

I expect her to continue begging, speculating about the connection I have to Carrick, but her almond eyes soften around the edges and she lowers her voice. "Navy, I'll agree with you that it's in the past, but I think we both know that it's not over and done with."

I swallow back anger and hurt and humiliation and other unnamed emotions.

"Sometimes talking helps," she adds.

I recline on the bed, clutching a pillow to my chest. I take a deep breath. This is going to suck. "I was best friends with Claire Kennely since we were in Kindergarten. She had five brothers. Two younger-the twins Kellen and Keagan. Three older: Colby, then Conner, and the one closest in age to us, Carrick."

"Sounds like that family had a thing for C-names."

"And K. Kellen and Keagan. The dad's name was Calvin and they started with C so the sons would have the same initials C.K. and then the twins were a surprise so they got K like Mrs. Kennely, Kathryn. Like you."

"Gotcha."

"Claire was the only girl and we were like sisters. You can imagine how thrilled my mother was that I became such good friends with a Kennely."

"The Kennelys."

"Yes, the Kennelys," I repeat, too young to have grasped the meaning when I met the family and later I was too familiar with them and their delightful dysfunction to care. "Anyway, as we got older, Claire would always tease me about which one of her brothers I had a crush on."

"Did you?" Katya asks, eating this up.

I look away.

"You did," Katya whispers.

"Yes, a big, fat, stupid crush, but we were also friends. Practically best friends like Claire and me." I recall early morning runs, lazy rainy afternoons, the way we'd find excuses to be together, to touch each other, to tease, to joke, and to run off on some important mission so we could be alone.

"But then when Claire died-never mind." I sniff, turning away.

Katya gives my leg a squeeze, staying there for a few more long minutes, but I don't budge.

She gets up, presumably sensing that I've run out of words. "I'll leave it at never mind for now, but I want you to tell me what happened, Navy. I think you need to let it out." The joking and teasing Kat is gone, replaced by the kind, caring best friend. She sets the notebook down, and I listen to her pad out of the room as I struggle to keep the tears in.

I lay in my new bedroom, as night settles in around me, my thoughts heavy with loss, with a broken heart I've tried to tape back together with a perfect outward appearance-a smile, the right clothes, career accomplishments, unflagging honesty, dedication, and a headstrong will not to date.

Now with the unexpected resurrection of someone from the past I'd rather forget, I'm not sure how well this life of mine is truly holding together. As for my heart, I've learned to live with its fractured pieces. I roll over and pull a happily ever after romance with worn edges from my shelf and part the pages.

It's the classic story of: girl falls in and out of love. Guy leaves. Another one appears. The original guy comes back, realizing his mistake. Meanwhile it turns out the other one that appeared was a cheater so there's no reason to like him. I'm getting to the juicy confrontation when Katya pokes her head in.

"I'm ordering dinner. What are you in the mood for?"

I push onto an elbow, blinking my eyes against the strain of reading under a dim light for so long. The glow of the digits on the clock on my bedside put us well past dinnertime.

"We could go out if you'd rather," Kat tries. "Celebrate, party, have a good time."

I know she'd rather. She's an extrovert, while, when left to my own devices I'm the opposite.

Her stomach gurgles.