"Go be with her," Riley had told you years ago now, her dark eyes shining with tears and with hope, her soft hand cupping your cheek. You promised you would, because no matter how crazy it might sound, you knew it would be the only thing to make up for all this, for all the feelings you'd been harbouring for a while now.
You cried sorry tears before you said goodbye, because you used to think you'd be Riley and Lucas forever, too.
You went to her place straight from Riley's, after saying your goodbyes. You jumped out the bay window, hopped in the midnight blue pick up truck she pretends to hate, and floored it to her part of the city. Taking three steps at time, you were halfway up the rickety fire escape that you're always scared shitless she's going to fall off of one night when she sneaks out when you hear her voice talking in that sweet teasing way you thought was just for you.
"Goodnight, for real this time!"
"One more kiss!"
"No—Josh, I have to go to sleep. Chill, we have all summer." You can hear her smiling and it's like a point blank gunshot to your heart.
You knew her voice anywhere but you hoped to God that you had the wrong building, the wrong window, the wrong girl. You looked up, and you saw a flash of her golden blonde hair, a flash of her adorable cow pyjamas and you knew you were right because of course you were. You see him too, with his stupid beanie and his stupid leather jacket, stealing one more stupid kiss before letting her shut the window behind him.
You hightail it out of there, before Josh can see you. You get into the midnight blue pick up truck she pretends to hate, and you don't dare drive away because he'll see you. You shrink down into the driver's seat like the coward you are, waiting for him to leave. But he doesn't leave. He stands outside her building and you watch him from the sideview mirror.
He's just standing there, with his hands in his pockets, looking up at her window. You look up too—she's still there, her little face pressed against the glass, like a beautiful mermaid in an aquarium tank. He waves and laughs and blows kisses and finally leaves.
You could have left after that. But she's still at her window, her little face pressed against the glass. After a while she turns the light off and goes to bed, and you watched her still. You watched the little black square of her window with a tiny moon reflected on it all night and cried until you thought you were really going to be sick, like you haven't cried since Pappy Joe died.
Then you went the only place you could think of, you went back to Riley's and you cried some more but she didn't shed a tear this time, not one. She told you that you would just have to be patient and then she gave you a cookie like you were fucking five and watched Friday Night Lights with you while you whined and wanted to know why. You hated yourself for not loving Riley like you loved her, because Riley was so much easier.
That was years ago now and she's still his and not yours. A month before graduation you mustered up the courage to really ask Riley why for the first time in almost a year, because you loved her best friend and you knew she loved you too. She had told Riley that you chose Riley three years ago and that still hurt more than you'll ever know and that you waited too long and that she's happy now and why can't you let her be happy?
Why can't you fucking let her be happy?
Today, years later, you watch her marry him, watch her become a Matthews. Riley cries—out of happiness this time. So do all of them: Farkle, Zay (he pretends not to), her parents, his parents, Cory, Topanga, Auggie, even Smackle. She doesn't cry at all and in high school that would have given you hope but the magical smile on her face cancels it all out and you know that she's happy and you've got to let her be happy this time.
You cry too, but not now. Later, after the ceremony and the party. After you've wished the happy couple a congratulations that couldn't sound sincere if you tried (you didn't try), wondering why you were even invited, why you even came. You cry in your big bed, cold and alone in your part of the city, trying to remember a time or picture a world where you are happy together.