Writer's Note: Thank you for your comments! Another short chapter today. Let me know what you think. : )

She said goodbye in June.

Henry strode along the path towards Hancock. The midday sun glared down upon Old Dorms, and the heat sizzled up from the concrete. Five or six undergrads lounged on their backs on the lawn, soaking up the sun in their tank tops and shorts, and an abandoned frisbee lay in the shade of the elm tree. Someone had propped open the front door of Elizabeth's dorm with a fire extinguisher, presumably in the hope that a breeze would ruffle through and clear some of the humidity, but the air hung thick and lifeless, and Henry thought they'd probably have done better to close all the doors and draw all the curtains in order to prevent the heat from seeping in.

Three weeks had passed in a haze of first year coursework and discussions over what topic he would pick for his second year thesis. Part of him had hoped that he would see Elizabeth at her usual spot in the library. Though, of course, she had no urgent need to be there now that her studies for the year were complete. The rest of him felt like maybe it would be better to distance himself, to prepare for when she left. There was something comforting about knowing that even if he didn't see her each day, she was still there, somewhere on campus, and he might run into her when browsing the stacks or buying his morning coffee.

Her plan was to stay until mid-June, she'd said, when her brother's school finished for the summer. Now, that day was approaching, and he wanted to see her: to say goodbye, in theory. Though, he couldn't deny that some small part of him—okay, a significant part of him—still hoped she would change her mind. Not to mention the part of him that kept imagining how just before she left, he would confess his feelings, and she would admit that she felt the same way, of course she felt the same way, and she would kiss him—passionately—and he would stand in the middle of the road and wave to her as she disappeared from sight in a taxi, and then he would spend the rest of the summer in a fog of promise, waiting for her to return to him.

There was a distinct chance that fantasy was a direct consequence of his mother forcing him to chaperone his sisters whenever they went to the movies.

He strode up the steps of the stairwell, past the flyers pinned to the walls that advertised various sports clubs, societies and parties, and made his way to Elizabeth's floor. Most of the doors on the hallway were wedged open, either with textbooks or flip-flops or dog-eared magazines. He stopped outside her room and peered through the open doorway, but as he surveyed her half of the room, a heavy frown crept to his brow. It deepened by the second.

The bed had been stripped. The pile of pillows and cushions in the corner had gone. The stack of books on top of the dresser, the pots and tubes of cosmetics, the wooden photo frame containing a faded picture of her family had all disappeared. There was no trace that Elizabeth had ever been there, and for a moment he thought that perhaps he had gone to the wrong room—maybe hers was one door further along. Or maybe he was on the wrong floor, given that the brass numeral on the door was the same '9' that had greeted him on his previous visits.

"Can I help you?"

A tentative voice drew his attention to the opposite side of the room. A girl with reels of auburn hair piled up into a messy bun and a smattering of freckles that graced the bridge of her nose and cheeks sat on the bed, her back to the wall, her bare feet dangling over the edge. She stared up at Henry, a pencil held poised over the sketchbook balanced open in her lap.

Henry dug his fingertips into the back of his neck and glanced up and down the corridor before he returned his gaze to the room. "I'm looking for Elizabeth. Elizabeth Adams. But maybe—"

"Oh, sure," the girl said, and she started sketching again. "She left weeks ago."

"What?" His voice sharpened with shock.

The girl didn't look up at him, just shrugged.

"But…she said she wasn't leaving until the middle of the month. She said she was going to stay here until her brother finished for the summer."

The girl shrugged again.

Henry's grip on his neck tightened, and his breath felt like it had been caught in a cinch. He pivoted away from the door, and stared down the hallway. It had to be a mistake. Elizabeth couldn't have gone already. She wouldn't have left without warning, surely.

He faced the girl again. "When did she leave?"

"Errmmmmm…the day after results, I think."

Henry's frown deepened. But that would mean she had known she would be leaving the day that they had ice cream together, that she had known she would be leaving and she had lied to him when she said she would be staying.

He shook his head, his jaw clenched. "She can't have."

The girl shrugged in a way that seemed to imply—Whatever you say.

"Do you know where she went?"

"Home, I guess."

But Elizabeth didn't have a home, not anymore. She'd told him as much as he'd held her in bed in that very room. The only home she had was the horse farm, and—

The horse farm!

He turned and strode down the corridor, back towards the stairwell, sidestepping a skinny brunette who practically fell out of her room in a fit of giggles and a cloud of cheap lager.

The horse farm was just outside Charlottesville, or so Elizabeth had said. It might take some persuasion, but surely he'd be able to get the address from the office—assuming Elizabeth had listed the horse farm as her forwarding address. And then he could drive there, and then…and then…and then… Well, he would figure out the rest before he got there.

He'd almost reached the door at the end of the hallway, when a shout chased after him.

"Hey! Wait!"

He stopped and glanced back over his shoulder, uncertain if the shout was meant for him.

Elizabeth's roommate—he presumed that's who the auburn-haired girl was—leant out of the room, her fingers wrapped around the edge of the doorframe. "Are you Henry?"

He turned around to face her properly. How did she…?

Then he nodded.

The girl ducked back into the room. She emerged a few seconds later with a small bundle in her hand. She scurried along the corridor and held out the bundle to him. "She left you this."

Henry frowned at the offering and accepted it with a certain amount of caution. He thanked the girl, or at least he thought he thanked her—he couldn't be sure when he was that distracted—and then he stepped away from the door to the stairwell and towards the window ledge.

He peeled back the wrapping of slate blue cotton and revealed his copy of Boethius's 'The Consolation of Philosophy' nestled amidst the fabric. He stared down at the book for what felt like minutes, his gaze heavy beneath the ridge of his brow, and then he placed it on the chipped white surface of the window ledge, so that the glossy cover caught a gleaming pool of sunlight. Next, he held up the fabric the book had been wrapped in, and let its creases fall free. It was the t-shirt Elizabeth had worn the night she stayed at his apartment. The one he had helped her put on after he'd seen her physically and emotionally stripped. The one that had disappeared along with her the following morning, and that still carried her scent.

He looked from the t-shirt to the book and back again.

What did it mean?

Why did she leave without saying anything?

Why did she ask her roommate to hand back his things rather than returning them in person?

Then he caught sight of the slip of paper that peeked out from inside the book, where the cover curled away from the flyleaf.

He clutched the t-shirt in one fist, and eased the slip free. He smoothed the piece of paper down atop the window ledge. Flecks of paint and dirt gritted beneath.

Elizabeth's cursive handwriting flowed across the paper:

Thank you for everything,

E.

That was it.

No explanation. No indication why she'd taken off. No apology.

He looked from the note to the book to the t-shirt, from the t-shirt to the book to the note.

Returning his things? 'Thank you for everything'?

He didn't know what it was that had passed between them: this friendship, this companionship, this…whatever this year had been. It was hard to define, especially when he could only see it from one side and Elizabeth's mind remained so elusive. But now, as he looked at his returned possessions and as he reread her note, everything inside him sank, until he felt numb, even to the surrounding heat. He'd assumed it was a case of when he would see her again, not if he would see her again. But this…

It felt like she was saying goodbye.