“I can’t believe this is it,” Maria grumbled from her seat on Alex’s couch.

“It’s not THAT far away,” Liz tried to reassure her, rewinding the movie they had just finished.

Maria rolled her eyes. “You wouldn’t be saying that if it was you that was moving two states away. What’s the countdown to?”

Alex stuck his head through the doorway leading into the kitchen. “Twenty-two minutes. What do you want to do now?”

“Hide and hope that my mom never finds me.”

“Maria, are you gonna say goodbye to—“

“No.” Maria stood up and stretched her cramped legs.

“So basically you are just going to have him find out that you moved when school starts in two weeks.” Liz sounded skeptical.

“Yep. That’s the gist of it.” Liz looked at Maria sharply, but before she could start up again, Maria continued. “Look, it’s been two months since he walked away from me and I haven’t even see him ONCE. He doesn’t deserve a goodbye.”

“But—“

“Liz,” Maria stopped her. “I’m gonna miss you so much.” She pulled her best friend into a hug.

“Hey! What about me?” Alex teased, joining his girls.

“Nope. I won’t miss you one bit,” Maria joked back, dragging him in for a hug as well.

“But at least you’ve got your father back,” Alex said, desperately trying to cheer up his friend as well as himself.

“But maybe I don’t want him back,” Maria whined for the hundredth time. It was a well-known fact that she resented her dad for leaving her all those years ago and was pissed at her mom for taking him back and moving her to California.

“I know sweetie, but we’ll come and visit and you can come back ANY TIME. It’ll work. You’ll see.”

“I’m glad SOMEONE’S optimistic, Alex,” Maria complained as she pulled on her sneakers. “Well, you two, this is it. Goodbye! I love you both SO much!”

“Are you sure you don’t want us to come and see you off?” Liz asked wiping at her tears.

“Yeah, I’m sure. I’ll call you when we get there!”

The three finished their good-byes once more before Maria was permitted to get into the half-packed Jetta.

Once she was out of sight, a red-eyed Liz turned to Alex. “She is SO going over to Michael’s to say goodbye.”

Alex nodded sadly in agreement.

***

Maria drove along the familiar streets to a place that held too many memories for her. One good thing that has come out of moving is that she won’t have to see Michael everyday once school started. Okay, not EVERY day but the ones when he went.

Maybe this would give her the opportunity to finally get over him. God, she hoped so.

Even still, she found herself parked in front of his apartment wanting to see him one last time. The moment that she gathered enough courage to go up and see him, she saw Isabel pull up, abruptly slamming on the brakes and jumped out. What stopped Maria was the tight, skimpy dress that Isabel had on.

Sure, Maria had heard from Liz about the so-called destinies but she never believed that they would actually be true. Heart broken but more determined than ever to leave, Maria drove back to her, now, empty house where her parents were waiting.