When he returned home for vacation, the first thing I heard was his mother trying to set me up with someone. Julian's voice, cool yet infused with his habitual languor, floated down from the second-floor landing.

"Are you really that bored, Mom?"

Mrs. Chase's tone revealed surprise. "Why are you upset? He's a very nice young man."

Everyone knew. He was a top student from Columbia University, while I graduated from New York University. An invisible gulf, condensed within the geographical map of this city. It was a self-evident fact—he was unreachable to me, and he had not the slightest romantic interest in me.

But no one knew that we had ended that "abnormal relationship" three years ago—that relationship which never had an official beginning. Nor did anyone know that there was once a night when he leaned against my bathroom doorframe and, the moment I turned off the hairdryer, said in a devastating, casual tone: "It's better to end it early. Honestly, this is all starting to get boring."

***

"Who's angry?" Julian's footsteps silently tread on the thick Persian carpet as he entered the living room. His features, always so sharply defined, were now immersed in a pool of cool indifference. "Don't waste your effort, she'll refuse."

"Are you so sure?" Mrs. Chase asked with a hint of challenge in her voice.

Julian didn't answer. He simply took the phone from his mother's hand, his thumb sliding across a few photos of the guy she hadn't yet had a chance to meet, a lazy smile appearing on his lips. His mother was very familiar with this look of his—that innate sense of superiority that had followed him like a shadow since birth. Julian Chase, nature's favorite, crushing all competition academically, surrounded by admirers for his appearance. He was the sun, and everyone else, including me, were merely planets orbiting around him.

"I know he can't compare to you," his mother conceded, "but perhaps Clara's taste is different?"

"You should try it," Julian said. His tone was completely detached, as if discussing the weather. However, he paused, his hand suspended in midair as he was about to open the door, his plans to leave temporarily put on hold.

He waited. Ten minutes felt like a century in the grand mansion, where it was so quiet that only the distant hum of city traffic could be heard. Then, my reply came through.

[No need, thank you, Mrs. Chase. I really appreciate you thinking of me!]

An almost imperceptible smile flashed across his face. It was an "I told you so" expression, performed only for himself. He turned, finally opened the door, and stepped out into the crisp New York air.

He never gave the matter another thought.

So, he would never see the second message that arrived on his mother's phone just minutes after that text. It was an electronic invitation, glowing softly on the screen.

[You are cordially invited to Clara Lawrence and Leo Sanders' engagement party.]

When the Sun Comes Too Late — Chapter 10

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