The year was 1967. They've had enough of youth and decided to make it their last college rotation. Good riddance. They were sick to death of hearing Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance, not to mention those fiddly togas and square hats.
That year, when they threw those hats in the air, it was for good. Life as adults began for them once again.
They hadn't seen each other for a while, having grown apart after what happened with the floor omelette all those years ago.
Dante landed himself a job in the town library. Calm and quiet, with all the books he could ever hope to read. She, now with a shocking red wig and the name Gwen, tends the bar at a local pub.
But they found each other again, as they always do, because they were each other's only constant.
Both lived separate lives but at night, when the town was asleep, they would go off together to the nearby woods and talk until dawn. One night, talks turned into kisses and then into something more.
"Can I tell you something?" said Gwen, lying on the bed sheet they always brought to sit on. The moonlight casting rounded shadows on her curves.
"Sure." said Dante, lighting a cigarette. A habit he picked up on one of his college runs. The sweat on their bare bodies glistened from the lighter flame.
"You're a shitty fuck." she said.
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Just horrible. I'm embarrassed for you."
"Yeah, okay." Dante shrugged, taking a long drag.
She slid up to him and pressed herself against his back.
"A really shitty fuck." she whispered, "let's do it again."
The cigarette was put out and the night faded into a mess of wet, sweaty limbs and breathless sighs. That was how it went for many nights.
Until one.
"I think I'm in love." Gwen announced on that night. Dante froze. Visibly elated, he opened his mouth to speak.
"Oh, no, no. Not you." Gwen cut him off. Dante looked as if he'd been shot down from the sky.
"You didn't think that I was fucking you exclusively, right? I mean, you're also fooling around with that girl, what's her name, Lulu? Lila?"
"Lola."
"Whatever, yeah, her."
"Well sure, I'm fucking Lola, but with you it's--"
"Stop." she cut him off again, "it's never going to happen, Dante. Anything more than this, you and me, never."
Dante sighs. A half growling, frustrated sigh. "Can I ask why?"
"Because we're never going to die and love can't survive eternity. After a while we're going to hate each other."
"I won't hate you."
"You won't love me forever, and anyway, his name is Leonard." she said, firmly ending the conversation.
"Leonard? That oily rich kid with the flashy car?" asked Dante. He sounded a little annoyed.
"He's not oily. And I like his car."
"You can do better." he spat.
"You mean you?" she spat back. Dante shrugged.
"Better than him." he said, sounding fully annoyed but defeated. What's a librarian compared to an oily rich kid.
"You're nowhere near the equation." she said, "so there's no point being jealous."
"He'll ruin your life."
"I got lifetimes to spare, so what if he ruins one? I love him, fuck you." Gwen quickly threw her clothes on, barely buttoning her shirt, and stormed off.
Dante watched her disappear into the thicket, then lit another cigarette. In the deep silence and darkness of the woods, the shattering of his heart rang clear as broken glass.
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