It felt a little strange at first being on her own for the first time in her life but Cass grew to love the solitude. She had so much more room to spread out now that Liz had taken some of their broken down furniture with her. She’d repainted the walls, rearranged what was left of the furniture, and resigned her lease for another year until she finished school.
As graduation approached she was inundated with invitations to parties, most of which she turned down. With working to pay the bills and studying every spare moment she had, she just didn’t have time for anything as frivolous as enjoying herself, but when she got a call from Liz asking if she could join them at their loft for dinner one night, she jumped at the chance. Even though she was enjoying the freedom of not having a roommate she missed the hell out of Liz.
They had fixed their place up pretty nice. The old crappy furniture they’d started out with had gradually been replaced by new pieces and their style was slowly evolving. They were moving towards a more modern contemporary style that was easy yet functionally comfortable.
Cass stopped at her neighborhood corner store to pick up a nice bottle of wine and an armload of flowers. Because they seldom got together anymore, it always felt like they had something to celebrate on these rare occasions when they managed to hang out. They’d both been so caught up in school and studying and whatever part-time work they could get to help pay some of their own expenses they had not been able to visit as often as they’d thought they would.
Over dinner they talked about everything that was going on in their lives and the evening slipped by in a hurry. Liz got up to make coffee and Bill and Cass gathered up the dirty dishes.
When Cass brought them into the kitchen she couldn’t help but notice that Liz looked like she had something on her mind.
“What’s up with you?” Cass asked. “Why the sad face?”
“It’s not a sad face, I have something to tell you,” Liz replied.
“Are you pregnant? Oh my God!” Cass said.
“No, I’m not pregnant, at least not yet anyway,” she said. “We sold the loft and bought a house.”
“Wow, congratulations,” Cass said grinning ear to ear.
“It’s not in Manhattan,” Liz said waiting for this information to sink in.
“Where are you going?” Cass said, her eyes widened knowing what was about to come would not be good news for her.
“It’s about an hour away from the city,” Bill replied as he brought the rest of the dishes in.
“It’s on a lake Cass, it’s so beautiful there. You’ll see when you come to visit,” Liz said. “It has three bedrooms so you can come and visit any time you want.”
“Wow, you guys don’t waste any time. When are you moving?” Cass asked.
“Escrow closes right after graduation so we’ll be gone in about a month,” Bill replied and stood there watching her reaction. “Don’t worry, we’re not dumping you.”
“You’d better not be or I’ll hunt you down,” Cass said smiling. She couldn’t have been happier for her friends but she knew that once they were gone it would be a long time in between visits.
The next time she saw them both was at graduation. They had finally finished and were relieved as the day’s events unfolded. They had a lot to celebrate. Both girls had achieved what they’d set out to do and as they threw their caps in the air that day they both knew that they would move on to a new kind of relationship once again.
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