You don't know what to do. What to feel. You don't know how Danny wants you to react. Danny's earnest smile isn't helping. His watery eyes aren't helping. Your trembling silence isn't helping.

You pick at your hands but your eyes don't leave his, and for some reason, you feel like they're getting a bit watery, too.

You wish he hadn't said that. You wish he'd smile wider and say, "Hey, lighten up, mate! I was just joking!"

But you know he's not going to do it. The way his eyebrows are slanting tell you. The way beads cling around his eyes tell you. His trembling lips trying to hold up that smile that you wish he can stop because it's making you think of all these things tell you.

You don't know what to do.

You've been friends since the beginning of time and you don't know how to react to this. There wasn't any precedence—it all happened so quickly, and it's caught you off guard. Your face shows it. Your eyes show it. Your hands show it.

After what seems like forever, Danny's smile falters, and it's disconcerting, like sandpaper scraping an open wound. Danny's always smiling, always making you feel like you've done something amazing when really, all you've done is mess things up. His "don't worry about it; Tom'll fix it"s make you feel like you can't ever do anything wrong, and, thinking about it, maybe he really did mean "I love you, Dougs".

You wish you could go back in time to stop all this from happening. Maybe accept that trip around the city Harry offered you—anything that could have prevented this, stopped you from standing in front of him, not saying anything, fiddling with your fingers as though they were the most important thing in the world just as Danny said you are to him.

You wish you could just tell him how you felt. How you really felt. You don't want to tell him something that you feel you should say just because he's your best mate and you don't want to break his heart. You just wish you can be strong enough.

But Danny's eyes aren't letting you.

"Dougs?" he asks, and you can hear the tremble in his voice, the hurt. The silence is breaking him and you can feel it. The silence is breaking you, too; maybe more than it's breaking him.

You just want to get away. Think about it. About everything. You know you can't make yourself love someone, and you wish you can be somewhere else. Anywhere but here, in front of Danny, still waiting for an answer.

"Dougs, you alright?" Danny asks, and you can't take it anymore. You just can't find the words. The moment they come to you, they disappear at the image of Danny crying. You don't want to break Danny, and you don't want to make him hurt more than you're doing now.

You finally take a breath and look away, down at the pavement. You drop your arms. You hear Danny move. You don't look up. You keep to the pavement.

"Danny, I…" you begin, but the words are caught in your throat. They refuse to leave. They don't want you to hurt Danny. You try one more time, but you can't even begin anymore. You can't even say his name.

Then, as swiftly as it comes to your mind, you say two words before you can stop them, and a moment later, you find your legs taking you in the opposite direction, taking long, leaping strides, as though the ground is made of ice and you're being pushed without pause. You don't bother to look behind you—you can barely look before you. Your eyes are stinging and the road is blurred by your tears. Your heart is thrashing with each step. You wish you could take it back, but you wish Danny could take it all back. Everything was fine before this. Everything seemed like it couldn't get better than it was. You told him you'd stay with him forever and a day.

Before this, the promise of forever was only a few steps away.

Today is that remaining day. Today is because of those two words.

"I'm sorry."