STAINED || Mendes

FOUR

Love is a scary thing.

Love can make people do crazy things- Things they'd never even dreamt of.

And that's exactly how Brianna found herself at Y/N's front door three months later.

Shawn tried to ignore it at first when the tour started. Every time Brianna would walk into the room he'd hang his head low, averting eye contact. This proved to be difficult as she was his assistant after all, so he'd resorted to calling on her as little as possible, lucky enough to barely see her once a day. She seemed to act normal around him, and it made him wonder if she had also seen the orange around them.

He was never going to ask her this, of course. But she could tell from his aversion that he had finally seen it too, and it was eating her up inside.

This wasn't how she imagined seeing colors to be.

She wanted the feeling of gradually falling in love with someone, seeing all of the colors around them. She wanted to fall asleep in her loved one's arms every night, to whisper sweet nothings to each other and explore the world.

But the person who she had fallen in love with, had already fallen himself.

She could tell there was no way to get to him even if she wanted to. Even when thousands of miles away from Y/N, he was always with her. Brianna swore they facetimed at least 20 hours a day, the pair even falling asleep to the sound of each other's breathing at night.

Brianna was so close, but she wasn't there with him, and she realized quickly that she never would be.

Eventually, Shawn didn't need to try to avoid her anymore, as she was avoiding him like the plague as well. And everyone seemed to take notice of this.

Even Y/N.

She'd noticed the first day, in fact, how strange he was acting around her. Whenever Brianna would walk into the room and people said hello to her, Shawn's face would fall, muttering something about how he had to hang up and that he loved Y/N.

However, Y/N wasn't so sure anymore.

Having spent every waking moment together before he left, suddenly having him gone was taking a toll on her. She would never admit this as she didn't want him to worry, but it was tearing her apart. Behind every phone call, behind every 'I love you', she spent her days crying, face shoved into the pillows that still smelled of his cologne.

And this was the part of love that nobody warned them about.

Nobody told them that loving would hurt so much. That when you're apart from your soulmate, your world goes cold, empty, and soulless. That a simple phone call just won't suffice anymore. That sometimes, mistakes happen.

The colorful flowers Shawn had gotten her the first time they met wilted with every passing day until eventually, all that was left was the colorless, crunchy leaves that turned to dust, much like their love.

Shawn began to realize that maybe they'd moved a little too fast. He was so eager to see color, to explore love and intimacy with someone. He had always seen colors as a blessing, but now, he saw them as a curse. He wanted his world to turn black and white again, because every time the love of his life's name popped up on his phone screen, all he felt was guilt.

And she didn't deserve that, but neither of them wanted to admit that something felt off so they continued to pretend for as long as they could, all the way up until the tour was over and it was time to return home.

Y/N stared at Brianna for as long as she could remember, watching the woman babble on and on about some color and how she was sorry. Her cries were incomprehensible and Y/N was confused as to why she was there, but she stepped to the side and let the hysterical woman in anyway, gently leading her over to the couch in the living room.