Three's a crowd

63

It's a strange feeling when you notice you feel completely alone from everyone that you've ever known. As if all the happy memories and feelings never existed and all that is left is empty space.

Perhaps I should have learnt to be more aware of my surroundings, but given my current state of mind - or lack thereof, I wasn't really in the right mind frame.

I felt a body beside me, their pants touching my legs as they sat down, close. I jumped as my head snapped up as the body retreated and held up their hands.

"Britt it's just me, Kyle! Crap I didn't mean to scare you!" He said as I tried to calm down.

"Why would you sneak up on me like that?" I asked turning my face away to wipe my eyes.

"I'm sorry, I just saw you crying and figured you probably needed a friend." He spoke softly and I tried not to notice how he scooted back closer to me.

"I don't want to talk about it." I sighed dejectedly pulling some grass from the ground and dropping it in a pile.

"Fair enough, but do you need to attack the ground?" He teased as I pulled up more and more grass.

I rolled my eyes. I wasn't in the mood for his teasing, I had enough to worry about.

"Yes and I don't want to talk about it!" I reiterated as he sighed and leaned back against the tree, his arm gently brushing against mine.

"Fine, silence it is." He smirked as he took out his phone and I continued to pull blades off grass from the ground.

He didn't pry or try to get me to talk and after a while I found myself surprisingly calmer.

"Thank you." I half smiled looking down at the pile of grass I had pulled. "I just have a lot going on."

"Britt it's fine." He smiled placing his hand over mine. The warmth was welcomed and calming even. "You don't have to explain anything, just know I'm here for you. I'm not going anywhere."

I took a deep breath, a genuine smile creeping on my face as I shifted to stand up. "I'm going to get food, you coming?" I asked as he let out a chuckle and stood up with me.

We walked to the coffee shop quietly. I could tell he wanted to ask me what was wrong, but didn't want to pry and a part of me actually wanted to tell him, to get it off my chest.

Still I knew I needed to tell Riley first. It wouldn't be right to tell anyone else before he knew. Even if part of the problem was that I didn't know how to tell him.

Once we sat down I pulled at a croissant and stared at my fingers as the pastry crumbled into flakes.

"So.." he broke the silence.. "theoretically speaking how can I help you with whatever problem you're having."

I caught his meaning and decided to get some advice without divulging too much information.

"So theoretically, if you and Sierra were super serious and she was leaving to pursue something that was her all time dream what would you do?" I asked testing the waters.

"Well I guess I would support her even if it meant it hurt me." He sighed obviously knowing what the conversation was about.

"Okay, well what if you had something major happen that you knew would make her want to stay and give up her dream, but you knew that if she stayed she may resent you for it later?" I implied.

"I don't understand the question?" His brows knitted together confused.

"Would you tell her about the thing that happened or let her leave to chase her dreams?" I asked looking him straight in the eye.