HIP #3: Forgetting The Old Us

Chapter 44

I leaned my back in my seat and took a deep breath. It has been several hours since that argument between Arthur and me passed. Even so, the things he said are all stuck in my head.

Because he's right with his words. I never asked for his help, no matter how much I needed it. I acted like I had everything under my control, as if I was never weak.

I always held my pride and never him. That's my mistake, which I can't admit even just to myself. I feel stupid thinking that I once been on that route. After that, Arthur tried to change the topic by asking someone else about their day and agreed with them.

Then he proceeded to the main topic which I was interested in, even so, I couldn't focus on it. I kept pacing back to the past. Back when I was trying to move on but couldn't do that one thing, I had to.

If it wasn't him who said all those, then I could have said out loud that I agreed. But I already felt a lot of shame knowing that out of seven billion people in the world, it's he who noticed that in me.

He kept talking about the lesson and randomly picked students who raised their hands to volunteer to answer and I wasn't one of them but he called me several times.

Luckily, I'm already familiar with the topic so I didn't look like a fool for the first time with him as the teacher in the room. Earlier, I think I caught Britney giggling at a corner when I rolled my eyes at Arthur.

When I looked at her, she tried her best to hide her laughter. But I saw how hard it was for her. Nothing was ever funny about what I did. Maybe she was just in the mood for laughing.

"So, what was all that?" Charlie teased as we were walking through the hallways of our school. I will leave this soon. I don't want to but I have to. I made a lot of memories here.

And soon, we're going to meet new sets of hallways. "What do you mean?"

"That," Charlie crossed her arms.

"What is that?" I rolled my eyes.

"I couldn't ask you before because I knew you wouldn't answer but now that it's just us, what was all that little talk with professor Arthur?" Here we go again! I don't actually hate this type of conversation with my best friends but the way they mention their names makes me shiver.

"He started it, you know." I licked my lips, dried by the cold breeze coming from the air conditioner.

"Really? Well, in my observations, he just asked about your day and you already said he has the answers to those. How did he start it?" Britney said. I should have prepared several deep explanations for these two.

"I tried my best not to be toxic, okay?" I slightly chuckled.

"Okay, okay. But the end of that though." She flipped her hair.

"End of what?" I asked.

"Didn't you hear him? He used your point of view and his point of view!" Our arms are wrapped around each other.

"I heard him, and I hate that I did." They both rose their eyebrows as if they're agreeing with me. Finally!

"He said he was tired of trying." And I never knew that. He never told me that before until now.

"Yeah, that's him. Easily gets tired of such things that aren't even tiresome." I was lying. Because I know it was so tiresome to love me like how he did. I know it was hard to understand me. I've been a jigsaw puzzle in front of him all along.

"Oh," Britney reacted. Perhaps she doesn't know how to.

"Well, he sounded like he's writing a book with all those words he gave out as a quote earlier. They sounded good, honestly." Charlie praised. She wasn't wrong. "I know, that's what he's very good at. He's very great when it comes to sincere words. If he only means them like he's supposed to then I would believe him."

He used to write me poems back then and I loved them. One of what he wrote is still in my head living here rent-free. I can't get it off my brain but I want to. The other side of me wants to keep it as a souvenir of the days he was mine. Or in other words, the day I was his third.

I sighed.

"He was sincere."

"Oh, Britney. If you only know him."

"I might not know him well but he looks like he still loves you. I mean, you know... low-key loving you? That's what I can see. He won't say all those words in the first place if he has moved on. He won't be that defensive for himself."

"How can you say so?"

"I've loved a guy who I can't have. And I lost him. Now, we're casually talking to each other like we were never a thing. So I know how boys will be boys." She's...

She's...

Undeniably correct.

"How do you think he can be like that?"

"Like what?"

"Like that! Acting like he doesn't love me anymore but still does."

"I don't know either."

"It's really hard to hard to hide your love for someone if the truth is that you still love him." Charlie interrupted.

"Do you think I still love him?" I know the answer.

"Only you can tell whether you do or you don't. Do you?" She asked.

Do I still love him? Do I?

I'm not sure. Half of me is saying that I don't. But the other half is saying that I do.

"I guess," I admitted.

"Wait, what?" Britney surprisedly asked.

"Yeah," I gave up saying that I don't love him anymore.

If he got tired of trying to understand and fix me, then I'm tired of faking my smiles, saying I'm okay, and telling them that I moved on.

"You're saying that you- you... ah... you umm, still love him?"

"What? Do you want me to lie or something? I'm done with that phase."

If I can't be true to him, then maybe I should be true to my best friends. That's the last thing I can do to say that I'm not going through all these things alone.