My Record Store Romance

It All Has to Fall Apart Somewhere

I sighed again. "That's what hurts, Drew."

His eyes searched mine, his breathing growing heavy. I knew I was being hard on him, I knew I was being horribly unfair. I knew that what I was doing to him was wrong.

But I needed him to know that what he was doing to me was wrong, too.

"Hailey," He whispered, taking a step towards me. His face was inches away from mine now, and he closed his eyes, like what he was going to say next was too painful to say as he looked at me. "There's nothing wrong with me. I'm fine, I swear, I'm okay."

His voice broke at the end, his eyes still shut tightly.

I shook my head in disbelief, not agreeing with him in the slightest. "Then just answer me Drew, just this once. If you just tell me the truth, I'll stop asking about it."

I listened as he took a deep breath, sucking air into his lungs as if he could never get enough.

I took a deep breath now, too.

"Tell me why you're always so hard on yourself." I exhaled, trying to not jumble my words together. I just didn't know where all of this was coming from- it was so unexpected. Like all the questions had just built up over time; and now I couldn't stop myself. 

But why did I feel like this? Why did I feel so hurt?

"Tell me why you are always so worried, so paranoid. Tell me why you couldn't stop shouting save her when you fell asleep during work, tell me why you were so afraid to go to the hospital on that one night back at the record store."

I froze, thinking about the next words that would come out of my mouth. "Tell me why it seems, no matter what, you always have the weight of the world on your shoulders."

When Drew opened his eyes again, it was like they were electrified. Filled with tears, I had to do all that I could not to drop to my knees and beg for forgiveness, not to run over to him and throw my arms around him, not to cry just because it looked like he was going to.

"Please- don't do this." He said, "Please, I can't explain it right now. It's not because I don't trust you, it's not because I don't want to, because I do, I really do. I'm just scared, Hailey."

"Scared of what?" I asked, watching him closely and then looking towards the door. He grabbed my arm suddenly, catching my thoughts.

"Hailey I don't want to lo-"

His sentence was cut off by the chirping buzz of his ring tone, and we both sighed. I nodded at him and took a step back, as he just continued to stand in front of me, looking as regretful as ever.

I just couldn't believe this was actually happening. The last time we had argued, it had been at the record store, almost a month before.

How did we get here?

I mean, I knew all about secrets. I knew all about lies. But with Drew, I thought it was different.

I guess I was wrong.

He cleared his throat as he fumbled through his pocket and searched for his phone. I continued to glare, cursing internally at the interruption. Whoever had dialed his number really had the absolute worst timing.

He answered at the fifth ring.

"Hello?" He asked, stress clearly evident in his voice. He was never really good at covering up his emotions, they always found a way to come out one way or another. It was just talking about them that he had a problem with.