Flames

five

“What? No stupid, smart remark from you today?” Louis asked after my lame response to his insult.

I shook my head and looked the other way.

I wanted to slap myself across the face for being so weird and reacting so little to what usually is great comebacks and invective, but I just was too drained to do so.

“You are so pathetic, you know that,” He said. And there he went again, hitting a soft spot. I hated every time he said that word, I hated the way it came out of his mouth, and I hated how sometimes I believed it so much. It was the first word that started this whole feud, and I couldn’t help but feel that it would be the last word that would crack me.

Once again, I didn’t reply. Instead, I crossed my arms over the table and laid my head on top. I closed my eyes for a second and tried to focus on happy thoughts, particularly on the happy days with Louis, how much we loved each other, the endless hours of laughing until we cried, and just thinking about them made we feel like crying too.

I just couldn’t deny how much I missed those days now.

“Sam?” I heard my voice being called, but when I opened my eyes and checked for the source, it was Madame Webber who had called my name instead.

“Ça va?” She asked. I wanted to respond and say that I was not okay, but I nod my head instead.

“À quoi penses-tu?” She added. I didn’t exactly want to tell the whole class what I was thinking about, so instead I went with the answer that I knew would be suitable for the situation.

“Nourriture,” I replied. Just like I thought, people began to laugh at my ‘thoughts of food’ and I was able to hide the fact that I was daydreaming about my ex-boyfriend, whom was seated right next to me.

Louis didn’t laugh though, instead, he gave me a scowl as his index finger slowly tapped the top of the table with impatience.

“Okay,” Madame Webber said with a chuckle, turning her attention back to the lesson she was giving before she called my name.

I sighed in relief at being left alone once more, but my body tensed up once again when I noticed Louis giving me a menacing stare from beside me. I couldn’t fully see his face, but I could outline it from the corner of my eye, and it was so strong I kind of felt it too.

We didn’t speak to each other after that, and as much I was trying to focus on the lesson, my mind kept going back into thinking about Louis and I, well, when there was a Louis and I.

The countless memories kept replying in my head over and over, and I couldn’t help but feel a little more alive just thinking about them. If it wasn’t for them, I would be thinking about my miserable life and dark thoughts would have surged in my mind instead.

Don’t get me wrong, I hated the way Louis treated me, and sometimes I just hated him as a human being, notably after all the insults and pranks, but I couldn’t help but still love him. After everything that we had been trough, how could I not? He was my first love and I figured he would be for my entire life.

He still gave me butterflies, but he also made me want to stab him in the eye with a pencil.

I hated him.

But I loved him.

Yet I could love him more than anything in the world, and it still wouldn’t mean a thing.

He made it specifically clear that he stopped loving me after walking away from me that Monday.

He probably thought that it would crush me even more if I saw him hold that girl’s hand, and he was right.