REALLY ✓

39: The Good Grief

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    TAYA's POV:

I had to do a double look, making sure that it was in fact Blake Harrison who was standing right in front of me, in front of Judah's house. I was so shocked to see him, but the craziest thing was that he wasn't even surprised at all to see me. As if he was already expecting me to be there.

"Hey," he said calmly.

"Uh... hi. What are you doing here?"

"I came to find you. I was following you, all through town," he explained, pausing for a beat as he said, "Can we talk?"

"Following me all around town? That's kind of creepy, Blake," I narrowed my eyes at him, "No, actually that's just creepy,"

"Yeah. I guess you can say I'm desperate. I just can't take it anymore. I need to speak to you... it's important,"

"Okay... Well, actually, I've been wanting to talk to you too," I said as I took a step closer to him and closed the door behind me.

"You do?"

"Yeah. I feel bad about the way things went down between us. We broke up and days later, I got together with Judah..."

"We didn't break up. You broke up with me. You didn't even give me a chance,"

"I'm sorry,"

"I've waited, you know? For days and weeks, I was waiting. I thought you might be coming around. I can't believe you'd move on, just like that, as if we meant nothing," Blake trashed his head to the side as his hand went to rake his hair in frustration.

"I know your favorite color's pink and your favorite food is the loco moco from Zippy's. You think I don't know you, Taya, but I do. And for weeks all I did was replaying it over and over in my head, what went wrong with us, and what I could've done differently to get you to stay... Look, I know I'm not a perfect boyfriend, to be honest I don't even know what I'm doing most of the time. But I do like you, a lot. I still do. And I want you back—"

"Blake, stop, please," I knew I had to stop him. This was painful to do, but I had to do it.

"Blake, I'm sorry, but the thing is... it was always Judah. It was always him from the start. I thought I could love you the way I love him, but I can't... I'm sorry that it had to be like this..."

I never meant to hurt Blake. I knew I had to be honest with him, at least now, and put him out of his misery. He deserved to move on and find someone that was right for him.

"You love him?" he croaked.

I nodded my head and he glanced away, unable to look at me in the eyes.

"Why?" he said after a while of silence.

"I don't know why... that's just the way I feel,"

"Why him? Why?" he asked again, his tone slightly higher than before.

"I don't know... he just... gets me. Like no one does," I found myself stuttering as I didn't know how to explain it words, "And I get him,"

"You don't even know who he is," he snorted a wry laugh as if to mock me.

"I do,"

"You don't," he was being so persistent about this.

"What do you mean?"

"Ask him about his dad," he said suddenly.

"Huh?"

"Ask him," he pressed on.