I Think I Love You | Randy

track 06. the long and winding road - the beatles

You left me standing here a long long time ago.

***

I woke up in a mood, my restless thoughts forcing me out of bed earlier than I would have preferred on a Saturday. The apartment was still a mess after last night, and Rye was nowhere to be seen, still sleeping off his hangover in his room.

I dug my leftover pizza out of the fridge, placing a couple of slices on a plate in the microwave. I stood and watched it revolve slowly, no motivation to do anything else but watch the cheese bubble and melt before my eyes. When the microwave finally binged, I sat with my plate on the kitchen counter, too grossed out by the mess to sit in the living room, letting my irritation fester as I ate.

I had started collecting the rubbish into a bag when Rye finally surfaced from his bedroom. He didn't notice me at first as he made straight for the kettle, as I had been too annoyed with him to even say good morning.

"What are you doing?" he asked when he finally saw me.

"Cleaning up."

"You don't have to do that, it's not your mess." 

"Well it was bothering me," I clipped, continuing to passive-aggressively drop bits of pizza crust into the rubbish bag.

"I'm sorry."

"It's fine."

I was being immature but I didn't really care. I knew I wouldn't be half as irritated by the mess if he'd gotten high alone, but it was the fact he'd done it with Sonny who he knew I didn't like, and that I'd ended the night essentially being their pizza delivery boy instead of celebrating my success. Rye hadn't intentionally done anything wrong, but his actions had ruined my mood all the same.

Rye didn't say anything else, instead he just moved towards me and tugged at the bag until he wrenched it out of my hand. I rolled my eyes as he shrugged, walking away from me backwards to take over the job. But before he could even pick up a single thing I heard a crunching noise and Rye yelped out in pain, hopping on one foot.

"What did you do?" I asked, my question answered straight away as I looked at the small pile of crushed glass on the ground where he'd been standing.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," he cursed, hissing as he tried to look at the bottom of his foot while still hopping on the other one.

"Sit down, you idiot," I commanded, helping him over to the couch.

"Wasn't looking where I was bloody stepping," he groaned.

"What even is that?" I asked, staring at the tiny pieces of clear glass embedded in the bottom of his foot.

"I think it's the cone from the bong." I shot him a pointed look. "Get off your high horse, Andy."

"I didn't say anything," I said, biting back a laugh. I grabbed his foot and Rye hissed, kicking at me. "Calm down," I said, studying the injury. "I need to get the first aid stuff."

I left him on the couch as I went to the bathroom to find bandages and a set of tweezers. Returning with my supplies, I found him now laid down completely on the couch, whimpering softly with his foot held high aloft. Classic Rye, taking any opportunity to be overdramatic so I would have to baby him. Was I not allowed to be mad at him for two seconds? I sat back down on the couch, putting his foot in my lap.

"I need to get the glass out. Keep still, okay?"

It hurts, Fovvs."

"Don't be a baby," I scolded, refusing to play into his games as I knew he was milking it for the sympathy. If he thought he could take advantage of my nurturing instincts to get out of the bad books, he had thought wrong. I began carefully extracting the glass pieces from his foot, determined to focus only on the task at hand.