The Beauty in Eternity

Chapter 84.

I felt a pull towards him in that moment that I simply couldn't ignore. It was indescribable, relentless, and stronger than me. I gave into it, and when I finally gained the strength to pull away I felt like every morsel of my being resented me for it.

I know this isn't right. At least, not right now. This isn't good for either of us. It felt wrong to pull away—it took every ounce of strength I had; but now isn't our time, and it will hurt us both. I need him as a friend right now.

"I'm sorry," I whisper, my eyes flickering away from his. "We can't do this."

"Don't be," he sighs. He flashes me a small smile and steps backwards. "Goodnight, Amara."

"Night." I mumble, biting my lip. Guilt. Guilt, guilt, guilt. Guilt for kissing him in the first place, guilt for pulling away.

I close the door behind me and scrub my hands over my face. I feel sick with the emotion, that only a matter of hours ago Elijah and I broke up, and I did that. It was disrespectful. I'm not a disrespectful person, all I do is think about others—so why the hell did I do that?

Moments later my pizza arrives, but my excitement for it has passed. I place it on the counter and go to bed, I need sleep. I'm going to be exhausted, slightly hungover and riddled with my new favourite emotion tomorrow.

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I wake up to a headache, but surprisingly, I'm really not that hungover. As soon as I open my eyes a sinking feeling in my stomach makes me want to hide under these covers and never leave. I worry about Elijah, where he is—what he's doing, how he's feeling. My mind flashes to Mason, more guilt climbing onto my conscience. I shouldn't have kissed him. I'm almost positive if I hadn't, he would have—but that doesn't make it any better. I can't get wrapped up in it. We're fragile, our friendship is fragile—and I know deep down that I need time to forgive him; because I haven't truly done that yet.

I shower, get dressed and contemplate making myself some breakfast before my eyes land on the pizza box. I shuffle towards it, plop myself down at the counter and tear off a slice. As I wallow in my own self pity and guilt, snacking on cold day-old pizza, I let out a sigh. "You are a mess." I groan to myself.

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Mason's POV:

"Alright, this is probably a horrible fucking idea—but what have I got to lose?" I mumble to myself as I approach the door. "Let's hope this goes better than it did in my head."

I knock on the door and take a step back, why the hell am I doing this? Of course this is a horrible idea. I'm sure if I looked up 'horrible idea' in the dictionary, this exact situation would be staring me in the face.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me." he scoffs as he opens the door, his jaw clenching.

"Look, Elijah—I just want to talk." I say as calmly as possible.

He stares at me with wide eyes before slamming the door. I stop it with my foot and give him a pleading look, to which he storms off in the other direction from. I walk inside and cautiously close the door behind me.

"You must think I'm made of stone, Mason. I let her go because I love her, but I'm not this good. I don't want to see you." he seethes, anger laced in his voice. His eyes are red and he looks like shit. He's been crying, and I don't know how to approach it, I'm not good at this shit.

"Elijah, I just want to talk—I need to," I begin. "I know you think you know the whole story but I need you to hear my side."

He scoffs under his breath, pacing back and forth with rage. I've never seen Elijah this angry, or even half as angry. I wonder why I even came here—why I want to fix things between us so fucking bad.