Honey and Milk

14: Creating Secrets.

George

I stood outside the older building, bricks worn and covered with the dying form of ivy. I tugged the coat tighter around me, my breath coming out in visible puffs. I cursed the air for ever being this cold, even when I was fully aware that the crispness of autumn would bring such weather in the dead of night.

I didn't know how I managed to convince myself to come here, standing in front of the door with my arm outstretched hesitantly, still rethinking how I'd managed to get here.

I was laying in bed, on my side and facing the wall. I didn't quite understand what feelings I was supposed to feel, shame, relief, numbness? But, I knew that I felt dirty, like I'd taken something from him that I didn't quite know. It was terrible, thank god Darryl and Zak had left by the time I arrived. The tears had dried long before, but I definitely didn't want to to break once again if they were to ask of my wellbeing.

I had been squeezing my eyes shut forcefully for almost half an hour, trying to will sleep into me and finally be able to turn my mind off, but noisy buzzes from my phone caused me to flinch back into consciousness, not that I wasn't fully awake originally. My phone continued vibrating, and I turned it over to be greeted with one of the last things I wanted to receive. A FaceTime call from the one and only Clay Caswell.

I stared, my heart barely even beating as the call quickly ran out, a notification appearing for a missed call. It took a second of staring, waiting for something, before I put my phone down once more. Why would he be calling me, why would he want to talk to me? There was no point, I'd seen the look on his face head on after I'd pulled back. He looked surprised, and I can only imagine the disgust he'd felt.

With a trembling hand, I flipped my phone back around and pulled up his contact, hesitating over the FaceTime button before switching over to a simple audio call. It had only rung once before the little "bloop" noise sounded to signal he'd received it.

"Hello?"

I wasn't exactly sure how to feel, not trusting my own voice to betray me. So, I simply sat in silence, waiting.

"Okay, I'm just gonna assume you're there. I dunno, it feels weird to just ignore it, pretty immature." Okay, well he just called the fact that I'd rather sit and isolate myself over confronting the real issue immature. I heard a deep sigh and shuffling before anything else happened.

"I just don't want to sit and act like nothing's wrong, since something clearly happened. You felt it too, right? Well, you won't answer, so I can just assume that you hated it based on your expressions." I couldn't tell if there were hints of guilt or regret lacing his voice, but emotions weren't really my thing to interpret anyways.

"Listen just -- I can't put it into words over phone. I'm sorry though, I never wanted to hurt you, I didn't understand it either. If you wanna talk, I'll text you my building and dorm number. Come if you'd like, Nick isn't around. So, bye, I guess."

He hung up abruptly and it didn't take long before I got a text of directions and numbers. I didn't really know what to think, why was he sorry? I remember it clear as day, the way his breath brushed against my face, his arms trapping me down, the way his eyes paralyzed me into my position. It was too good to be true, like a dream, and I couldn't help myself. But god was I so greedy.

Still, it felt wrong to leave him there, debating whether I would arrive or not. The words he'd used, he felt like he was the problem, the one in the wrong. I couldn't let him feel that way, it would build up as too much guilt and simply fester there. 

So, back in the present, I was now walking through the halls, looking at my phone and reading the numbers along the doors before stopping in front of one with the same digits as in the text. The quiet silence of the corridor was overwhelming, and I could hear the ringing in my ears as I stared, quietly telling myself that I still had time to turn back and go to bed, pushing away the issues until a further date.