Liam surprises me by stopping the car in one fluid motion, facing me with eyes wide in disbelief and hurt. I’m aware my words hurt him, I did it on purpose. I had to do it to prepare him for what’s to come. I just didn’t think he would stop in the middle of the street on such a fast turn. He could’ve caused an accident, considering it’s snowing.
“Liam! Why did you stop like that?” I demand. My heart begins beating faster due to the surprise.
“What did you say?” he asks and I sigh.
“I said: why did you stop like that? That was reckless. It’s snowing, Liam! You ought to be careful when dri—”
“Before that!” he shouts, cutting me off and surprising me. Ah, he means what I said before he suddenly stopped. I close my eyes and sigh tiredly. For a moment I thought that approaching this topic whilst he was driving would be a good idea as he would have to concentrate on driving instead of the issue.
“Ah, you mean that,” I say, injecting my voice with a lack of concern. “I just noticed that lately. We signed the contract on the twentieth of September, which means it ends on the twentieth of March. Practically a month away,” I explain as if it was the simplest thing. But from the corner of my eye I see him clenching his fist around the wheel. “I’m sorry for mentioning the contract; I know you don’t like it when I do—”
“Then why? Why do you bring it up?” he snaps, cutting me off once again. “Even if we have one month left, why now? Why tonight?”
“Come on, Liam. It’s not a big deal,” I try to calm him down. “I just noticed it today, that’s all,” I lie because I’ve been aware of this all the time. “Don’t tell me you forgot we have to ‘break up’ in March.” Even if I’m trying to make that sound nonchalant, I still feel the lump in my throat. It does feel like we’ll be breaking up for real.
“It’s not that—”
“Then why does it surprise you?” Now I’m the one cutting him off and I see him pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration.
“I’m not surprised because of that, I’m surprised that you bring it up, that you still care about it! I thought we were past that,” he exclaims and I take in a sharp breath.
His words make my heart race because it seems he really forgot about the contract and thought of us as a real item. I know it felt like that, but even if I let myself just enjoy my time with him and my feelings grow, at the back of my mind I always knew we were just together because of a whim and a contract.
I look away, my eyes focused on the snow falling around us. I don’t want to fight now because we still have one month. I know we can’t be close, that I need to build up walls to protect us both, but that doesn’t mean I want to end it here and now or make our last month something difficult and uncomfortable.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter. “I shouldn’t have mentioned it now,” I say because eventually I’ll have to bring it up, when the deadline arrives. Our time is definitely running out.
“But you’ll mention it later,” he says, his voice tense. I don’t even dare to look at him, but I can feel his eyes boring into my skull.
“Eventually,” I mumble and I hear him sigh, frustrated. “Let’s drop it, okay? I don’t wanna fight now, Liam.” I turn to look at him and it’s hard to smile but I try. “I haven’t seen you in a while and I missed you.” I bite my tongue because I shouldn’t have said that, but the words escaped my lips because I couldn’t stop myself.
Liam doesn’t say anything else, he just looks me in the eyes and I can see in his that he’s still hurting, that he’s worried and I also see dread. But all that disappears when determination crosses the brown sea of his irises and his hand reaches out for the back of my neck, pulling me into a fierce kiss that takes me by surprise. I tense at first because I wasn’t expecting this at all, but then I melt against him, my own hands grabbing the lapels of his coat and leaning in closer, kissing him back with the same passion and need. His lips are demanding and rough, his arms wrapping around me, pulling me closer, almost onto his lap. I can barely keep up with him, but I don’t want to break the kiss. I want to be weak right now and forget we have a month left, that I have to break up with him for the sake of his career.
However, I feel his hands unbuttoning my coat and slipping under it, going for the hem of my jumper—which is quite long, like a wool dress that I’m wearing with tights and high heels boots. That’s when I draw back, panting heavily and grabbing his wrists to stop him from going further, not because I don’t want it, but because I’m scared I might let him and I can’t allow that to happen here, in his car.
“We… we have a reservation, don’t we?” I say, my voice a bit hoarse and it’s a bit difficult to speak when he’s looking at me with so much desire in his eyes.
He mumbles something I can’t understand before he rubs his face with his hands after I release them.
“We do,” he agrees and I go back to my seat, buttoning my coat up again, trying to even my breathing. In what moment did I—or Liam—unbuckle my seatbelt?
We drive in a very awkward silence and it feels like the distance between the restaurant and my home is hours instead of twenty minutes. When we arrive to the restaurant, his hold on my hand is tighter, almost as if he were scared to let me go. I also hold on to him without saying a word. We are led to a faraway table and I notice Liam also made a reservation for the neighbouring tables so we can be left alone.
The restaurant he’s brought me to is not fully decorated in Valentine’s Day’s thematic, which is quiet refreshing. Maybe that’s why he chose this, knowing I wouldn’t like the overly cliché celebration. It’s also a Korean restaurant. It’s not big or extremely fancy and it’s, of course, fully decorated in Korean traditional art. The waiters are not Korean, but the owners are and they are wearing the traditional attire. It’s not a kimono, of course, and it looks a lot different. I don’t know the name of it, but they are very colourful, however, they look heavy.
We have no idea how to pronounce the names of the dishes, which are written in Korean and in its respective Romanisation below, but even then I’m not sure how to say it, so we accept the suggestion from the waiter.
It’s basically a lot of meat that’s literally still cooking in front of us. I look around and see the other costumers wrapping it in lettuce leaves and feeding each other in the whole romantic mood. Liam and I eat in silence, barely looking at each other. The food is delicious, very spicy, but it tastes shallow and I’m sure it’s because of the awkward mood between the two of us. Everyone around us is acting all lovey-dovey, not even minding the Liam Payne is here, even though some of the couples around are very young and could easily be his fans.
I sigh and keep eating, feeling the weight of my words on us. The weight of our remaining month choking us to the point it’s hard to swallow. This has to be the more uncomfortable dinner we’ve ever had and by the time we finish the dessert I’m actually relieved we’ll be leaving now.
Even after Liam has paid the check he doesn’t move and I don’t dare to stand up either. He still looks tense and I know it’s because of the words I spoke before. He shoves his hands inside his pockets and I sigh, seeing that as the sign to leave but instead he takes a little box from it. A present.
My eyes widen, remembering we’re here to celebrate Valentine’s Day and I also have a present for him. So I look for it inside my purse and also put it on top of the table. I watch his expression and I see the surprise written there.
“Happy Valentine’s Day,” I whisper, pushing the present towards him but instead of grabbing it, he takes my hand and I feel a jolt going from my fingers to the rest of my body. We look at each other and my chest feels tighter, I have to work harder to make air come in, consciously. I want to get closer, to break the walls that I can now feel between us. I succeeded, I built them up and now they bother me.
He puts the present he got me in my hand and lets it go to grab the one I gave him. I see him open it and look confused at the watch inside. He takes it out, inspecting it and a little smile shows up on his lips when he notices the musical pattern of the design. He opens it but he doesn’t see that on the inside of the cover there’s another layer that works as a locket. There I put a picture of us, one that we took in Paris. That’s another reason why I picked that particular pocket watch, because it had that secret compartment that he wouldn’t notice at first. I could tell him about it, I could tell him now why I chose this present, but I rather not. He smiles at me honestly and says, “Thank you, Belle. It’s lovely.”
I nod, fighting the smile and the lump in my throat. I know he means it, I can feel it in his voice. Even if it’s a present he would never wear because it doesn’t suit his style, he still likes it.
Then I open mine to find jewellery, but not any kind of jewellery. Just as the charm bracelet he gave me for Christmas that now has a charm from every city I’ve visited with Liam and one for London, where we met, this silver necklace has a girl on a swing. I’ve seen the design before, but this is different because instead of just holding the ropes of the swing, this girl is holding a book. This girl is me.
I look up to meet his eyes, mine sting for a moment and I think they are welling up, so I blink quickly to get rid of the tears and smile at him but the lump in my throat is choking me.
“It’s lovely. Thank you so much,” I say it, meaning it because I really love it. It’s not a necklace I would wear every day because it’s a bit big and I’m quite allergic so I can’t just wear any type of jewellery, although I’m sure this is hypoallergenic because he knows of my condition. But still, it’s such a special design that I feel it should only be worn for special occasions.
“I got that specially made for you. Nobody else has it,” he tells me and the lump gets tighter in my throat.
“Thank you,” I breathe out and he stands up and comes to me, positioning behind me.
Then he surrounds me with his arms, like giving me a back hug but instead of embracing me he grabs the necklace from my hands and helps me to put it on. He then makes me look at him, his smile sad when he says, “It suits you perfectly.”
I want him to kiss me right there, slowly at first, trying to memorise what it feels to be like that, but he doesn’t do it. He doesn’t lean in, nor does he grab my face in his hands to keep me from pulling away. I even think of standing up just to kiss him but he steps back and offers me his hand.
“Shall we go?” he asks and my heart breaks a bit. The walls are too tall and thick for us to break down now.
“We shall,” I accept, defeated and feeling the weight of these walls on my own shoulders.
I take his hand and stand up, he helps me with my coat and I see him shoving the watch inside his pocket. I feel something warm in my chest at the sight and then the necklace weighs on my chest, almost burning through the fabric of my jumper.
We walk out, in complete silence, and then back inside the car.
Awkward, so extremely awkward.
That’s all I can tell about the mood between us. Even when we say goodbye at my door, I feel like a hole in my chest has begun to grow when he walks out without giving me a kiss. I stay there standing, regretting how I handled things but also knowing it has to be this way.
And I tell myself that over and over again as time keeps passing by, with Liam and I still in this awkward mood, with short conversations over the phone that start drifting apart until we don’t even call each other. I don’t go visit him again and the European leg ends the first week of March. One Direction is back in London, but it’s worse now when we meet because the need to touch him, to hug him, to kiss him burns inside but I don’t allow myself to do so. I long to be like we were and I see the same longing in his eyes, but no one dares to break the walls.
When I wake up on the twentieth and I see then that number circled in red I just want to crawl back to bed because I’m not ready. I’m not nearly ready to end this because a month hasn’t been enough, not even six months would’ve been enough to prepare myself for this moment. I feel the hole in my chest bigger than ever, eating me alive from within.
Today I have to break up with Liam. Today the contract ends. I never believed I would be so miserable about it.
-:-:-
Happy Valentine's Day. I made it coincide hehehe... although it's a bit sad but oh well, it can't be butterflies and unicorns all the time, can it?
Until the next update! What about 1.5k votes for it?
Bel, xx