incoming call from aaron!
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máire's phone rang through her car, stopping her music as she drove through london to the airport, she answered it without thinking — one press of a button on the bluetooth attachment in pedro — and upon hearing aaron's voice on the other end, immediately regretted it. they hadn't spoken since the previous night, and she hardly wanted it to be across a speaker phone in her car.
"hey, where are you?"
aaron's voice was still in morning mode, groggy from waking up as he rubbed his eyes and walked into their kitchen searching for a glass of water. his head pounded from the hangover he was suffering as a result of the night before.
"going to pick liz up
from the airport, bout ye'?"
máire tried to seem nonchalant, tried to focus on the traffic. but she was holding her breath seeing what aaron would say, or otherwise fail to. upon hearing elizabeth's name though he suddenly seemed to be more awake.
"shit, that's today?"
aaron straighten up, and looked down at himself — still only clad in his button down from the previous night and the boxers he'd worn to bed.
"yeah. i figured your
hangover was going to
be awful, so i didn't wake
you. i put the paracetamol
out on the table though."
as soon as she mentioned it, aaron spotted the two small ibuprofen's on a napkin on the counter. he thanked whatever god was above for máire; she knew he had a hard time opening up the bottles sometimes, particularly when hungover.
"right, thanks. you're
a life saver."
he switched the phone from his one hand to the other to take the ibuprofen and then leaned his weight on kitchen counter, debating wether or not to say anything about the night before. he considered acting like he didn't remember anything, but he knew it was going to be awkward anyways and didn't feel like lying.
"you know i remember
last night, don't you?"
maire bit down on her tongue and nodded once, shortly, as if she was searching for a way to constraint herself so he wouldn't be able to see any signs of the way the mention of the night before seemed to affect her. even though he couldn't see anything, and in actuality was miles away, her instinct was to suppress.
"right, 'course
you do."
"do you want to talk
about it?"
aaron asked the question cautiously, as if scared he had hurt maire and didn't want to see her upset. maire answered quickly, hating the idea of the conversation turning into that direction while she was half awake on coffee and they were both still working through the night before.
"not if you don't — i mean,
you were plastered. we were
both steamin. it's okay if it was
just a fluke, i understand."
partially, máire knew she was lying — or, at least, trying to make it seem like it was less of deal than it actually felt to her. but it was the safest way, really, to preserve the relationship they had. if she admitted to what she really felt — what had been relentlessly turning over in her mind since the night before — she knew she ran the risk of ruining their friendship
"are... are you
alright?"
aaron crossed his arm of his chest, as if trying to make himself as small as possible. he wanted to run away like a child, crawl into someone's arms until the guilt of his actions went away; the only issue was that the arms he wanted to crawl in to were máire. máire just sighed.
"of course i'm alright.
aaron, i promise."
"i just, i want to
make sure you know
i'd never try to — i'd
never want to upset you."
máire could tell that he was upset himself, struggling to find the right thing to say. they were both trying to sort through thoughts and emotions and repercussions, but she knew that was different for each of them. he was worried about her, that much was obvious; her first goal was to make sure he understood that she didn't feel used or taken advantage of. she was a bit jarred by the situation, sure, but not because of that.
"this isn't — you didn't
take advantage of me.
we kissed. that's all, i'm
old enough to know how
to be an adult about it."
aaron stayed quiet for a moment, his head hung as he chewed at the inside of his check, debating wether or not to admit why he felt so bad about kissing her.
"i was also old enough,
though, maire."
she seized up for a moment, suddenly realizing why he was acting the way he was. an internal oh resonated throughout her mind and her heart dropped — he was comparing her to himself, to what he went through when he was younger. the need to clarify that she fine with what had happened suddenly felt urgent.
"you're not her, though.
this isn't that. i need you
to know that. you know
that, don't you?"
she'd become very serious now. she'd been serious before, but it had been more of an awkward thing she'd hadn't wanted to deal with that early in the morning. upon realizing aaron's thought process, her drowsiness went away and her awkwardness was set aside.
"stop — no, this isn't,
you're not supposed
to be comforting me
right now."
aaron had already far convinced himself that there was a bad guy in the situation and that it was himself, that she was going to hold it against him forever. she had sensed that, and even though she was technically lying when she was trying to be blasé about it — she had been reliving the moment since, every second of it, heat rising to her face, wanting to go back to it and hating herself for wanting that — she knew they were in two different mindsets. he regretted it, she was realizing she had a crush on him, and his regret was infinitely far more complex than a silly crush.
"look, everything's fine, i get
it. we all do stupid things
sometimes. sometimes
you get hammered and kiss
in front of pubs, people
do that sometimes."
he wanted to breathe a sigh of relief at her words, but he still found himself holding his breath, still worried that she'd suddenly flip. it was as if he hated himself for jeopardizing their friendship and could only rationalize to possibility of her hating him too.
"you're, you're young mars.
i'm just worried, is all, i
don't want you making the
same mistake i did."
i don't want you to love me, not like that. not when i'm too damaged to properly love you back, he scolded himself mentally. he was scared of becoming something he would despise, afraid a pattern would begin.
"listen to me aaron, i'm not.
no mistakes are being made.
you can breathe. we don't have
to dwell on anything, there
isn't anything to dwell on."
she didn't know who she was trying to convince more — aaron or herself. but she was willing to sacrifice the way she the world stopped when he kissed her if it meant being able to hold onto the fact that having him in her life kept her world turning.
"things haven't changed
between us, you know. i love
you, you're my best friend máire,
i don't want anything to change.
i'm sorry, i'm really sorry. i don't
know what got into me."
i love you — the words stung máire in a way they never had before, as if they were a cheap attempt at compensation for something they both knew he couldn't give her. her grip on the steering wheel tightened, she shook her head, distracting herself by instead focusing on the roads signs as she approached the airport terminal and trying to find an excuse to get off of the phone.
"of course not. no —
look, i'm coming up to the
pickup spots, i've got to
go, traffic's a mess.
we'll talk later, alright?"
"máire —"
he tried to get her to stay on the phone, but she was already determined to hang up. she knew she had gotten the point across that she didn't feel used or betrayed, or that she didn't hate him, and the rest she just wanted to deal with later. aaron had good enough intentions, but her mindset was foggy, her judgement was cloudy. any longer and she knew she'd say something she'd regret.
"goodbye!"
mars bars has ended the phone call!
—
she pulled off to the side in a pickup spot and put pedro in park. almost immediately, she put her head down in her hands against her steering wheel and sighed, cursing herself for allowing her emotions to get ahead of her in what she knew was going to be an impossible situation.
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