Maddox:
Tyler and I are meeting Rose at the diner tonight. Ever since he breifly met her at the game a month ago he has been breathing down my neck for a proper introduction and I finally gave in and asked her. I was ecstatic when she immediately agreed with no hints of hesitation or doubt behind her beautiful eyes.
That past month has been amazing with her. All my time has been amazing with her actually. We spend a lot of time together, and she smiles and laughs most of the time now. I feel so fucking proud of her and of myself for being the reason behind most of those smiles.
Thankfully, that Jeremy dick hasn't shown his face to either of us again after that one encounter and I'm fucking glad, because I'm not sure if I'll be able to not fuck up his face if I see him a second time.
The weather is much warmer now, and my angel seems happy about it. I told her I'll pick her up tonight but she refused, telling me that she can't be afraid of walking alone forever. I agree, but it still makes me feel worried as shit.
All my worries fly out of the window, however, when Tyler and I step into the diner and I see her chatting with Melody, the middle aged sweet waitress that serves us every time we come here. My Rose has a beautiful smile on her face as she talks animatedly with the woman and I feel pride swimming through my veins again.
"Oh, here they a-are!" Rose spots us and waves enthusiastically, looking as much of an angel in her white dress as the first time I ever saw her, almost two years ago. If someone had told me back then that we'd be here today I wouldn't have believed them. She had always seemed like such a dream so out of reach from a mere human like myself. But now I get to see her everyday and my dream seems closer than ever imagined.
"Hey, Angel." I greet her with a grin as I scoot in beside her before dropping a kiss on her cheek. She blushes in response and I fucking love that. "This is my best friend, my childhood friend and my roommate, Tyler."
She smiles shyly at him with a small wave. "I w-wanted to thank you for the other n-night. That g-guard wouldn't have h-helped me reach Maddox."
"No thanks necessary at all." Ty grins as he sits down across from us. "So tell me how he's been treating you? Is he nice to you or do I need to kick his ass? I'll gladly do it if you just say the word."
My angel giggles then shakes her head. "No ass kicking ne-needed. Please don't do that. He's v-very nice indeed."
Ty's grin is directed at me this time. "I've raised you right, my boy. You make me proud."
Rose laughs. "H-how long have you b-been friends for?"
"Too long, if you ask me." I mumble and she elbows me in the side, mouthing 'that's rude' with a cute frown between her brows.
Tyler breaks into a loud laughter and Rose flinches slightly before relaxing soon after. "We've been friends since kindergarten actually. We're like soulmates, really."
Grumpily, I shake my head. "You're my brother, yeah, but you're not my soulmate, dude."
Mischief swims in Tyler's green eyes before he smirks. "You're right. I forgot. Your soulmate is an angel."
I narrow my eyes at him and the dickhead looks like he's about to burst into a fit of laughter.
"Is he talking about the girl you're in love with?" Rose asks with a soft smile on her face that looks somewhat sad and I almost groan at how oblivious she still is. I've been dropping hints left and right for her and she's so damn oblivious it hurts my brain sometimes.
"Yeah." I nod.
"Is she still not ready?" She asks with a cute little pout that I want to kiss more anything and I honestly don't have an answer to her question. Sometimes I think she actually might be. Other times I feel like if I let her know she'll run and I'll never see her again. So I just shrug.
"She'll be soon." Tyler's grin looks like it's about to split his face in half. "I can feel it."
Deciding to change the subject, I clear my throat and point at the menus resting untouched on the table. "Ready to order, Angel?"
Her eyes light up with excitement and she quickly nods. "Yes. I want that chocolate milkshake you got me the other day."
Absolutely oblivious. Adorable, but oblivious.
Sighing, I smile at her softly and drop a kiss on the top of her head. "You got it."
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Ella:
After saying goodbye to Tyler, Maddox and I head to my room to have another movie night. I feel kind of guilty that Maddox spends most of his free time with me instead of socializing like a normal college student, but he keeps assuring me that he loves spending time with me and he could do it forever too. I think he's just too sweet and he knows I'd be feeling guilty so he always has a response ready to make me blush and drop the subject.
Once inside my room, I take off my shoes and grab Maddox's hoodie that he has forgotten here one night when the weather was nice and he decided to stick with the T shirt he had underneath. I've been secretly enjoying wearing it almost every night since, because it's way too big on me and smells really nice. I turn to face him as he gets comfortable on my bed, throwing most of my pillows away. "So what do you wanna watch?"
"Doesn't matter with me as long as I get to cuddle the shit out of you." His response makes my eyes widen and my mouth fall open.
He gives me a sly smirk, obviously noticing my stupid blush. I glare at him and plant my hands on my hips. "Stop that. You've been doing that a lot lately. Quit it and start a movie."
I don't know why my heart pounds every time he does that but it does and it feels weird. A good weird, though.
He laughs at me with a nod and I walk into the bathroom to change. I put on black tights and his hoodie, that reaches past the middle of my thighs, with some socks because it gets cold at night then brush my teeth and let my hair loose for once. It's a lot longer than it used to be. I think I like it. It suits me better.
"Did you pick something?" I ask as I head out and when Maddox lifts his head up he freezes. His eyes scan my figure at least three times before they focus on my face and I can't comprehend what the look in his eyes mean.
Nervously, I play with the strings of the hood. "Are you mad because I didn't ask for your permission?"
His eyes move up and down my body once more and I suddenly feel too hot. "Do I look mad, my Rose?"
I silently shake my head and swallow the water in my mouth. His eyes seem a lot darker than they were earlier and he suddenly shifts around on my bed. If I didn't know any better I'd say he was nervous too. "I'll give it back one day."
He relaxes and smiles at me. "You're definitely keeping it because it looks way too good on you. Now come here."
With a grin, I jump next to him on the bed. Our shoulders are touching and I'm waiting for him to start the movie when he speaks up. "You look really beautiful with your hair down. I like it a lot."
I look at him with soft eyes, warmth filling my soul up again. Maddox is so observant. This is the first time I let my hair down in front of him. I don't know why, but ever since it started to grow I haven't felt confident about it. Except lately I've been starting to feel more beautiful than usual. Maddox's constant compliments are helping me more than he knows, because I know he never says anything he doesn't mean. Slowly, gradually, and subconsciously, Maddox has been helping me build my confidence back up.
My head is more silent than it is loud nowadays. I still hate people and I still stutter when I have to talk to them but I don't seem to mind it as much as before. I don't hate what I see when I look at the mirror anymore. Because if someone as amazing as Maddox cares about me then I must be good. I must be worth it.
I no longer know what I'd do without him. He's the best person I know and the best thing that has ever happened to me actually. Not since Jaxon left, but ever.
Now, I definitely feel good about my hair too. "You do? I used to always cut it much shorter. But after everything happened I guess I never cared enough. But now I feel like it fits me better, you know?"
Maddox's frown returnes and I know he's about to ask me something he doesn't know if he should because he looks down to his lap breifly before scanning my face then he looks ahead, as if he's having an inner conflict. I also know what he's about to ask me and I know I'm ready for it.
"You can ask. Come on." I pump my shoulder with his, teasing him.
He relaxes with a chuckle. "I'm that obvious?"
"No, I just know you that well." I shrug with a grin and he nods in agreement before his features sharpen and he takes on a look of determination on his face.
"What happened to you last year, Rose?" He looks worried and nervous. I grab his hand in mine, because I want the support to be able to have this conversation and he looks like he needs it too.
I scoot a little closer so my head rests on his shoulder and start fiddling with his long fingers as I speak up. "Let me start from the beginning. I used to have a best friend who was as close to me as Ty is to you. Cassandra. We were inseparable most of our lives. I used to have the silliest crush on her big brother, who's four years older than me. His name is Jaxon."
Maddox tenses slightly and I'm surprised at how steady my voice is, how silent my demons are. As if I'm recapping nothing but a mere story, I go on. "As I grew older, my crush on Jaxon kinda grew with me. He was always nice and polite. A little closed off and arrogant sometimes but I didn't mind much. He always treated me well but never actually noticed me, you know? I was just his little sister's bestfriend back then."
I know I have a small smile on my face as I remember, and that doesn't bother me at all. Actually, I think I feel alright. I find it oddly calming talking about this to Maddox. I don't feel like bawling my eyes out and I'm not choking up on words. On the contrary, I feel like this needs to get off my chest for some reason. Like I need to tell this story out loud one last time. And then I can finally be free. "Sophmore year starts and I see more of Jaxon than I usually did. He had important work in the city and so he was staying with his family at his childhood house, while I was there almost every day with Cass because she said she doesn't want to stay in a dormroom. Then, Jaxon finally sees me. Not as the little girl he was used to having around, but as a nineteen year old, beautiful woman."
Maddox's hand clasps around mine for support, but he doesn't get that I don't even need it. I'm truly okay and that surprises me as much as it fills me with so much happiness. Sighing in content at my thoughts, I go on. "For as long as I can remember, Jaxon has never had a serious relationship before. He just doesn't do the whole girlfriend and settling down thing. It just wasn't for him, I guess. I was too naive to think otherwise. Anyway, so when he finally got attracted to me to he offered me a deal. An arrangement as he likes to call it."
The memories start rushing back, the hours and days of hot sex we enjoyed together. Unlike how I expected to feel, I'm no longer uncomfortable. I don't feel like clawing my way out of my own skin. I feel safe, because all I can focus on now is Maddox's hand playing with my fingers and knuckles just like I was doing to him minutes ago. "He said he wanted to have a sexual relationship with me. Fun, with no strings attached. And I accepted his proposal because why not, you know? I was young and hopeful and I wanted to have fun too. We spent months together and I was really happy. Even happier that it wasn't just sex as he liked to believe. We used to go to dinners, and lunches. Dates, I thought they were. We used to have picnics and talk for hours on the phone if we couldn't see each other for longer than a day. I fell in love with him."
"You don't have to go on." Maddox's voice is deep, husky, as he speaks so he clears his throat. "I think I can guess the rest of the story."
"It's okay." I shrug, scooting closer to him a little. "I'm alright."
He seems reluctant but nods anyway and I continue. "I think I'd been in love with him all along. That arrangement only made me sure of my feelings. But the more days we spent together, the closer our time was coming to its end. He was clear from the beginning that it could only last for a few months before he has to leave to LA for work. He was also very aware to warn me every now and then not to fall for him. I knew he wanted nothing more than fun, but I fell anyway. On my birthday, we were having dinner, and he dropped the bomb that it was our last night together, that he was leaving after our meal."
Maddox groans at the realization and I almost giggle at his reaction, but I don't. "I thought I had more time to figure out a way to tell him that I wanted more, but I didn't. I shouldn't have said anything that night, but I couldn't not try, you know? I was going to lose him anyway. He was leaving for only a few weeks, so I had hope that I could convince him to continue what we had when he comes back. I told him that I knew he wasn't ready for a serious relationship, that I understood he needed time. I told him I won't ask him for anything more than what he gave me those few months, nor was I going to expect more of him anytime soon."
I shrug again with another sigh at how far the memory seems. I have been through so much since then that it feels like I have aged a decade. "I was stupid to think I could change his mind. I thought I had a chance because I saw love in his eyes, though. I've known him for a time long enough to be able to read his eyes, his emotions, but I was so wrong. He said I only saw what I wanted to see. He was right, because as I saw love and passion, he was mainly just nice. He said I was living in fairytale land where we could have a happy ending that was nothing but a dream. He said I was selling myself short. That I deserved more than he could ever give me. I told him I deserved him. But he left anyway. I sat there, bawling my eyes out in the middle of that restaurant, in front of everyone, for at least two hours. I was so out of it, stuck in my own crumbling love life, that I was startled when two security guards had to escort me out because the table was reserved for another couple who were on their way. They said they had been trying to get me to leave for at least have an hour before they had to force me out. I don't even remember how I managed to walk home that night."
"I'm so sorry you had to go through that, Rose. He's right though. You deserve so much more than that." Maddox sounds in pain and I rub my free hand over his arm.
"You know what the real problem is? It's that I have no one to blame but myself. That's what really haunts me till this day. Not that Jaxon broke my heart, not that he left, but that I had been so blinded by my love for him that I truly was living in a faraway land with my hopes and dreams keeping me away from reality. I don't blame him because he was really clear from the beginning. I blame myself because I somehow still misread him. I made assumptions that shattered me, Maddox. So I promised myself never to assume anything anymore. I'll only believe what the person in front of me says, nothing more and nothing less. Because when I leave it to my head, I always misjudge."
Maddox is silent again so I speak up. "That's my story."
He shifts away from me to look me in the eyes before he says, "I'm so fucking proud of you, you know that?"
And I smile and nod my head because I do. Because I'm proud of me too. Because I'm doing so much better than I was a year ago. Because I'm finally recovering. Because even though I still blame myself, I no longer hate it. I've accepted what happened and I learnt to see that I'm not a stupid person after all. I'm good. I love too hard, and hope too much, but that doesn't make me a stupid, naive person. It makes me who I am. It makes me Rose. And Rose is good.
And that's all thanks to the man who has his arms wrapped around my figure, covering me with his warmth and love.
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I'm so happy for Rose!
Let me know how you like this story so far.