Sometimes I feel the remnants of heartbreak linger about me, and I don't know why. It sticks to my own skin like a second layer of skin. It was tiring to keep pretending that everything was fine and that everything is okay because it was not. I don't know if I'll ever truly be okay again.
It's one of those things that I gradually get used to, like a stray fly on a summer day or the pain that comes with wearing killer high heels. There's a heaviness in my soul that weighs down the corners of my lips; empty and distantly chaotic. And it's times like this where I have no fucking clue how to place my emotions into words, I don't know how to weave them into a story, and I'm falling apart. It's a slow process: starts with the mind, flows through my body, and ends with a frenzied breakdown.
And I know that this is the exact reason why a million-and-one problems stem from minuscule insecurities that bury themselves in the bottom of my rib cage, stinging like hand sanitizer on a paper cut. But I can't process anything right now, during this exact moment, as I stand in front of three hockey players that somehow know exactly who I am but also just claimed they have no clue who I am at all.
I hurt. It hurt so much that the air I exhale doesn't even want to trace its way back to me. I close my eyes just a second and listen to Nev and his many conspiracy theories as to what was going on at this very moment.
"Hold on, I'm so lost." Kamie shakes her head, putting her camera down by her side. "You all just told him you don't know AJ."
"Who is AJ?" Andrei looks at her, genuine confusion laced in his tone. "That is Alyssa."
"I'm AJ." I finally speak up for myself as the bleak hopelessness I felt finally subsides, just a little.
"You're name is Alyssa, you told me your name was Alyssa."
"Alyssa Johnson, AJ. A as in Alyssa, J as in Johnson." Everyone murmurs some vague response as they understand where the confusion was originating, and I blink once slowly. God, I think to myself, I can't fucking believe nobody really understands that.
I stumble back a bit as Andrei envelopes me in an affectionate hug, his body smelling faintly of sweat and his eyes sparkling. "I wasn't sure if that was you walking down here, it didn't feel real." He smiles down at me and my body relaxes a little bit. "I can't believe you're here."
"Yeah, me either," I say dejectedly, but it comes out more of a whisper. I couldn't stand the fact that he acted like he wanted me here right now that the cameras were rolling but the text messages told another story.
"Do you two know anything about this?" Kamie points between the two teammates standing on either side of Andrei as I try to place who they are.
Jesperi Kotkaniemi. Andrei always just refers to his as "KK" though, ironic because he can't even remember my initials. He was Finnish, he played center, he was drafted the safe year Andrei was, and he and Jarvis are practically conjoined at the hip as inseparable as the pair were. I don't know too much about him, but I did know that Andrei spent plenty enough time with him to call him a friend.
Seth Jarvis. He was the far youngest of anyone in this hallway currently, and from what I know about his maturity level, it shows. He would consistently send voice memos from Andrei's phone to me when it was left unattended, clearly showing that he knew of my existence. When Nev told me that he had no clue who I was, I was taken aback by all of this because the evidence pointed toward him being on my side. I couldn't wrap my head around the fact that he denied who I was and put me through all sorts of emotional trauma, yet technically none of it was his fault.
"Of course." KK nods his head making eye contact with me for the first time, a friendly smile feigns his lips afterwards. "He's told us tons about her."
"I know probably too much about you, I honestly was sick of hearing about it." Seth crosses his arms and lets out an exasperated sigh. "He's always like 'We have such a good friendship, but I'm attracted to her but I don't think she likes me that way." He mocks him with the worst Russian accent I have ever heard.
"Very annoying." KK joins in again shaking his head.
"Like, my guy, clearly she has put up with you this long just-" Seth continues before being abruptly elbowed by Andrei himself.
"Wait for a second," Nev said stepping to Seth's side and coming in closer, "You knew this whole time we had this shred of doubt and kind of concern that maybe she was talking to his brother or a social media intern."
"My brother?" Andrei asks shocked at the idea. "No, no, not possible. Jarvy, you know that Evengy has a girlfriend. You met Sara in San Jose last month."
"Listen, I just work here." He throws his hands up in defense. "They're the experts and I've seen the show like a million times, they're usually not wrong about this kind of stuff."
"We just try and consider every option." Nev now starts to defend him himself.
"You know what's crazy? We used to ask him too if she was real because we didn't believe him either." KK looks at me and back to Andrei.
"A lot of the times I saw her trying to FaceTime and we'd be in a car and have no connection, or some of the stadiums we travel to have really bad service and wifi, we just couldn't answer." Seth tries to back up everything Andrei ever told me to be true.
"They gave you his phone number and you told them no." I cross my arms and squint at him, mad for all the emotional distress he put me through.
"That wasn't his number."
"Who's number was it then?' Andrei looks at me for what felt like the first time this whole confrontation since our embrace. "Who's number do you have if it's not mine?"
Nev began to reread the number provided and Andrei nods to confirm his number. Seth looks at us both wide-eyed and tries to look around and whistle as if he had nothing to do with any of this.
"It's almost crazier that it was you and there was all this 'mystery' around you not FaceTiming and that could easily," Nev starts to ramble on before being cut off by his partner.
"Could have been explained by a few things." Kamie finished his sentence preventing a big long spill. "There could have been so much better communication between you and her."
"I'm glad you're who you say you are," I begin to speak trying my best to hold on to my emotions, "but I'm still really confused by all of this. This was supposed to be a happy moment, the best moment of my life maybe, and I don't feel that way."
"Yeah we need some answers here, I'm not exactly sold on any of this either." Kamie crosses her arms and cocks out her hip. "Like, do you have any explanation for how you acted? How you treated her?"
"We had the impression that if you were real, that you had something to be concerned about. Is there something we need to know?" Nev joins in my defense, my heart sinking lower into my chest again waiting for a response.
He pauses for a second to choose his words wisely, "No. It's just that she sees me on TV and social media and has that understanding of me."
"Yeah, but I never had this idea of you or that you had to meet any type of expectation or anything." I shake my head at him stepping closer.
"I was just concerned with how you pictured me in your head versus reality."
"Yeah," I say unsatisfied with the answer.
"So here's the big question then," Nev does a rolling motion with his hands, "where are you with your feelings for Alyssa? It sounds like you've talked about being together, you're adults."
"Like moving to Raleigh," I state sourly and cross my arms before looking down at the floor.
"I want to be with you, you just scare me." He reaches for my hand as I pull away.
We all stand there for a brief second in our own atmosphere of tense heartbreak and silence. I was still recovering from his words, not because he was wrong, but because I know he was right. God, and if I could stop feeling like this, I would in an instant.
"What do you mean she scares you?" Kamie breaks the silence finally, curiosity getting the better of her.
Andrei kept his distance as he once again tries to string together the right words, and my eyes flickered everywhere but him. He's still agonizingly beautiful underneath the harsh fluorescent lighting: lips soft, eyes sharp, and body sinful. Revealing in his warmth even as the water inside my soul begins to freeze, I don't mind being burned by his fire though.
"Because she's smart, successful, hard-working. She's passionate about her work and won't stop until she can finish what she starts. I've never met anyone like her, she's perfect in every way." Although I'm not looking directly at him, I can feel the warmth of his smile as he gleams at me before it fades away. The warmth that I felt was suddenly taken over, like a cloud drifting overhead on a warm sunny day. "She seems strong, but she breaks so easily. I hurt her over and over again because of my insecurities, and I didn't want to see that anymore."
He turns to face me, and as my hands itch to push away a fallen lock of hair in his eyes, I don't. His words hurt me, despite the fact they're true, because I'm weak and human and vulnerable. And I hate it, hate feeling like this, like I'm always a piece of glass that's half shattered.
"Alyssa, I wanted to say-"
If he digs deeper into my wounds, I know I'll crack. "Why didn't you call me back?" I murmured, head tilted to the ground. "You didn't say anything to me for two weeks, Andrei."
Andrei's hands dart out quickly to snag my hand gently, and my bottom lip trembles. He's aware of what he's doing, of what I'm feeling, and the information is enough for me to shake it off gently. Because if there's one thing I hate, breaking down in front of people is excruciatingly painful.
But the next thing he says sends a line of starlight straight down the nerves of my spine. "I didn't want to hurt you anymore," he breathes. "I thought if I left you alone that you could just move on and stop letting me hurt you." I close my eyes as he runs the pads of his thumb across her open palm, and my knees grow slightly weak.
Exhaling a slow breath, I squeeze his hand in response, "All you had to do was tell me that," I whisper, and my voice is too soft for him to hear.
"Wait you ghosted her?" Seth burst in from the outside of the conversation. "Bro, that was the worst possible thing for you to do here. All you do is bitch and moan about how you think you're in love with this girl but you're too scared to tell her, and you ghosted her."
"Talk about self-sabotage." Kamie leans into Nev and mumbles as if we can't hear her.
"Okay, this is by far the weirdest and strangest turn of events may be in Catfish history," Nev announces to everyone in the hallway. "Let's take a few minutes to break off, and talk about all of this one on one to check in."
"AJ, come with me?" Kamie motions for me to follow her as she pulls me into a half hug, I rest my head in the crook of her neck as we walk. "So it's all a bit of this, 'I wanted to but I didn't.' You know?"
"Yeah," I respond with a blank expression.
"Are you buying it? Do you think what he said is genuine?"
"Does it still make me seem naive if I tell you I believe him?"
"I'm usually the voice of reason with these investigations, "Kamie bounces her head from side to side as if she were a scale, "but for once I think it segenuineuine. While I don't agree with him ghosting you, I think he does care about you and wanted to protect your heart."
"Jordan would be shitting her pants right now," I say making both of us snicker. "She's going to be so mad."
"Do you want to go back over?" I nod my head and followed her back around to rejoin the group, Seth and KK now dispursing to likely give us some more privacy. "So now what?"
"Well, seeing as this is a first," Nev starts, putting his hands on his hips, "I think it's a good idea to call it a night and meet again tomorrow?"
"Actually, I was hoping to talk to Alyssa." Andrei looks at me once again, his eyes meeting mine for what felt like the first time again. A new type of glimmer lighted them up as if something had magically changed for him. "Maybe, I could follow you guys back to the hotel. She can ride with me?"
Nev and Kamie exchange a look with one another, then the production manager, and then me. There had never been anything like this before, this was all new territory for everyone. I didn't hate the idea as it took the pressure off of both of us knowing that the cameras wouldn't be documenting our every move.
"What's the move?" Nev looks at me, the power completely in my hands at the very moment.
"Sure."