MESSY
011, the way he looks at you
" AM I INTERRUPTING SOMETHING?" I hear a voice, I break from Callum and notice Olivia stood in the hallway. She's changed into pyjamas that as a woman I know isn't comfortable to sleep in and is more on for show. Men are oblivious and will think we sleep in stuff like lingerie with a light brush of makeup on our face and not the pair of cotton shorts and an oversized shirt with scotches of white pimple cream scattered on our face.
It makes my stomach drop, and I recoil without looking at Callum. I don't know why but I think I'd feel worse If I did. Is that what I walking in on? Is that why he opened the door half naked? Was he waiting for her? Did he think I was her?
But my lips part and nothing leaves my lips, I'm stood in the hallway like a mute mess and I can't focus on either the beautiful woman who stands in front of me or the half dressed man who is stood beside me who I can tell is looking at me, waiting for me to do something, to do anything. This is all too much for my mind to comprehend.
" Olls had something of mine that I left with her yesterday." he lies, almost as if to reassure her.
Why does he need to reassure her? What has happened between them that a hug between me and him — two people who have a friendship that has spanned nearly a decade — has to be justified with nothing less than a lie?
I feel sick as I purse my lips and nod. Just offering an artificial smile as I flicker my gaze to Callum but can't stomach to actually look at him, instead I focus on the painting that is close to his face. But he's staring at me, that thought alone is making my eyes water as I just nod.
I inhale " night Callum."
" night Olympia."
not Olly? No Olls? Oh I'm definitely fucked.
I give Olivia a look that she gives a half assed smile to before I begin moving back down the hallway. Picking up my pace once I turn a corner and I'm no longer in their eye line. In a normal state I would hide around the corner and spy but nothing about this entire situation is normal.
I hate this feeling, mostly because I don't know what it is and why it's brewing in me with more intensity the more that I think about that interaction. About Callum, about Olivia, about Callum and Olivia... together?
Walking until I reach my room, the small paper bag sits by the door like I left it. I look down at it, exhaling with a tense stature as I kick the bag over with my bare foot.
Continuing down the hallway, and then down the steps and through the dining room and the kitchen. Only feeling the ability to breathe normally again when I push the patio doors open, my head bows and the concrete patio catches a couple years that leave my eyes before they have chance of falling down my cheeks.
I sit down on the step of the outside patio, although it's not as warm as it is in the day. It's not like London where you have to bundle yourself up before an outing.
Sat on a step looking at a beautiful view that my mind won't let me appreciate. Instead my hand reaches into the pocket of my linen trousers that pool at my feet as I peel my phone out from my pocket, the lock-screen of me and Drew, taken at some restaurant by either one of my friends or his. Back in New York, god how everything was much simpler back then!
My lockscreen is normally just the view from our apartment in New York. But I change it when I miss him, which is odd as he currently lies in my bed a floor above me and he's not the reason I've had to take a fresh of air and in the last couple minutes he's barely been at the forefront of my mind.
I call the only person I know who can handle this situation with the delicacy that I currently can't. The phone rings as I stare up at the night sky and silently pleas that they pick up.
Then the phone goes silent and I hear a simple,
" you ok babe?" Florence ( aka my lifesaver) hums and I nod, although she can't see that so I make some kind of noise with the nail of my left thumb tasseled in my mouth.
I exhale " I think I'm losing it, like literally insanity." I tell her and hear her small laugh, and then when she acknowledges the silence on my side the amusement turns to concern, " oh, what's up Olls?"
My mouth opens, it doesn't filter as I tell my best friend the only thing I can tell her " I think Callum's seeing one of the girls in the cast." I tell her and hear her hum, like she's silently asking why would care.
Because I have a boyfriend.
I have an amazing boyfriend, who I adore with my whole heart.
And yet this hurts, like a physical pain that sits in my chest.
" and-and he brought me this dress, a dress I really loved." it's fragmented pieces of the last few days that I give her, my brain rattled but still hoping it's enough that she'll draw lines to what I need to do to stop this ache that sits in my chest still.
she hums, so I continue " so I went to ask him, because even though I knew it was him- I guess I..wanted a reason to see him." I tell her, it's honest. It's brutal but still honest .
" and we're talking, I'm asking him to tell me why once again." I tell her, " tell me why he left, tell me what I did, what he did that we couldn't be fixed."
The breath I exhale is unsteady " and just as we get there, crossing the bridge back to civility..."
" there she is, beautiful olivia in her lingerie asking if she interrupted something!" I scoff.
" stupid beautiful olivia." I mumble.
" Olls, are you jealous?" she asks and I shake my head "no! No..." I say it a second time a little less adamant.
" it's just we were so close and she comes along and ruins it!" I whine like a child. Because my naivety is in full swing right now.
Florence hums " so are you upset about the interruption or what the interruption was?"
My brows furrow " what are you trying to say?"
"Look Olly, it's no secret that you've never liked Callum's girlfriends." she tells me, and despite my inner denial I know she's telling the truth. I haven't.
The one actress who he began seeing on set? she was too territorial
The model who he met at a New Year's party? hated our friendship, but hated me most
" yeah, but only because he dates people that I don't like." I tell her, and she poorly hides the scoff in her voice, " it's like a superpower of his."
" and what about this Olivia girl? separate her from being with Callum, what is she like?"
I exhale " great, she's fucking great." I say with a resentment I'm not even aware of. My free hand palming my face as I exhale.
" and yet you're still..." Florence exhales "..angry, annoyed, jealous?"
My face contorts even though she can't see it from across the ocean " jealous? why would I be jealous!" I ask her and hums like I'm staring at the last piece of the puzzle and yet can't figure out why we haven't solved it yet.
" for the same reason you haven't liked any of his previous girlfriends and he can't stand your boyfriend." she says, as I leave the air blank so she can speak.
" you like him Olly, the same way that he likes you and always bloody has." she tells me and it feels like a ton of bricks that hits me.
Like a literal shift in the world that I live in. I feel like an idiot that I didn't realise it before seemingly everyone else did. Florence, Callum, Drew..and god knows who else by now.
" fuck." is all that I can stomach to say, " has he always-" I ask and she hums.
" Olly, do you not see the way he looks at you?" she asks and my teeth tether between the nail of my thumb and I exhale.
" I just thought-" I can't finish my sentence because I don't know what I'm thinking.
" we've been friends for so long." I tell her, in regret of my own blindness — how long? where glances across rooms more than just a flicker of gazes between friends? When did his arm wrapping around my shoulder become less platonic than romantic. How long have I been blind to the fact that my best friend felt this way towards me, feels this way?
No! he's with olivia now... isn't he ? Well the secret rendezvous I just encounter in the hallway would make me suppose so, and how they've been doing things together. Sitting together at the table, one of their hands unaccounted for which thinking about it now so conscious of my feelings makes me nauseated.
And I'm with Drew. God Drew. Who's asleep upstairs whilst I speak to my best friend as I slowly admit to myself that I have feelings for the one person I've always been adamant I don't have feelings for.
I'm a shit girlfriend. I'm a shit person.
But this feels out of my control, never would I have started dating Drew if I thought I liked or even loved Callum. This has just happened, I've lost him and now that loss has made me realise how I feel. I didn't do this on purpose, my subconscious is the shit in this situation! Not me!
I shake my head " Flo..I have to go." I tell her and she offers me a twenty four hour lifeline before I hang up and sit on that step.
My heart hurts from inside of my chest, I lift my hand and go to palm the area of skin the ache reverberates onto — hitting the thin metal chain of the Ruby necklace, that I've worn since the day Callum gave it to me. I've never taken it off — even when we were fighting or not talking — now I think he still held a piece of himself with me if I kept it with him.
Now I feel like I need it more than ever.
Eventually I get up, begin to trail my way back up to my bedroom. Eyes flickering to the knocked over white bag which I hoped he would have come looking for me. wanting to explain although he hasn't got anything to explain to me and when he noticed the small bag he would pick it back up.
Just to show he was still there, that he still cared.
But there it sits, on its side, the neat bow of ribbon now just hangs loosely and the material of the dress spills out. And he probably lies beside (or even on top of) Olivia, and that idea makes my heart sink now.
I pick it up, slowly turning the handle of the door and place the bag on the chest of drawers , looking at it with a slight sadness as I begin to undress.
Leaving my clothes against the floor as I change into a cami and a pair of boxer shorts I'm pretty sure are Drew's. Trying not to wake the sight of the bare back that I stare at.
Brushing my teeth and washing my face. Sliding into the sheets as I notice Drew's half asleep eyes looking at me with a gentle smile.
I try to smile back as he asks " you ok?" he says and I nod even though it's a lie.
" yeah, just needed some air." I tell him, his lips curve and his arm moves to pull me in. Slipping around my waist as I fall into my normal position that I've slept in for just over a year.
How do you tell someone that you love that you think you love someone else..well the someone else.
Do you just say it, or do you hope the feelings go away for the other person or wait it out long enough that my current relationship shrivels away but I've waited too long that he's not waiting for me anymore.
I squeeze my tearing eyes when Drew kisses my head and I scold myself for doing this to him. Even though I don't think I was entirely sure what I was doing until I couldn't go back.
The heart wants what it wants
And unfortunately, mine wants Callum.
And I think it always has done.
AUTHORS NOTE.
tehe xoxo