↠Bradie
I'm not one hundred percent sure why I would drive a total of two hours just to see Hayes for a day. Not even a full day either, just a couple of hours.
I guess it has to do with the fact that seeing him for those couple of hours outweighs the hour trip I take alone and the hour trip alone back.
But I just think about those three months we get to spend exploring foreign places together. I get this giddy feeling just imagining being snuggled up next to him every night. And holding hands while walking streets around people we don't even know the names of because that's all I really want. Just to spend quality time with him.
But here I am outside of Tyler's dorm room already regretting this decision I'm making. I knock on the door twice and my whole body tenses up waiting for my ex-boyfriend to answer. If I'm lucky, his roommate will answer and I won't talk to him. If the universe wants to hate me, he will answer and we will talk.
With my luck; a boy with blond hair, undone, pulls back the door and I stare Tyler dead in the eye. "Oh," he coughs, "hey."
I smile just a slight without showing my teeth. "Hi," I croak and the way it comes out makes me sound so weak.
"Come on in," Tyler opens the door wider and reveals his room that I haven't been in sense October. He says it in such a way that makes him sound like he's not even phased by my being here. Like it happens everyday. "So, uh," he runs his fingers threw his hair like he usually does, just like Hayes does. "What are you doing here?"
I almost sit down on his bed, Tyler notices and nods his head. I sit. "Well I wanted to say I'm sorry."
"Uhhh," his eyebrows pull together and he looks around the room. "For?"
"The way I broke up with you. And then just completely forgetting you afterwards."
He sighs, "Bradie what are you doing here?"
"I miss you."
His jaw drops and it doesn't make this situation more comfortable. "Bradie, we dated for two months and it's been, what, 7 months now?"
"And that means I can't miss you?"
"It's a little far fetched don't you think?"
"I never said I missed you in a relationship way. I miss us talking and falling asleep together and going out for lunch. I miss spending time with you. And even though we weren't ever friends; I miss being friends with you."
Tyler finally sits down in a wheelie chair across from me. I stare him dead in the eye and I think because of Hayes I have much for confidence in myself to the point where I'm able to have this conversation and look him in the eye.
"Don't you have a boyfriend?" Tyler asks.
"Jesus Christ Tyler. First: he's not my boyfriend," that line hurts. "Second: I'm aloud to have guy friends," that line is true. I don't do that 'my boyfriend says I can't hangout or talk to any guys bullshit.' I am my own person and I will talk to whomever I want. Hayes doesn't control that or me.
"So that's why you're here. To be my friend."
I swear he can see my eyes plead, "if that isn't too much to ask."
"Friends it is," he smiles. I return the gesture.
Later that night I walk back to my dorm, across campus, alone. I rethink the entire thing with Tyler in my head on my walk back.
Friends. That's all it is and all it will be. That's all I want it to be and Hayes can't get upset about that. That would be preposterous of him to get upset and I actually don't think I could ever handle a guy that wouldn't let me be friends with another guy. But honestly, I do see where he could get upset at the fact that I walked over to his dorm to tell Tyler that I missed him and at the same time said I don't have a boyfriend, which sounds like I was available for him, which I'm not. I consider Hayes mine, even if he doesn't consider me his.
Now that I think of it: I walked half a mile to Tyler's campus to tell him I want to be friends. I literally walked over to my ex boyfriends campus to tell him I want to be friends. I could have done that over the phone for gods sake.
"Did I really just..." I whisper to myself with no one in a 50 foot radius of me. "Aw maaan," I whine.
***
I always sleep with my phone plugged into my charger, under my pillow. Usually people don't call me at 7:30 in my morning, but today someone did. So I answered Nash's call.
"Hello?" I whisper trying my hardest not to wake my very light sleeper of a roommate.
"Hayes is going on a trip with you for the entire summer?"
"Nice to talk to you too," I rub my eyes.
"Hi. Wow. So nice to hear your voice. Hope I didn't wake you. Actually, I sing care." He sounds mean, hostile even like I really did something that upset him. I don't get how Hayes coming with me on his own free-will could upset Nash, but it did.
"May I help you?"
"Why would you do this to him?"
"Do what?" I raise my voice to a normal speaking tone now, "Nash, what could I have possibly done that could upset you or Hayes?"
"Bradie," he sighs and I think calms. "You're leaving in 5 months for New York. You would really spend three months with my brother and then leave for New York? He's not going to follow you there and this isn't going to be some fairy tale. It's reality and he's staying in Georgia."
I don't say anything, I don't even make a sound, I just push end. I close my eyes again and lay my head back onto my pillow and try to fall back asleep.
I thought I was doing him a favor, I thought this would be amazing for the both of us. I thought it would be fun and incredible to be able to explore together and fall asleep together every night. Of course I thought about afterwards but not really in the sense of me going back to New York and him not coming.
Later on that day I had gone to one class already. I had memorized Hayes Wednesday schedule and called him right after his second class ended.
"Hey B," he answers. I smile sense I haven't heard his voice in two days. It's such a comforting sound.
"Hey," I sigh my words.
"Everything okay?"
I sit down at the nearest bench so I don't actually faint from my thoughts that are overwhelming and controlling. I know I'm not thinking this threw but it will kill him even more if we keep making trips to see each other when it won't work. Nothing will ever work. "Hayes I can't do this anymore."
"What? B, are you okay? What's going on?" he rushes but no matter what he says it won't change the fact that I am going to New York.
"But I don't know if I'm ready to loose you just yet. Well, for a fact, I know I'm not ready to loose you. But after this trip we will be so close and then I'll leave and it will brake me into a billion pieces to have to leave you. So this should really just end now. So I can brake into only a million pieces." I let a silent tear roll down my cheek and I can feel myself shaking and the phone rattling up against my ear.
"B! Okay listen to me-"
I stop him. "No, Hayes. I gotta go now. Goodbye."
"Bradie!"
I end the call and fold my hands into my lap. I slowly place my phone next to me. Everything is moving in slow motion it seams. I stare at my hands and feel my phone vibrate next to me, but I watch a tear hit my knuckle.