So you get to find out how Debby reacts now :D :D This one's dedicated to Brontosaurus for voting on like all my chapters and leaving a really lovely long comment on the last one :D see, when you give me long comments you get dedications, so comment please :D
Enjoy!
************************************************************************************************************
Michael was worried she might never speak. They stood there, staring at each other in shock, with Alfie and two girls standing by watching. It felt like he and Debby were the only people in the world, though hundreds surrounded them.
Michael tried to swallow the lump in his throat and say something, but it seemed that time was frozen and he just couldn’t make the words come out. Finally Alfie cleared his throat and whispered loudly in Debby’s ear, ‘Who is this guy?’ He drawled out the word ‘is’ as if it was disgusting, as if Michael was disgusting.
It was like a spell breaking, Debby’s face lit up and she ran to Michael, throwing herself on him.
‘Michael! What are you doing here, stupid?’ she cried, hiding her face in his shoulder.
Michael pushed her away slightly so he could look her at her face. They stared at each other, and Debby’s eyes filled with tears.
‘I have no clue,’ he told her. ‘I just needed to come.’
She nodded. ‘I understand. I missed you too.’ She took deep breaths to control her threatening tears, then turned back to her friends.
‘Taffy, Bronwyn, you remember Michael,’ she said to the two girls, then moved over to Alfie. ‘Alfie babe, this is Michael, he’s… an old friend of mine.’
Alfie snaked his arm around her slender waist protectively, and gave Michael a glare. ‘Nice to meet you Michael.’
‘Wow, I just can’t believe you’re here,’ Debby said, unable to remove the grin from her face.
Michael shifted his feet, not sure what to say. This wasn’t exactly what he had expected, he had been preparing himself for the worst- Debby getting angry that he’d come- or the best- Debby falling into his arms and asking him to make everything back to how it was. Instead he got an in between; she was pleased to see him, but as friends.
‘Yeah,’ he managed. ‘I just wanted to pay an unexpected visit. Do you think I could drive you home?’
She shrugged. ‘I guess, you wouldn’t mind Alfie?’ she asked her boyfriend.
‘No, of course not,’ he replied, without much feeling. ‘I suppose you guys have a lot to catch up on. How long has it been?’
‘Three y-‘ Both Debby and Michael started at the same time, but their eyes caught and they stopped.
‘Uh, yeah, it’s been three years,’ Michael finished. He could almost see some kind of understanding spread across Alfie’s face as he digested this information, and Bronwyn and Taffy giggled excitedly.
‘So girls, I see you’re just as giggly as the last time I met you,’ Michael said, turning to them.
‘Yeah, we aren’t great at growing up,’ Taffy joked.
Michael looked at Debby again, and she smiled. ‘Well, since I’m driving Debby home, we should probably go.’
‘Oh… yeah,’ Debby agreed, not breaking eye contact with him. For a couple of seconds they just stood there, staring at each other some more, each unable to believe that the other was really there, then she gave herself a little shake and turned to Alfie.
‘I’ll, uh, see you tomorrow,’ she told him, leaning in for a peck.
What she got was a hell of a lot more than that. Alfie grabbed her to him, and stuck his tongue down her throat. This made Michael smile, because it looked a lot like Alfie was feeling threatened by his presence, but then he just felt sick.
He actually wanted to throw up, and it felt like his heart was being ripped out, but before he could get angry enough to do anything about it, Debby pushed Alfie away, and walked over to Michael’s car.
They sat down and put on their seatbelts in silence, and it wasn’t until Michael had turned out of the school that she said anything.
‘What the hell is this?’ she yelled. ‘What do you think you’re doing here Michael? You think you can just turn up and everything will be okay? It’s been three years!’
‘Woah, where is this coming from?’ Michael asked, feeling hurt. ‘A few seconds ago you were like “Oh it’s so great to see you” and all that.’
‘You can’t just waltz into my life!’ she cried.
Michael didn’t respond, he just stared ahead and as soon as he could, pulled the car up on the side of a road. He turned off the engine, and looked at Debby. She was avoiding his eyes, arms folded sternly on her chest.
‘God Debby, even when you’re angry you’re beautiful,’ he told her, calmly.
She looked at him now. ‘You’re unbelievable! You think you can win me over just by flattering me? When you drove all the way down here, did you not stop to think that maybe I have a life? A life that is completely separate from you, a boyfriend?’
‘A boyfriend who is hideous, might I just add,’ Michael scoffed.
‘No you may not! He’s my boyfriend, and you’re nothing, I haven’t even heard from you all this time.’
‘Debby, it’s not like you tried to contact me either,’ he pointed out. ‘I just… needed to see you. I started telling my flatmate about you, he wouldn’t let me not, and then I just couldn’t stop thinking about you. Remembering how much I love you. I didn’t think you’d just be ready for me, but I hoped. I didn’t really think, I just needed to see you again.’
She groaned and rubbed her face. ‘I was doing fine,’ she said, through clenched teeth. ‘I’ve been dating, I’ve been having fun, I’ve tried to move on. It was finally almost working, and now you turn up? I just don’t know what to do.’
‘Almost working?’ Michael asked. ‘You’ve thought about me?’
She sighed and looked at him. ‘Michael, you were the love of my life. Did you really believe I never thought about you?’
He leant his head back on the headrest of the seat and closed his eyes. ‘Debby, Debby, Debby,’ he sighed, keeping his eyes closed. ‘Just so you know, I never stopped loving you.’ He opened his eyes and looked at her. ‘I thought about you everyday, I dreamed about us making it work. I’m finished uni now, and you’re almost finished school; I figured if we were ever going to do this, it would be now. I knew you had a boyfriend, but I didn’t care.’
‘Michael, we can’t do that again,’ she said, gently taking his hand in hers. ‘What we had that summer was amazing, but the amount of pain it caused me afterwards was too much. As soon as you left my house I knew that the whole thing had been a mistake. It was so great when we were together, but it wasn’t worth the pain when you left. I can’t do it again.’
‘We don’t need to do it again Debby, I’m not asking you to end anything with Alfie, but since I’m here, and I have nowhere else to be, can’t I just stay? I stayed with Dee last night, and Beth’ll be home tomorrow, so I thought I could stay and see her again.’
‘Well, it’s not like I can forbid you from being here,’ she said, looking a bit happier than before.
‘You know you want me here really,’ he told her. ‘You almost cried when you saw me.’
‘Well, it was out of shock,’ she claimed. ‘Not because I was glad to see you.’
‘Sure, I’ll believe you,’ he teased.
‘Oh shut up and drive,’ she told him, grinning from ear to ear. He sighed, and turned the key in the ignition. The engine came to life and he pulled away from the curb. The mood had changed so completely in just a few seconds.
‘So now that we’ve established that you’re only here on a strictly friends basis, want to come back to mine?’ she suggested.
‘Yeah, sure,’ he said. ‘I was staying at Beth’s last night, and Dee says I can stay as long as I want, so it’s not like I have to get back home anytime soon.’
‘You got here last night?’ she asked.
Michael kept his eyes fixed firmly on the road. ‘Yeah, I didn’t know where else to go, so I went to Beth’s.’
They drove in silence for a minute or two, feeling the tension. Even if they were “just friends” right now, there was till tension. What they had had didn’t just go away, whether or not three years had passed.
‘So how come Alfie seemed to know who I was?’ Michael asked, after the agonising silence.
‘He didn’t straight away,’ Debby told him, sounding uncomfortable. ‘I think he figured it out when you said that you hadn’t seen me in three years. He never knew your name, but he knew there was a guy, three years ago, who played a pretty big role in my life. He must have realised that it was you.’
‘He got pretty jealous, didn’t he?’ Michael said playfully. ‘I thought if I said the wrong thing, he might punch me. Is he always protective?’
She grunted. ‘I guess so.’
‘Actually I had a right mind to punch him, when I first saw you two,’ he admitted, keeping his tone light and cheery, even though she clearly didn’t want to talk about Alfie. ‘There’s something about his face that just screams “I’m not a nice guy,” I guess.’
‘I forgot about how judgemental you are,’ she muttered.
Michael chuckled. ‘Really? How could you? Remember the first day I was here, when I told you that you were a horrible person and you threw a strop and ran back to Beth’s?’
Suddenly it was like Debby lit up, she sat up straighter, she uncrossed her arms and she was almost smiling. ‘You wonder why I did that?’ she joked. ‘You literally told me I was awful.’
‘Yes, but I was in love with you, I was allowed to say bad things,’ he told her, taking a quick glance at her. God, I’d forgotten how beautiful she was, he thought.
‘Michael! Eyes on the road!’ she warned him. He looked back at the road in front of him. ‘Anyway, what kind of justification is that?’
‘Well, I don’t know, but it seemed like a good one at the time,’ he told her.
‘I didn’t even know you loved me then,’ she pointed out.
Michael paused for a beat, then said ‘I never did.’
Debby froze, confused. ‘What do you mean you never did?’
He sighed and tried hard not to look at her. ‘It doesn’t matter, I shouldn’t have said that.’
‘Well you did,’ she pointed out. ‘You have to explain now, it’s your fault for saying it.’
‘Well-it’s just that- you never really told me you loved me, you said I was the love of your life, but at the time…’ he managed to get out. ‘You said you thought you loved me, but you couldn’t be sure, because you had never been in love before.’
‘Oh.’ He thought she might say something more, but she didn’t.
‘See, I told you I shouldn’t have said it,’ he mumbled.
‘Michael,’ Debby said. ‘I hope you know, I did. I really, really did.’
‘That’s the problem, isn’t it?’ he told her. ‘You did.’
************************************************************************************************************
So guys, what do you think? Did you expect that? Do you dislike Debby for how she acted? Do you know what's going to happen next? COMMENT and tell me :D Also, if you have a second, a vote would be nice...