I'd have to put my feelings on the side until I charged forwards and talk to Nathan about what has been happening. Too many thoughts are flying through my mind to comprehend, I ignore them.
'Meet at yours?' – Riley.
'Yes.' – Nathan.
His answer is brief and doesn't do a thing to settle the nerves chewing away at my stomach lining.
"To Nathan's house, please." Archer stops driving towards mine, and switches in the favour towards Nathan's. I don't know the direction of Nathan's house, but Archer seems to. I guess there isn't too many large house floating around in the city. If I was to own a mansion, I'd want it to be near the beach or next to some place cool, like Disneyland.
Archer turns the radio on so the car trip is no longer silent. The song that begins to play on the radio makes me sink further into the chair and hide under my jacket. Staying in bed this morning is still the favourable option.
When we arrive at Nathan's house, Archer insists on waiting out the front instead of leaving me by myself. I insist he doesn't need to stay, but Archer still disregards my wishes and parks the car.
"Looking after you is my job, one I take seriously and with pride," he goes to say, "I have games and books to keep me amused."
I don't bother insisting, I just let Archer be. It's comforting to know I have a quick escape plan in case things go haywire, but I won't tell him that. I sum up all my courage to open the door and leave my safe zone.
As I walk up the skinny pathway to the door, I notice the handle rattles and the door opens with Nathans standing on the other side. This is the first time I get to walk through the front door, it's a shame it's not on a better term.
Nathan's eyebrows are pushed together in a tangled mess, his nervous appearance almost mirrors my own which doesn't help the situation. If Nathan isn't confident about what's going to happen, I can't be either.
A whole new swirl of emotion and thought running through my mind.
"Come inside." I follow Nathan through the house and into a side room which looks like it's been designed to appeal to a younger audience through the images and interior design. There's funky art work all over the wall with hilarious slang and expressions. The space is long with an area with a couch and TV, to the other side having a small pool table.
"Do you want a drink?" asks Nathan.
Drinking water is the last thing I want to do right now.
"Can you just tell me what's happening between you and Sasha?" Slips out of my mouth. My self-control is slowly slipping, I'm too curious and nervous. I just want to be hit with the information now rather than later. One big blow works nicer than small ones.
"I was at Sasha's house to ensure things between us were done for good. She'd been asking if we could hang out again, but I turned her down," he explains.
"What-" I'm not sure I want a definition of what their relationship was like. Stuff with his past should probably stay here. I don't need something else to worry about.
"I started seeing Sasha romantically for a couple of months, but nothing serious. I'm sorry you had to find out this way."
I want to shut my mouth off, but it I can't seem to stop it from running its course. More words of drivel escape before I can even realise it.
"But you're not sorry you kept this from me?"
"This happened when you weren't talking to me. The moment you walked back in my life I completely finished things with Sasha," he explains.
The fact he brings up that I wasn't talking to him makes anger swell up inside of me. He wasn't the one talking to Alex or myself. He's the one who cut off contact. I never wanted him to leave my life, and he did.
Alex has never left.
The shimmer of anger in Nathan's eyes brings the prospect of a long guilt trip about my actions in this imploding situation. His mouth parts and he takes a deep breath. Here comes the guilt trip.
"I'm the one waiting for you to finally realise we would be perfect together." His voice is raised, angry, but swirled with desperation. The glow of anger is long gone from his blue eyes, and it replaced with sadness and seeking comfort.
But I don't know how to return his gesture. I don't know what I want, or what would be perfect for me. Is there really someone who is perfect for me? I thought Alex would have been, or even Nathan, but both hold their own individual flaws.
"How do you know that?" I ask.
"Because I'm the one that you always come to when you want an escape, the one you share your troubles with, the one who's always going to be desperately waiting on the side for you to finally realise I'm the one for you." Nathan creeps further towards me and I don't step back from his advances.
"When was the last time you had stability in your life?" With all the crazy emotions and memories swirling in my mind, it's hard to pin down an exact point I felt like my life wasn't a gigantic circus.
"What about Alex?" I ask.
"Why not?" Those two words send my mind frozen. "All you ever say is, what about Alex? You never shoot my advances down. I know you want to be with me." Confidence surges through is stance as he continues to stride towards me.
He wasn't all wrong, but he wasn't all right either.
"You're scared." The end of his shoes touch mine. "I've made myself too available, so you're never going to choose between us."
"I-" Had nothing else to say.
"It's me or Alex, not both."
The time had finally come and I wasn't the least bit prepared for it. Adrian Volkov seemed like a nice option right now. You didn't need to have feelings there, just a will to start over.
"I don't know." I crumble.
My shoulders sag forwards, and my head drops so that my gaze is fixated on the floor.
"Of course you don't," Nathan darkly grumbles.
My palms begin to sweat and my legs shake. Nathan's attitude immediately makes me regret coming here. A new feeling of power, frustration and annoyance clouds my judgment and lifts my head.
"Why are you suddenly acting like this?" I flip the conversation and avert it to himself.
"Because I don't want to be the person you keep in the shadow, and going to Roza's party made me realise I want to be the person who holds your hand, the one you come running to when you need help. The one you hold at night. I want you." His hands cup either side of my face tenderly.
If I can't chose Nathan after this confession, did I really deserve to have him? Maybe Nathan dating Sasha is a good thing. He certainly doesn't deserve someone who constantly runs between two guys.
I take a step back, which makes his hands fall from my face and return to his side.
"I need to leave."
As I start to walk towards the exit, but Nathan grabs my arm and stops me from walking away.
"Don't go," he begs.
My body stays frozen to the spot, like my feet have been glued to the floor.
"I didn't intent to pressure you like this, I'm just desperate to have you as mine." Silence fills the air like suffocation. Nathan wraps his arms around my body and I instantly melt against him. As I look up into his cobalt blue eyes, Nathan cups my cheek with one hand and kisses me.
So much fiery emotion bursts through me, a hunger within me starts, a want, a desperate need to remove any gaps between us. His lips are so soft and warm against mine, delicate and smooth. The kiss felt right, but so wrong in many different ways.
"I'm perfect for you. Perhaps I'm stupid for thinking you'd want me back," he whispers, his breath fanning across my face delicately.
And in those moments, my heart breaks for him.
I press my hands on either side of his face and softly press my lips against his.
"Nathan, there's always going to be a part of me that wants you. But you have to understand I'm all over the place with my career and my feelings. It's a big ball of mess and I can't start clearing things up and making important decisions until I get myself organised," I say.
"But-" I rub my thumb over his lips, silencing him from saying anything.
"All I'm doing is dragging you back down into this black hole of unhappiness, and at some point you're going to leave again, I know it. I want to finish writing my songs for the album, announce I'm leaving and work on my new material. Somewhere in between there, I want to find my feet and organise my feelings. Even if I leave Alex right now, you're still going to be in my shadow until I step out of this mask and start being honest with myself."
"Riley-" I silence him again.
"I love that you fight for me every single day and that you would wait for me. But I need to wait for you now." All sorts of emotion flicker across his face. It takes all of the strength inside me to now crack and just run away with Nathan.
"What do you mean?"
"You clearly have something with Sasha, and you should be free to explore that without me getting in the way of it," I answer.
Nathan tugs on my body harder, like he's never going to let me go.
"She was nothing, it means nothing."
"If Sasha doesn't mean anything, you wouldn't have gone to her house to explain things. I know you're going to hate me, but it feels better than know I'm hurting you every second of the day."
"Please don't do this."
"This isn't the end, just means we still have some growing up to do until we can be together."
"Why does it feel like goodbye then?" asks Nathan.
I brush the tears away from his cheek and kiss him once more.
"It'll never be a goodbye with us, just a see you later." I chuckle between the tears.
"Never a goodbye." He swiftly nods his head.
"I'm going to go and burry my head in my music because I urgently need to finish it so that I can finish that chapter of my life," I say as I take a step back from his embrace.
"What about our chapter?" The sadness begins to dwindle from his face.
"Baby, we're still unwritten." I wink.
"I'll walk you to the door."
"Thanks." I nod my head.
Nathan holds my hand and slowly leads me back to the front door. Before I am able to open it and walk through, Nathan tugs me back and gives me one last passionate kiss.
"I –"
"I'll see you later," I interject before he can say anything else.
"Bye, Riley." The selfish side of me kicks in. I stand on my toes and give Nathan once last warm embrace before stepping back and slipping out the door. Without looking back, I hurry to the car and hop inside.
"Back to the studio, please, I'm going to finish this album right now." Archer doesn't say anything, he just puts the radio onto a soft hum and reverses out of their driveway. I slip down the chair and close my eyes. My teeth chew on the inside of my lip and I hold myself together.
Goodbye isn't forever when tomorrow is around the corner.
Thoughts and Hate box can be found bellow ;)