The next month continued the same way the rest of the quarantine had-playing games, drinking a lot, watching movies, and shooting videos. You started hooking up with Alex occasionally and then fairly often until almost every day you ended up screwing almost daily. However, that was mostly all that happened. You hadn't put any labels on anything, didn't change anything about your dynamic, and still kept it a complete secret. It was all fine with you. You didn't have any romantic feelings and as far as you know, Alex didn't either. Everything was comfortable, and you were starting to see Alex and George's place as yours as well.
And then it all finally ended.
You and Alex were woken up at about 8 in the morning to the sound of pounding on the bedroom door. It took you a second of still half-asleep thought to realize what was going on, but once you did your eyes shot open. It seemed that Alex figured out what was happening around the same time that you did. It was George.
"Get up!" George shouted through the door. "We have to celebrate!"
Neither you nor Alex understood what he was talking about, but you both knew that if George was to burst in he would know exactly what had happened that night. The both of you jumped out of bed as quickly as possible, grabbing your clothes off of the floor and putting them on as quickly as possible, and Alex opened the door. He had the door barely cracked with you peaking out from behind him, both of you with clothes all disheveled, some inside out or backwards.
"Did you hear?" George asked, then eyeing your clothes said, "I guess not if you just woke up."
"What? What's going on?" you asked.
"They're letting us all out. Quarantine's over! C'mon, let's celebrate!" George replied, grabbing Alex's arm and pulling him out into the living area. You climbed back into bed, hiding your head under the covers to block out the sun.
"Oh no you don't," George said, pulling you out of bed. "We're celebrating, now."
You both walked back into the living area and saw Alex on the phone ordering pizzas. Way more pizza than you thought the lot of you could ever consume in one afternoon. You went into the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of vodka and a pack of hard cider. "Alright, we doing shots or what?" you asked the two of them.
"Oh, absolutely," Alex said, grabbing shot glasses and putting them out in front of you so that you could pour you all shots. You all clinked your shot glasses together and downed them as quickly as possible. The pizzas arrived, and you grabbed the 5 large pizzas from the delivery man. You put the pizzas on the coffee table in front of the couch and brought the hard ciders over as well. The three of you drank and ate until you felt like you were going to burst. And then you kept eating.
"Alright, well, once I sober up I should probably head back to my place," you said.
"What? No, no. Stay. Celebrate," George said, slurring his words a bit through all the alcohol.
"Ya, stay with us. You can go back tomorrow," Alex agreed, also drunk off his ass.
"Nah, I really do need to go back home. My roommates have to be wondering where I've been," you told them, knowing that was a blatant lie. Your roommates might not have even noticed you were gone.
"Fine, just stay for another drink then," George replied, handing you another hard cider. And that one cider turned into three more. You had almost completely forgotten that you were supposed to be leaving. You had entered that stage of drunk where all you could think about was having fun and get drunker. You all ended up just sitting around drunkenly telling stories and trying to stuff more pizza into your mouth.
"I can do it. I can finish the rest of this pizza," you announced to the group, giggling drunkenly.
"If you...if you can finish the rest of the pizza, I will give you 10 quid," George told you.
"Bet?" you responded.
"Oh absolutely," he responded. "There's no way you can do it."
And with that, you started shoving as much pizza as you could into your mouth as fast as possible. Both of them stared at you, partially in disgust and partially in amazement. Normally, you would be more self-conscious about the way you were acting, but you were drunk and dammit there was money on the line and you'd do anything stupid for a dollar. And against all the odds, you finished the pizza.
"I did it! You owe me 10 quid," you said.
"No fucking way," he said.
"But you said...you bet on it," you argued.
"Yeah but that was when I thought you couldn't do it," he said.
"You bastard," you muttered. You laid down on the couch and closed your eyes, feeling nauseous and heavy from all the alcohol and pizza. You groaned from all the pain in your gut.
"I can't believe you actually did that," Alex said. "You feeling ok?"
You nodded, eyes still closed. You passed out on the couch and woke up around 4pm. You looked around and saw that Alex and George had already cleaned up everything and were playing video games on the floor in front of you, mostly sobered up by now.
"Ah, good morning," George said.
"Yeah, I should probably get going for real this time," you said, getting up from the couch. "Thanks for letting me stay here. Sorry it was a lot longer than intended."
"No need to apologize. I'd lose my mind if it was just me and Alex here," George said.
"You can come and stay whenever," Alex said. He saw you making your way to the door and added, "Let me walk you home."
You allowed him to walk you home, but you were afraid that he was going to try to start a conversation you weren't ready for. Of course, that was exactly what he wanted to do. He walked you completely in silence, both of you fearing conversation since you knew exactly what needed to be discussed. About halfway to your place he stopped.
"So are we just not gonna talk about it?" he asked.
"Talk about what?" you played dumb, hoping it would stop this conversation from ever happening. It was your go to strategy in most uncomfortable situations.
"About what's going to happen know."
"Well, I thought we didn't need to talk about it. Like, I thought it was a circumstantial friends with benefits thing."
"Yeah, yeah. That's what I thought, too," Alex said, but something in him sounded disappointed or caught off guard.
"Cool, so we don't really need to talk about it anymore, I guess, and everything goes back to the way it was before."
You went the rest of the way home mostly in silence. Once you got there, you quickly gave him a hug and ran into your place. You walked past your roommates on the way to your room, and they didn't so much as bat an eye. They clearly didn't realize that you were gone. You spent the next few weeks working as many shifts as possible to make up for all the income you missed out on when you were stuck in quarantine. You had no days off, plus a lot of the time you ended up with double shifts. With everything just now opening up, all the bars and restaurants were packed. Every shift felt like you just barely made it without screwing everything up. Your feet were killing you after spending all that time getting used to lounging around just to jump right into full days of only sitting down for 15 minutes every 6 hours. Every night you came home and were so tired all you could do was strip and fall into bed.
Still, every day you got a text from Alex regardless of how bad you had been at communicating the day before. It was always a toss-up as to whether you had a long conversation over text all day long or you would only get back to him with one text during your lunch break and go radio silence for the rest of the day. You thought it was sweet that he was messaging you so often. While you guys were definitely in contact before quarantine, it wasn't like this. You thought he probably just got used to having you around, not to mention that you'd definitely gotten closer after spending all that time together.
This wasn't entirely untrue. Alex wasn't quite sure why he was feeling what he was feeling, but he missed you a lot. He was so lonely, but it was more than just that. He missed you a lot more than he had ever anticipated, and he just wanted your attention. He understood that you were working a lot and were very busy, so he was trying his best not to annoy you with too many messages or get too disappointed when you couldn't reply to him. He found himself wondering if you were just avoiding him and were, in fact, hanging out with other people. "Do you want to go surprise y/n at work? We could grab dinner while we're there. It'd be like a fun day out," Alex suggested to George.
"Alex, it's been like 2 weeks and all you've done is talk about her," George said. "What the fuck is up with you?"
"I don't know. She was living here for so long and now we never see her. It's weird to adjust to," Alex said. He knew that this wasn't the only thing going on, but he didn't want George to know what had happened between the two of you and he wanted to keep avoiding what he was really feeling. He had thoughts in the back of his mind that he had been pushing down well before you left. He was thinking of finally opening that door, but when he walked you home, you completely crushed that idea for him. He didn't want to admit that there was something he wanted when he knew he couldn't have it.
"You're right. It has been weird not having her around anymore, but are you sure it'll be ok for us to visit her at work?" George asked.
"Maybe we don't need to be specifically visiting her...We could just be having dinner where she just so happens to be working," Alex said.
George smiled, "Who could argue with that."
You were about halfway through your shift when you saw Alex and George walk in the front door. The bar was just behind the hostess's desk, but it was so noisy that you were unable to hear what they were saying. They were seated in the hightops in your section, and when you saw that, you immediately went over to the woman with the tongue piercing who was working the bar area with you, per usual.
"Hey, would you be able to take that table over there for me? I'll take one of your tables," you asked her.
"Sure thing. But what's up with them?" she asked.
"Oh, I just know them, and it might be a bit weird, especially with one of them," you told her.
"Oh? Well, you'll have to catch me up with all the drama later than," she winked and went back to work.
You hoped that it didn't seem like you were avoiding them. You were worried about people visiting you at work, and you were especially worried about waiting on anyone that you knew. You compartmentalized every part of your life, and you tried to have a very clear line between work and the rest of your life, mostly because you were very worried that anything deemed "unprofessional" would get you in trouble with your boss. This made it especially worrisome when Alex and George showed up, partially because of what had previously happened with you and Alex and partially because you weren't sure what kind of behavior you could expect from them.
You went back to work and about half an hour later you took your break. You grabbed your meal from the kitchen and then sat in the back room with your dinner. You checked your phone for the first time since your shift had started and saw that you had a few texts from Alex and one from George.
Hang out on your break? George had texted you. You purposefully didn't open it, because you weren't quite sure how to respond. You hoped that if you waited long enough you could tell him that you had just read it and already took your break.
Hey, we're coming to see you at work :)
We asked the hostess to sit in your section, but I think she messed up
Maybe we can see you on your break
Are you avoiding me? Alex had texted you about once every ten minutes. You felt guilty. You felt it heavy in your gut, and suddenly, your dinner seemed inedible. You forced yourself to eat it, only able to take a bite every now and then. You didn't want him to think you were avoiding him, even if that was a little bit true. You didn't know what to say, but you didn't want him to feel bad. You waited until the very end of your break to respond to the both of them.
Sorry, I just read this and my break is already over :( And then just to Alex you sent, Not avoiding you, just super busy
When you came out of the back from your break, they were already gone. You finished out your shift, and once the dinner rush calmed down, the bar pretty much emptied. You started chatting with your coworker, and almost immediately she started interrogating you about Alex and George. You were hesitant at first, but you figured there was no way she would ever end up speaking to your friends about this. is. You told her everything. Everything from quarantine and everything from the walk home and everything that had happened since. You ended up spilling a bit too much of your actual feelings when all you had intended on telling her was the facts.
"Listen, babe. Can I give you my two cents?" she asked you, but you had a feeling she would tell you regardless.
"Ya, sure."
"I think you miss him more than just a regular friend, ya know? I think you have feelings for him. And I think maybe part of you knows it, so you're avoiding it with all these shifts. Just take one day off when the new schedule gets made, ya?"
You nodded, knowing you really did need the day off.
"And as payment for my advice," she said, tossing you a key, "you can do the bathroom check."
You rolled your eyes, but you went and did it anyways. You spent the rest of your shift thinking about what she had said. You decided you would request your day off as soon as you got home, but instead, you ended up passing out in your work clothes on top of your covers. This turned out o be a good thing, however, because Alex had texted you while you were sleeping. In an attempt to see you without seeming needy or admitting to missing you, he had decided to throw a small party to "get everyone together again".