Who We Once Were - A Jolivia Story

Chapter 21

Olivia had taken her mom's car to the parking lot. She had finally got her full permit a few weeks ago but she still preferred getting a ride with her mom. It allowed her to spend more time with her and just relax before and after work. Tonight didn't seem like a good time to get a ride though, seeing as she had no idea how the night was going to go. She'd asked her mom to borrow the car to go meet Josh to which she accepted, but was weary about the whole Josh part. Her mom didn't think it was a good idea to go see him and Olivia herself was having mixed feelings about the whole thing.

Of course she had been the one to ask him to meet, but still she found herself wanting to chicken out more and more every minute closer she got. She finally pulled into the lot around 8:55 pm, always one to be punctual, and sat alone her car fretting for the next five minutes or so. She asked him to meet her here because it was a neutral zone between their two places. She didn't want to meet as his 15th floor apartment in case things went south again, fleeing from there once had been more then enough for her. She also didn't want him at her place because she didn't think she could handle kicking him out, plus they didn't have as much privacy with her mom home.

If she was being totally honest though, she kind of chose this place because of the sentimental value it held for her. They had just finished writing Just For A Moment at his place and he drove them to the In-N-Out here for celebratory burgers and shakes. Somehow, that led to her admitting that she'd never actually been driving before and he landed up giving her her first lesson in this very lot. She knew it was cheesy but that memory was one she'd always used to cling to convince herself they'd be okay when things got bad between them. She figured if this was it for them, if they were never going to be okay again, at least hashing it out here would destroy that old memory for her. If she was about to be hurt by him again, it would be for the last time, she'd cut out any chance she had of going back to him. It sounded stupid aloud, she knew it did, but that didn't matter because in some weird way, it made sense to her. 

She saw his car pull into the lot and she took a deep breath trying her best to ready herself for whatever was about to happen. She did a double check in the mirror fixing up her hair before leaving her car, locking it and walking the short distance to his. She knocked lightly on the passenger door window which got his attention and he unlocked the door. She opened the door, took a seat and shut it behind her. It had barely been a second and the silence was already defeating.

"So, um" she started not really knowing what she was going to say. "How was the drive?" She landed up asking softly which was definitely not the right way to start this difficult conversation.

"It was okay um, and you? Did you Uber?" He asked, neither of really them looking at the other.

"No actually I drove and it was pretty good thanks." She shrugged. 

"Oh so is your mom waiting for you?" He asked finally turning to face her and she could make out the small crinkle in his brow from the corner of her eye. 

"No uh, I got my permit a couple weeks ago so I drove myself." She said with the smallest hint of a smile as she turned to face him as well.

"Really! Olivia congrats that's amazing!" He said as a wide beaming smile spread across his face and she couldn't help the way her heart glowed a little and the small laugh she let out. 

"Ya, thanks." She said softly. "So uh- anyways we should talk about-" She started, changing the tone.

"About, uh ya." He finished for her, following suit with his change in expression. No one spoke for a small moment, until Josh decided to finally break the silence. "Look Liv, I'm so sorry, I really am and I'm not asking for you to forgive me or anything I just need you to know that." He sighed and she was about to respond but, he kept speaking. "About what I said the other day, I'm not going to deny any of it. I care about you, a lot more than friends should and I don't think that's ever going to change but I shouldn't have sprung that on you. The whole point of avoiding you was so that you'd never find out and now you know. I didn't want to ruin what we had and I didn't want to make you uncomfortable and yet here we are." He said laughing dryly. "The point is," he paused. "I miss my friend so much and if you ever do decide to give our friendship another shot, I'm not going to let this ruin it. Do we think we could just forget about it what I said, pretend it didn't happen?" He finished with a large exhale. 

"Uh, ya definitely."Olivia was conflicted, on one hand it really hurt that he was basically telling her he wanted to forget everything he admitted to her, like it would be so impossible for them to ever work. On the other hand, no matter her romantic feelings about him they still had so many issues between them and their relationship. She wanted to tell him how much she loved him and then they could go live happily ever after together but unfortunately that's not how real life worked. 

"Josh I- what you did was incredibly stupid okay?" She started and he bowed his head a little in what she assumed was shame. "It really hurt me and I can't just move forward. You- you broke my trust and you abandoned me with no explanation." She let go of a shaky breath. "You don't get to just make choices that involve me and then leave me out of the loop. Any kind of relationship is supposed to fifty - fifty and you denied me that." She said looking at the ground.

"I know Liv and I'm so sorry. I'm an idiot and I messed up really badly but I was scared of losing you. I know that sounds dumb okay? I landed up losing you anyways but for some reason it just made sense in my head." He apologized, shaking his head. Her thoughts were pulled back to what Claire had said, 'Josh tends to do stupid things with good intentions when it comes to the people he loves.' 

"I believe you." That caught his attention as he looked up to meet her eyes. "Maybe it's stupid, but what we had was really special to me. I would give anything to just go back in time and fix this whole mess before it even happened but we can't." She said and he gave her a small nod, still looking a little awestruck. "What we can do is make things better now though." She spoke taking a deep breath. "Look I'm not saying we can just go back to how it was okay?" He nodded. "But maybe if we try, we can work past this together?" She suggested with a small hint of a hopeful smile mixed with a boatload of nerves.

"Together," he echoed. "I'd like that very much." He responded with a small smile of his own. There was a moment after that where neither of them broke eye contact, they just stared into each other's eyes not making a single sound. That was until Olivia cleared her throat and looked away, Josh following suit.

"So um, do you wanna grab burgers or something? I'm kinda starving."She said with a small laugh. "I mean we don't have to I just-" 

"Burgers sound great." He confirmed with a warm expression in his eyes. The two got dinner and ate in his car while they talked, catching each other up on the little things in their lives, mostly just surface level stuff. Sure it was nothing like how they used to be but it was something, it was the first time they had a proper conversation in months, it was progress. 

A/N - Our babies our finally starting to heal so yay! Hope you all enjoyed the chapter and as always please let me know what you thought in the comments and votes are always appreciated! Just a reminder that we have two chapters left, almost doneeee. I know we're not quite there yet but I just wanted to thank all of you for the overwhelming support especially as of lately, it means the world to me ❤️