By Your Side (Twenty One Pilots)

Old Feelings, New Beginnings

Josh sighed as he set down his phone. He had never really been one for phone calls, as they usually gave him some sort of anxiety, but this one had to have been the worst he could remember. Josh loved his mother, he really did, but sometimes he wished she would forget about family gatherings so he could breathe for a little bit.

“Everything okay?” Debby asked as she walked back into the bedroom, a basket full of laundry in her hands. “You look upset.”

“Yeah,” Josh sighed again. “My mother called.”

“And why is that so bad?”

“She wants to know if we’re going to her place for Thanksgiving.”

Debby set the basket of laundry down on the bed. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

A few minutes of uncomfortable silence passed before Debby spoke again.

“My parents want to know if we’re going to their place for Thanksgiving.” Josh looked up but Debby avoided eye contact, instead busying herself with a shirt that she kept folding and unfolding.

“Oh?”

“Yeah.”

Josh watched as Debby continued to slowly fold the laundry. He couldn’t think of anything to say. He had told himself that today was going to be the day where he told Debby how he was really feeling, but he couldn’t do it. Staying with Debby felt so wrong, but leaving her felt wrong too. He didn’t know what to do.

Once everything was folded, Josh helped Debby put it away in their dressers. Neither said a word while they worked, the only sound in the entire apartment coming from Richard, who wanted the sink water to be turned on. They could both feel the tension, but neither wanted to bring it up. They were stuck awkwardly avoiding eye contact and jumping every time their fingers touched.

Eventually the laundry was put away and there was nothing left to distract the two anymore. They sat side by side on their bed, each waiting for the other to say something first. Unlike the weeks before this, the silence that separated them was uneasy and held a sense of sadness and longing.

“Josh, we need to talk.” Debby’s voice broke through the air, shattering the silence the same way as the baseball Josh had once thrown through his neighbor’s window.

“I just, we’ve been together for so long and, we had that one break, but I don’t know if… what I’m trying to say is,” Debby stumbled over her words.

“You don’t have to rush on saying anything. We’ve got time,” Josh tried to reassure her. Debby smiled at him before continuing.

“What I mean is, that I still really love you, but I don’t think I’m in love with you anymore? Because to me those mean two completely different things and I don’t want to keep you trapped in a relationship where I can’t return your feelings. And for a while now things have been feeling really weird and different and I didn’t know how to tell you and I was just really confused and I’m sorry now I’m crying I didn’t mean to tell you like this.” Debby hid her face in her hands and tried to slow down her breathing.

Josh immediately put his arm around her and pulled her into his side, silently breathing out a sigh of relief. Debby buried her face in his shoulder and hugged him back.

“Debs, it’s okay,” he whispered. “I understand. I felt the same way, I just never knew how to bring it up.”

“You have?”

“Yes. I didn’t really know what was going on so I never said anything, but or maybe the past month or so things have been feeling weird,” Josh explained. “I think that sometimes things change, whether we want them to or not, and sometimes it’s for the better. Maybe we needed something from each other when we were younger, and now that we’re older and more grown up, we need something else.”

Debby pulled away from the hug and looked up at Josh. “I’m so so thankful that you understand. I didn’t want to hurt you.”

“I just want you to be happy,” Josh smiled. “You’re my best friend.”

“You’re my best friend, too.”

After a few seconds of silence, Josh laughed. “I guess that settles whose house we’re going to for Thanksgiving.”

“Yeah,” Debby smiled. “I’ll go to your parent’s house and you’ll go to mine!”

“Because that makes total sense,” Josh joked.

The pair of them were happier throughout the rest of the day. They weight that had been piled on top of their shoulders was finally gone and they felt like they could actually breathe for once. The mood in the apartment was light and happy. Richard was even joining in on the lifted spirits; darting between Josh and Debby’s feet and stealing their socks. She could tell that they were both feeling much better.