but the wait will be worth it

chapter thirty six

Present day
The next morning
September 20th 2012

"Five more minutes," she mumbled from underneath the covers. I rolled my eyes with a sigh.

"I have to be there in five minutes, Clar."

Clara groaned into the pillow. "No, you have to be there at 9."

I removed my hand from the smooth skin along her back to pick up my phone on the bedside table. Checking the time, I rolled out of bed. "It's 8:45," I mumbled.

I could see Clara bury her red hair deeper into the soft pillow, plugging her ears with the fabric. "So you have fifteen minutes."

I rolled my eyes once more while opening the closet door, picking out a coat and a black t-shirt to wear.

While peering in my drawer, I searched for some pants.

For some stupid reason, I had brought a shit ton of pants with me to Holmes Chapel, with only leaving two or so pairs here. I should've gone back to my mum's house to pick up the rest of my things before getting on that train to Doncaster.

I was thankful for Eve, though. If I wouldn't have gone back, Louis and I's relationship would've remained unfinished.

I yawned while searching through the drawer, tired eyes beginning to get puffy.

Clara had insisted that we make the best out of my first night back to London, leaving me worn out and unwilling to go back to work today. Although of course, I had to. My reputation was already pretty crappy with the boys and label right now.

Somehow, I had thought that having sex with Clara would solve all of my feelings for Louis. Thought that it would just push them away. But for some reason, last night had only brought them closer.

It was weird, in a way. Sleeping with Clara in the bed that Louis and I used to watch television in every night before bed. Getting a midnight cup of tea in the kitchen that Louis and I had remodeled when we first moved into this little flat.

It's as if there were ghosts of him everywhere. Ghosts of us. Ghosts of what we used to be.

And kissing Clara in this house, the house that built up so much of my life; I had somehow managed to set myself in a trance of deja vu.

When I touched her skin, all I felt was Louis's. When I tasted her lips, the taste of Louis just kept re-entering my senses.

And I didn't know, if it was just because we were in our old house. It could've been because I'd never kissed Clara in the city Louis and I fell in love with. Either way, I felt him in the taxi, and I felt him in my bed last night, too.

Is that what unresolved love felt like?

When anyone else you're with, you can't even begin to see all that they are, the loving things they do, or memorize the ways they touch you. All you know is the way he had used to run his hands down your back, kissing your neck when you just tried to get one, precious moment of sleep.

Or maybe it was just me, and my unresolved feelings about myself.

I was a bit scared about going back to headquarters today. Who knew what MacHeath was going to do to me.