Sidewalks ( Karl Jacobs )

chapter fifteen

Guilt rushed through me as I stared at my phone screen. I knew how it looked, especially since I had been online the whole night. I typed out an explanation, the truth, but as my finger hovered over the 'send' message, it felt wrong to me. I had messed things up, badly. Sending a text message would be insincere.

I deleted the next letting out a cry. All I needed to do was apologize and explain what had happened. I squeezed my eyes shut, slamming the call button on my phone. My nerves were running wild as the call rung out. Once. Twice. Three times. Just as I pulled the phone away from my ear, the call was accepted.

"Olivia?" Karl's voice called out. Immediately, my throat went dry.

"Karl," I choked out. My breath caught in my throat.

"Just get it over with. Rip off the band-aid. How did I fuck things up between us?" He rushed out, stuttering through his words.

"Karl, I- I" my words were stuck. It felt like there was an iron wall between me and the phone.

"I'm sorry." He took in a low, jagged breath.

"No!" I shot out, a small voice replacing my own. "Fuck," I swore under my breath. "I'm sorry. I swear I wasn't ignoring you. I just hadn't been on my phone since we had gotten off of stream. I thought you were annoyed with me or something. You were acting so weird earlier. I just didn't want to bother you. I swear, you didn't do anything. I'm such an idiot. I promise I'm not usually like this. God, I don't know what it is but things are so weird with you!"

"Weird?" He asked softly.

"No," I groaned at my own incompetence. "That's a bad choice of words. I just really like what we have going on here. I don't want to mess things up."

"Me neither," Karl let out a short laugh.

"Oh," I blinked slowly, processing the conversation.

"Look, let's just make a deal. No more being weird between us. Alright?" His voice had a hint of humor behind it, but I knew he was being serious. "We both want this friendship. So no more stress? We're on the same page now."

A piece of me deflated at his words. I did have a crush on him, I knew this by now, but that's not how he feels. His flirting is no more than a joke. "Deal," I grimaced at myself.

"Okay, perfect. Goodnight, Olivia. I'll talk to you tomorrow." Karl laughed, and I said my goodbyes. I plugged my phone into my charger, laying in bed. I did really value our friendship. I wasn't going to let a stupid crush get in the way of that. This little crush has to be nipped in the bud now while it's contained.

As I drifted off to sleep, I focused my thoughts on anything but Karl. The less I thought about him, the better.

     The next morning I woke up feeling much better than I had the previous night.  I flipped over in bed, grabbing my phone.  I looked at the notifications, seeing that I had a lot of texts to respond to.  I dropped my phone, overwhelmed.

"Sapnap?" I called out, hoping he would hear me. Not even a minute later, he poked his head into my room.

"You good?" Sapnap asked slowly, giving me a weird look.

"I need a hug," I frowned and stuck out my arms, opening and shutting my palms.

"You're such a weirdo," he shook his head, pulling me into a hug. "Do you want to just chill today?" He asked, sitting on my bed.

"Yes, please. Let's watch a show together!" I hurried over to my monitor that sat across from my bed, firing it up.

"Have you watched Haikyu?" Sapnap asked me as he got comfortable in my bed.