Fortuitous || Jack Steele [1]

fifty five

Steeley's POV.

"You're a moron." Is the first thing that comes through the phone when I answer the call.

"Thanks Caleb," I respond bluntly, rolling my eyes. "As if I didn't know."

"So you admit to fucking up?"

"I don't know, maybe." I shrug, not liking the direction this conversation is already taking.

"Mate, why did you do that to her?" Caleb's voice goes low with disappointment. "Why did dump Madelyn like that?"

"Did you seriously call just to berate me?" I huff in annoyance although feeling a sting when hearing Madelyn's name.

"Well I just want to know why you'd hurt Madelyn like you did. She's broken," he tells me with a frustrated tone.

I won't deny that my expression breaks when Caleb says that. I'm glad he can't see my face.

My eyes gravitate to the grey hoodie which I had accepted was Madelyn's. Yet now it hangs off the couch, untouched, since she thrusted it back into my arms.

The frustration grows within me at myself and at so many other things.

"Because I had no choice!"

"That's bullshit. You did have a choice," Caleb refutes.

"What would you know?!" I counter angrily, hating this situation.

"What would I know?" He scoffs. "I know that Taylah leaving broke you. You were absolutely devastated and I saw that with my very own eyes. So don't go saying 'what would I know?' when I physically witnessed the pain you suffered, supported you and offered you a place to stay so you wouldn't be alone.

"You did have a choice to choose between Madelyn and Taylah. You chose the woman who left you, in a general sense, over someone who dedicated so much time, love and sincerity to you. Why, Jack? Why?"

"I'm happy with Taylah," I get out shortly and pathetically although I don't believe it much.

I'm not really helping myself here with a lack of rebuttal. It's because I know I'm wrong. I know I made a mistake but I'm trying to ignore it.

"You are? Last time I checked you were heartbroken. And last time I checked you're both in two different states having not spoken in person for over year, yet here you are in a so called 'rejuvenated relationship' that revived itself over a phone call," Caleb states sternly, getting his point across.

When he puts it that way it does seem pretty, well, pathetic. And makes me look like even more of an idiot.

"This doesn't impact you, Caleb," I affirm, ignoring his previous words. "And how do you even know this?"

"It does when you drag a poor girl into your shit and leave her in the trash. And I found out because that poor girl was in tears when she called Audrey. I put two and two together. There's only one other person who'd make you trip over your own feet, and that's Taylah."

Caleb's firm tone isn't something I have come across often. He's passionate and set off by the fact I mistreated Madelyn, which I did and I hate myself for it. You hurt someone Caleb cares about then you'll know about it when he bears down on you with little mercy.

I didn't want to hurt Madelyn... I really didn't. I didn't want to make her cry or feel used. I was so distracted by the impact Taylah had and somehow still has on me.

It had been hours since Taylah called saying she wanted to rekindle things and start the relationship again.

Time had passed and I had deliberated for ages trying figure out who it would be: Madelyn or Taylah?