Dance with me darling

sam

When we arrive at Van's, Dean knocks on the front door and a few seconds go by before the door is swung open by Larry.

We all head into the living room and I greet Van and the rest of the lads before sitting myself down on the sofa. I know it's rude, and I know I'm acting like a sulking child. But I want to go home.

"Are you not having a drink?" Benji comes over and sits beside me, his arm over the back of the sofa, a pint in his other hand. He frowns at me, a concerned expression on his face.

"No I'm not drinking tonight... I'm driving us home later on" I lie, we actually planned to stay in a nearby bed and breakfast for the night, but any other excuse would make me sound boring.

"Fair enough" Ben smiles and takes a swig of his beer, looking around the room for something to talk about, for something to catch his eye and distract him from the awkwardness of my depressing silence.

"I'm just gonna nip to the bathroom" I say to him and he nods in response. I stand up and make my way to the stairs, but I stop on the first step. Because Olivia isn't downstairs. I'm hoping and praying she's not home.

When I make my way up the stairs, the faint sound of music coming from Olivia's bedroom grows louder and louder until that's all I can hear. And even though its quiet, its so defeating. Her bedroom door is slightly open and through the crack I can see the light it turned off, but her room is visible with the orange glow of a lamp.

The floorboards under the carpet creak when I step closer to the bathroom, and I wince at the sound. I probably shouldn't care, she'll probably just assume it's one of the other lads. She's probably forgotten about my existence by now.

I make my way into the bathroom and lock the door behind me, and I grab onto the edges of the sink, holding my head down between my shoulders. My brain feels like it's inflating and deflating over and over, just throbbing in my skull. Begging to be ripped out and wiped clean.

I stay in the bathroom for a few minutes, I know I'm being dramatic, I know I'm acting like a teenage boy with a broken heart, but the truth is, that's exactly how I feel. Like a boy with a broken heart. I just don't feel good knowing Olivia doesn't see me the way I see her, knowing that this whole time it's just been me overanalysing our relationship. I don't even know if I should be calling it a relationship. It wasn't much of one.

Someone knocks on the door after a few more minutes and almost gives me a heart attack, I can't get the words out of my mouth to tell them to wait so I just turn the tap and hold my hands under the hot water for some seconds before turning it off and grabbing a towel to dry my hands. I check my appearance in the mirror and run my hand through my hair, trying to make it look fairly decent.

I unlock the bathroom door and I have to close my eyes for a second when I see who's standing outside waiting for the bathroom. I need someone to slap me, or pinch my arm extremely hard. I need someone to grab me by my shoulders, shake me vigorously and tell me that all of these bad things aren't actually happening to me, it's just my imagination playing tricks on me. It's just my brain torturing me, punishing me.

I realise I'm stood directly in the doorway blocking her entrance after she arches her brow, she's leaning her back against the banister at the top of the stairs and her arms are folded over her chest, her hair up in a messy knot on the top of her head. She's wearing grey joggers, the waistband rolled down to make them hang from her hips. And she has a Led Zeppelin t-shirt on, it's oversized but she has it tied at the waist and just looking at her makes me feel at a loss of oxygen. I'm trying my hardest to breathe normally but it's so hard when she's stood directly in front of me, looking at me the way she is, dressed the way she is.