Because I Love You

chapter eleven.

She was awakened by the sound of the wooden floor creaking as Tyler walked across the room. Her head felt like hell took over and she squinted as the way too bright light hit her eyes as they opened. Melissa had no idea where she was and frankly, she was too tired to care. On the other hand, Tyler came to realize what had happened the night before just by looking around the room.

"What time is it?" she managed to say. Tyler turned around quickly, surprised that she was also awake already. He checked the clock.

"It's uh one-thirty in the afternoon," he answered. Suddenly, Melissa found the energy to sit up straight and widen her eyes.

"What? That's impossible, what even happened last night?" She started to freak out. Tyler slightly opened his mouth to tell her but closed it as he decided she should find out by herself.

"Just open your eyes," he said and she nodded. "Look at yourself." Melissa gave him a confused look and hesitated to take a look as she slowly started to piece it all together and realized that she was only wearing her underwear and bra. Her lips parted at the sight of the now stained white sheets and started to tear up which would only make her makeup even more smeared.

"You fucking asshole," she said shaking her head. Tyler opened his mouth to talk but she interrupted him. "You took advantage of me, you knew that I was a virgin and that Elijah's my boyfriend. You fucking knew and you still did it."

"Melissa, it's not like that," he said, shaking his head and walking closer.

"The hell it isn't!" she yelled, crying. "You took my damn virginity Tyler, and I'd say that's a pretty big goddamn deal." She stood up from the bed and grabbed her dress from the floor.

"We were both to drunk to notice, this isn't either of our fault," he said as she slipped the dress back on. His tone was so calm as if he had seen in this situation a million times before. "Please, just take a drink of water before you leave. You're hungover."

Melissa shook her head but grabbed the glass and threw the water at him. "You deserved that."

Tyler struggled to open his eyes but finally did. "Ok, I probably did but just hear me out ok? I-"

"Don't bother," she interrupted. "Nothing you can say or do can fix this situation. I don't remember anything after drinking that glass of rum and you took advantage of that." She slipped her shoes on. "Did you even use protection?"

"I don't remember." Her eyes widened. "What?" he questioned.

"Please tell me that's a joke," she said as she stopped everything she was doing and just stared at him. "I have a boyfriend, he's coming back today, and you- I don't have birth control."

He shook his head. "Well maybe you should've thought about that before you came over, got drunk, and kissed me."

Her lips parted and even though she was not going to at first, she walked one step closer, still crying, and slapped him in the face before walking out of his bedroom. "Melissa, wait," he called after but she disobeyed and kept walking down the stairs, out the door, and slammed the door in his face before he could chase after her.

----

"His mother called and said he'll be here soon," Melissa's mother said while staring at her daughter as she sat almost unmoving on the couch. "Sweetie," She sat down on the couch with her and put her arm around her shoulders, "what happened before you came back from Tyler and Gemma's? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"Nothing mom," she answered a few moments later. After she rushed back from Tyler's house to hers, she ran to her room frantically, cried for about an hour, but was later able to take a shower, get dressed in a clean floral dress, and do her makeup well enough so that it would hide her dark circles and make her red eyes less noticeable.

"I just don't understand why-" her mother started but she was interrupted when the doorbell rang. Melissa quickly got up, relieved that she got a break from her mom's underage drinking talk and opened the door to a smiling, very handsome Elijah. She for once that day was able to smile and immediately gave him a hug.

"God, I missed you," he said, breaking the hug and kissing Melissa on the forehead.

"I missed your stupid face too" she joked and he smiled. She had missed him too much and she could not do much about what happened with Tyler except avoid him, forget what happened the night before, and keep loving Elijah the way she had since day one.

She was finally content, that is, until he lifted her chin to kiss her and suddenly stopped, giving her a confused look and frowning. "...have you been drinking?"