It's Never Just Goodbye // Ed Sheeran

You Like to Suffer

Ed

FIVE MONTHS LATER

Summer had finally hit.

She laid out on a chair, basking in the sun, with nothing on but a string bikini. She sipped on a margarita casually and read over a magazine she was on the front cover of. Music from the radio played loudly outside and through the cracked window, I heard the lyrics perfectly, and to the point where it almost annoyed me.

I came here to be alone - a simple beach house rented for an occasion of songwriting and peace. Over the past months leading up to a prickling hot June, I had finished off the final concerts that supported my new fame of Plus, and spent most of my time writing along the way and recording demos of said songs on my computer. A partially new fame that had grown almost a year after the album was released.

I needed to think. A break away from any form of reality, a sudden reality I was hoping to escape, and a chance to work on any new music. Suddenly, as I sat on the couch and watched her through the sliding glass door as she tanned by the pool, I regretted telling her where I was staying.

Ellie rolled off the chair and pushed her sunglasses to the top of her head. She sauntered over to the door and slid it open with all her might. In an almost seductive way, she said, "Do you mind rubbing some tanning lotion on my back?"

It was like I was in a movie and the hot chick I dreamed over was finally talking to me. I blinked, shook my head, and said, "Not right now. I'm trying to work."

She laughed bitterly, "Work? You're lying on the couch, doing nothing. You haven't worked all week."

"Because you're here."

I found myself on my feet and into the small, but airy kitchen. Ellie didn't get the hint that I tried giving off, the one where I wanted to be alone, and she followed me in. Finding herself a seat on a wooden stool across from me.

"You didn't have to invite me, big papa."

I rolled my eyes. "Don't call me that, Ellie."

"It was a joke... It was meant to be ironic."

"I don't care and I think you have the wrong definition of irony in your head." I tapped my skull and sighed. "I didn't invite you, my dear. I needed time up here to work." To work. To forget things. Same thing.

"You need time to chill, baby. To chill and have some fun..." She reached across the breakfast nook and ran her thin fingers up my arm. If I closed my eyes, they felt like spiders running up and down the length of my forearm. "And I don't see you complaining when I get you in bed..."

Two days I was up here alone before she called me. For months, when I was away performing and trying to clear my head, I easily ignored her. Yet, here she was, back in my life and persistent as hell.

"You know," She licked her lip before biting down, grinning at me. "I've missed you a lot."

"Is that so?"

Swiftly, she was off the stool and standing next to me in moments. Her little hand resting on my knee before slowing moving up. Ellie's lips pressed against my neck as she bit down. Her hand squeezed at my inner thigh and my entire body tensed up.

No matter if she annoyed me, I couldn't help myself around her. Ellie pulled me off the chair and tugged me to follow her into the already trashed bedroom. She shrieked loudly as I pushed her on the bed. Intensely, my lips pushed against hers in a needing manner. Her hands undoing the button on my pants in a rush, fingers moving quickly.

I untied her bikini strap and kissed her chest, and stopped. My phone, sitting on the nightstand, buzzed loudly. "Ignore it." Ellie mumbled, her hand now down my boxers.