stuck with a phobia ; lee felix

love hurts

☾✰

"Hailee, you're being stupid," Ivy scolds across my ear as I sat my ass down in the corner of the school bathroom.

"I am not stupid," I pout and somehow Ivy could sense it. I know it's been a while since we've talked, but every time something happens, I can't help but turn to her. I miss my best friend.

"He's crossed the line Ives and I just don't know what to do anymore," I massage my temples as a growing pain pierces through my skull like an ambushed arrow.

Ever since that night, Felix's words have never left my mind, and the way my heart blossoms a thousand times more at the thought of him concerns me too. I'm hiding out here in the bathroom just to avoid seeing him. Pathetic really.

"That's the point Hailee. You're not supposed to do anything. He confessed to you so that you can know how he feels! I can't believe you like him back too—like Hailee? That loner who never talked to anyone? The one who—"

"Okay I get it, shut up now," I exasperate. Perhaps missing out on lunch with a terrible headache wasn't the best plan, but I had to avoid Felix. There was no way I could face him for the time being.

"So when do you plan on talking to him then? After I have grandkids?" her tone was laced euphemism and I've missed it.

"Some other day thats not today," I groan, slouching back against the wall. Felix doesn't deserve this. He doesn't deserve to be avoided after such a revelation, which explicates all the more why I shouldn't be with him.

"Hailee!"

"Ivy! I know, I have to stop letting this phobia take over everything, but it's so hard to give my heart away again. I've been closed off for years and now you expect me to give him a scabby, ugly thing?"

"It's not ugly. You're just doing that thing again."

"What thing?"

"When you push everyone away whenever you feel this foreign feeling take over your heart. Can you stop trying to run away for once and actually approach it?"

I feel like I've had this conversation with her a million times. "You know it's not that easy. What if five years from now, all the words he's said to me are said to someone else?"

"That's just your trust issues talking—"

"I've seen it Ives! My mother's seen it! True love does not exist. Maybe—maybe whatever we're feeling is that dumb childish thing every teenager experiences. I'm sure it's not that serious."

Only fools fall in love, and perhaps we are both fools.

The line goes quiet when someone exits out of the stall, and gives me a weird look with contorted brows. I don't even know her, but then again, I barely know anyone.

Ivy doesn't start speaking until she hears the door slam shut. Worst awkward minute of my life.

"Freshmen year," she begins again, "English class. Remember that dumb book report we had to work on?"

"Hey that was a great book! Why does no one have taste for literature?"

"Recite your favorite line from it," she deadpans.

I ponder for a moment, my mind tracing back to two years ago when I was infatuated with a novel we had to read for an English assignment. I don't understand how any of this correlates though. Ivy doesn't even like English.

"Did you forget? You would recite it as if it was a mantra," she laughs melodiously.

Then the epiphany hits me as quick as lightning reaches the ground, "In the cave you fear most is the treasure you seek," I say.