August & Colin | WRU series | book 1
We take risks. We make mistakes. We lie. We love. We hurt. We lose total control.
I took a risk. I paid the price.
I made a mistake. I felt the guilt.
I lied. I lie.
I loved. I try not to.
I hurt. I still do.
...
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I mindlessly slump down on the couch and stare at my feet as I try to process the conversation I had with August merely 20 minutes ago.
She told me she loved me and I couldn't comprehend it. My lack of a response was a result of that. I couldn't understand her words because her actions contradicted them completely so I stayed quiet, silently cursing her for shutting away her emotions three years ago. For shutting me out.
Besides that, I also scolded myself for letting her be the sand in my hand that slipped through my fingers when I tried to hold on too tight. Perhaps, I let her slip when I didn't run after her. That night, I thought the reason for her fleeing my house was simple. She saw me as a mistake, wrongdoing, a fault in her life even though everything between us had felt exactly right. That's what I thought at first, that's why I wanted to run after her. I didn't because it dawned on me that I might've been a distraction from the hurt she felt, and that realization crushed me.
To me, she was everything but a distraction from something. She was the distraction I needed distraction from because she claimed my thoughts like they were property to buy and she was rich enough to buy them all.
With every fiber in my body, I hoped I wasn't a way to get her mind off of things. I hoped I was the mistake because that meant what we felt was real and I believed something real could bring her back. I scroll through the few messages between us and clench my teeth as I reread the ones from that night.
1.07 am Me - Where are you?
1.11 am Me - Ari? Me - Are you okay?
1.29 am Me - Please, let me know you're home safe
1.31 am Ari - I'm home
1.32 am Me - Can I call you?
1.40 am Me - Or can we talk? Me – Tomorrow? Or whenever you can
2.23 am Me – Ari, please
2.25 am Ari - I'm sorry
2.25 am Me - Sorry for what? Me - Please, talk to me
2.36 am Me - Ari?
She never responded. She never came back. The next morning I had to find out from my sister she left for the rest of the summer to spend it with her grandparents. Her message was clear. It's why I didn't answer when she called a few days later. She left a voicemail which I was reluctant to listen to at first but had listened to at least a hundred times by the time summer was over. Each time a new question arose. Each time I shoved it away like it was too late for answers. Now, three years later, I got those answers like she knew I wasn't going to ask for them but needed them desperately anyway.
"Dude, you okay?" I slowly lift my head as if it weights a thousand pounds and see Daniel walking to the fridge in our open kitchen.
"Can you give me a drink?" He nods, grabbing a beer for both of us and a package of nuts since I normally snack on them when I enjoy a beer. Right now, however, I shake my head when he offers me the package.
"Since when are you not hungry at this hour?"
"I'm just not in the mood for snacking right now." I'm also not in the mood to relive every memory of August and me but my brain is playing tricks on me. It's like my mind is a magic hat and my brain keeps on pulling memory after memory out of it. It's endless.
"Are you okay?" Daniel asks a second time after a few moments of silence.
I huff, shrugging my shoulders. "I don't know." I take a sip of the beer in my hands before continuing to thoughtlessly inspect the bottle as if an explanation of how I should feel is written on it somewhere. "August told me she loved me." There's a short pause in our conversation and I can't blame him for not knowing how to answer my statement since I have no clue either.
"August told you-" He stops himself and by the sight of his expression I'm guessing he's currently trying to replay the past days in his head which means he definitely heard me wrong.
"Past tense. She told me she loved me. As in three years ago."
He draws his eyebrows together. "Randomly?"
I hesitate as I think back on how we almost kissed on the side of the road. Me pulling away must've been the reason she brought up our past because I'm sure she knows I would've let her kiss me if we were strangers. We were once and I desperately fell in love with her then. Yet we aren't now. I'm not the same carefree, risk-it-all boy because he got his heart broken by her. And this version doesn't want to give in to her piercing eyes and warm laugh. This version wants to see her terrible jokes, her weird scientific facts, her adoration for movies, and her chaotic organized mess of a head as a friend. Just a friend. "Not entirely," I finally answer.
"Col?" Daniel's suspicion is written all over his face.
"We almost kissed but I couldn't do it."
"Did you want to?"
"No." The speed with which I respond makes Daniel raise his eyebrows. I avert my gaze back to my bottle of beer and take another sip trying to ignore him but it's as if his eyes are burning through me. His silence speaks a thousand words and every single one of them is questioning my answer. I glance up, hoping my expression screams my answer is the only correct one but after one second of eye contact with him I cave, sighing. "I don't want to," I whisper.
"What don't you want?" My defeated laugh comes out as a huff.
"I don't want to want her." The confession from my voice crashes into a wall serving as one of the borders between her and me. I wish it was strong enough but it wobbles furiously, threatening to crumble to the ground when the right push is given so I remind myself of what has happened to prevent it from doing just that. "All it does is lead to nothing when she runs away."
"Do you know she will?" No, but what happens when she does? When I'm still not enough for her to risk something for? What if I'm still a mistake for her?
From the millions of similar questions, I only voice one. "What if she does?" By the sympathy in Daniel's eyes, I can see the memories playing in his head of how I spilled my heart out to him after she left three years ago. He was there for me then and after all those years he's still my soundboard. I'm grateful for that even in the moments when he drags emotions out of me I don't want to feel.
"Look, before I say anything I want you to know I'm not rooting for anyone or anything to happen." I absolutely don't like that beginning.
"I support you in whatever decision you make but I have to say that 'what if?' is the stupidest question ever. Because you know, what if a meteorite falls in this exact spot, then we'd be dead. What if tomorrow I walk out and I get run over by a car? What if I buy a lottery ticket tomorrow and win? Then I'd be a millionaire. But I don't know that, do I? Because we don't know the answer to 'what if?' because we don't know the future. But I get it. It's scary. The only thing you can do is ask yourself if you want it and if she's worth the what if because sometimes you have to risk the what if you're scared of to get the what if you want."
His advice keeps haunting me way after our conversation is done. It creeps around in my head when I'm all alone in my bedroom staring at my ceiling waiting for sleep to snatch me away from my thoughts. Hours pass me by before I finally fall asleep as a confused mess.
