Bitter (wlw) (txs)

thirteen

After showering and having a half decent meal I decided it would be a good time to call Mei. It was better to sort the whole situation out before it was too late.

I lay on my bed and pressed 'call' on her contact. My heartbeat increased with every phone ring I heard, until she finally picked up.

"Hey, Ellie" she said, with a croaky voice.

"Hey...how's it going?"

"I've been better but also definitely worse, so that's that" she laughed. "You?"

"Yeah, same. I'm good now but couldn't say the same a few hours ago"

"Fair enough"

"Yeah. So...uhm, we should talk abo-"

"I'm really sorry if I did anything that made you uncomfortable. Well, of course I did. I'm sorry" she immediately said.

"No, uhm, it's okay. We were both drunk, I guess. I'm sorry for running off like that"

"Yeah. You had me really worried there! Thank god I asked some people outside if they'd seen you and they had, they told me you got in a cab. I wanted to call you to make sure you were safe but was scared that you were mad at me"

"Of course I wasn't mad at you. I don't know if I would have answered because- nevermind." I paused. "But as I said, we both didn't really know what we were doing. It's all good"

"I mean...yeah. All good"

"You don't sound convinced" I jokingly pointed out.

"No I am...it's just that...I don't know. It's stupid. I might have been not completely lucid but I thought that...you know. You wanted to kiss me back. Like, not only because you were drunk. 'Cause I kind of wanted to."

"Oh"

"Yeah"

"You know I really love having you as a friend. I just-" I embarrassingly stumbled over my words, not expecting what she'd just told me.

"You don't have to" she interrupted. "Really. Just...I hope this doesn't ruin our friendship. I'd hate to have done that"

"No, uhm, it's fine. Really." I said trying to sound convincing, even though I was still surprised. "Once again, it's all good"

"You sure?"

"Of course"

"Good. I was scared shitless" she laughed. "If you wanna hang out any of these days...just text me. I'd be glad to"

"Yeah, sure. I definitely do"

"Great! Uhm, my headache is coming back, I think I gotta go. But I'm glad we talked about this before it got too awkward"

"Feel you, hope you feel better soon then"

"Same, honestly" she chuckled. "Bye, then!"

"Bye! Have a good day"

"You too" she said as the call ended.

I impulsively laughed, remembering that I'd more or less had the same conversation with Sam a while before. Even though the situation between us was pretty different.

What Mei told me surprised me a lot, I just thought she was a very affectionate person and acted like that around everyone.

I was really hoping I didn't mislead her without noticing, or even worse hurt her. But she seemed to have taken it quite serenely.

On the other side, knowing someone felt like that towards me gave me a strange surge of confidence.

That same evening I received a text from Sam, precisely "Fancy a movie night?"