The Dress - an Iain de Caestecker Fanfiction

Chapter 8: Cold Shoulder

Chloe gets back to room an hour later, you're still dressed, and still crying, but you've curled up on your bed, under the covers, clutching one of your pillows. 

"Hey, what happened?" She asks. You just shake your head. Just wanting to sink through the mattress and disappear. 

"Elizabeth is going to kill me." You groan,

"What? Why?" 

"Because I'm an idiot."

"Yeah, that doesn't sound like her, so I'm gonna need a little more info here." You feel the mattress sink at your back as she kneels next to you. The tears, which had only just stopped, started flowing freely once more,

"Iain and I just broke up."

"No way! Why?" You don't answer, you try to dry your eyes, but just succeed in smudging your makeup all over your face and pillow. "Wait, is this because of what Brett said?" You burrow deeper into the pillows and covers, but Chloe digs you out and pulls you into the bathroom, "Come on. We're going to get you cleaned up and you're going to tell me what went wrong." She drags you against your will into the bathroom and you slump down on the side of the bathtub as she helps you take down your hair and scrape off your makeup. 

"I don't know what's wrong with me. One minute I don't want to be away from him, the next minute I feel claustrophobic and I have to get out."

"Hey, I hear ya. Sometimes the idea of being tied down to one person the rest of my life terrifies me."

"But you and Austin are still together?" 

"Well, yeah. The future is always scary, but I love him. I'm not giving up my time with him because I get a little spooked." She hands you your pajamas and leaves the room, leaving you alone to get dressed and think things over. 

She doesn't press for any more information when you come out and crawl back into bed, but she does get excited when she finds Sixteen Candles is playing on TBS, she jumps back into your bed and makes you watch it with her commentary. By the end of the night, you have to admit that you feel a little bit better, but you are dreading however tomorrow may turn out. 

.

.

.

The interviews are just as exhausting as everyone mentioned, and you're really starting to feel a bit like a broken record as most of the interviewers ask the same questions. By the end of the day, you're wondering if you can do it over again tomorrow. At dinner that night you notice Iain's missing.

"Iain sends his apologies, but the poor thing started coming down with a nasty chest cold this morning."

You frown. "He was fine yesterday, what happened?"

"Yeah, he didn't sleep too well, heard him tossing and turning all night, and by this morning was hacking and coughing. By the end of the interviews he'd nearly lost his voice."

An idea takes root in your mind. You hated the thought of him having to be alone when he's so sick, but you try to take part in the conversation for a little while. It's hard to follow and contribute when your mind is miles away. You want to share in the jokes and admit to your own interview bloopers, but there is something else you have to do. 

After a reasonable length of time you excuse yourself for the night, but discreetly order vegetable soup and French bread to go, before you make your way to Iain's room. 

.

.

"Hang on." Iain croaks from somewhere in the room. He really does sound horribly sick. When he opens the door you see his shoulders slump a little bit. 

"I brought you some soup."

"I'm not hungry."

"But I need to talk to you. And you need to eat." 

"But I don't want either." You grit your teeth slightly at his stubbornness, and invite yourself into his room anyway, pushing past him without a problem. 

"You should get back in bed,"

"I know, but I have an unwanted guest at the moment that I can't seem to get rid—"

"And you should rest your voice, you sound awful." You nudge him toward the bed until he moves, albeit grudgingly. 

You pull the soup and bread out of the bag you brought and set them on the nightstand next to Iain, who watches every move you make. You push the styrofoam cup and plastic spoon toward him, and when he doesn't even look at it, you pick it up, sit next to him on the bed and start trying to spoon feed him.

"Why are you bothering?" He bites out

"I want you to get better."

"But why?"

"Listen." You say nearly slamming the cup of soup down on the nightstand. Your words come out rather harshly as your limited patience beings to wear thin, "just because I think I'm a lousy girlfriend for you, it doesn't mean that I don't care about you. It's because I care—"

"That you thought we would do better apart?" 

"Hey! I don't want to be apart from you... I just don't want to waste your time." He sighs, "this is why I came by."

"I thought you were trying to help me get better." He says with enough bite that you had two count to ten before you replied.

"I am. I wanted to show you how much I care about you as a friend. How I want to make sure you are taken care of, and happy. So I wanted to ask you if you could possibly find it in yourself to forgive me for hurting you, just enough that we could stay friends. As much as our imagined futures differ, I don't want one completely devoid of you."

You wait, feeling like you're in limbo, watching his unchanging expression hoping for an answer. He never speaks. He doesn't smile. He doesn't take your hand. He reaches over to take the cup of soup and eats.