Head in the clouds

Thirty Seven - Morgan

I don't know what I do now. I had the night. I know he had no way of getting here in the meantime. Anyone with common sense would just leave it there you know? If you told someone you loved them and they just vanished, you'd leave it. You'd brush it all under the rug and just move on with your life.

I was fine.

I was fine with me and him doing whatever but the label. He'd said it a few times this week in the middle of a conversation where I couldn't focus on it and I knew what he was doing with that. I knew he was making it so I didn't stop him using it. Use it and then distract so I couldn't. But then those 3 words. It just made it all way too real. I felt like I'd time travelled back to 2018 but this time I could stop it all happening.

The thought of going back to all of that shit was terrifying. I'd gotten through a lot of shit in the build up to being here now. So much that I'd just lost count of all the trauma and how I had to deal with them. They were buried pretty deep and it was rare I had a reason to face them. The life I'd built myself meant I didn't need to. My rule on no dating, not going home, just focusing on work. I didn't need to think about it and it wasn't a fake happy I was living last year either. Before LA, before the Grammy's, before Theo.

Before he showed me a taste of a possibility of life with him. If things were different. Like I'd said to Sandra. If there wasn't music in the way and my past didn't exist and I didn't have trauma and parent issues. Theo would be great. He is great and he will be. For someone who's not me.

I stopped in the hallway, brushing my dress quietly and slipping onto the sides of my bare feet as I stared at the boy sat outside my front door. Pizza box on his lap with little boxes dotted around him as he ate. His eyes didn't move from the box for even a second.

"Are you going to come eat then or just stand there staring at me like I'm mad?" I took a breath, walking the rest of the hallway and sitting down against the opposite wall, taking some food out of the box.

"I wasn't expecting visitors at 1am."

"I was in town." He shrugged, still not moving his eyes. "Aren't you supposed to be in Leeds?"

"Came home early. Got pissed at mum and Sarah's judgey eyes." He nodded. "What were you doing up here? I'd have left my keys in the box for you if you needed somewhere to stay Noah."

"It was a last minute thing."

"So, you were just going to sit here and what sleep in the hallway until tomorrow morning and drive home before I got home?"

"I knew you were on your way down." He looked up now. "He's really worried Morgan." I picked at the toppings on the pizza, throwing mushrooms back into the box, pulling it apart but not eating it. "We're worried. Me and V. You can't just drive nearly 5 hours home at 9pm without talking to someone Branners. Do you know what it took to stop V sending out a search party because she was convinced you'd been abducted? Jasper is literally holding onto her right now until I tell her you're here."

"Well tell her then." I nodded at his phone in his lap, standing up and unlocking the door behind him. "I take it you're staying?"

"Well, I'm not leaving you like this."

"Like what Noah? I'm fine."

"No, you're not Morgan." The front door slammed shut and I dropped my handbag onto the sofa in the open plan room. Noah put the boxes on the counter taking his jacket off and throwing it behind me. "You've not been fine for months and then we find out you've had a whole thing going on with Theo. What's the secretive shit about? We could have avoided all of this if we knew about it."

"Stop Noah."

"No Morgan because your sabotaging yourself. Again, and it's not even in a cute or funny way right now. You know he's been checking in with V whilst you've been away right? He told her about you seeing your parents and telling him about Jake and he text us both yesterday about a breakdown and not knowing what to do? That man cares for you Morgan."

"That's the problem Noah."

"Why is it a problem Morgan?" His voice raised but only slightly before he pulled out a stool from the little breakfast bar and sat on it, watching me closely, not speaking. "Why did you run when he told you he loved you?" I knew I should have stayed at a hotel for a few nights.

What do I even respond to that? Because I know the answer but he won't like it. Theo has messed everything up. I had it all under control. I knew what I was doing. I knew what my next step was. I knew how I felt and I could manage it all. But then all 6 foot of him saunters in and was so fucking soft he took me from being worried about him touching me to worried about him never touching me again to worried about him still wanting me now. He deserved better. He was amazing. Has the kindest heart I've ever seen, it's just under that harsh exterior but it's so easy to crack through and when you do, it's like a cloudless sky in the middle of June. Warm and relaxing and freeing.

I was cursing myself now for ever taking this further than a professional friendship. After that song was finished, that should have been it for us. I should have thanked him for his time and said it was nice working with him, that we should do it again sometime and then gone about my life as normal.

"Morgan." Noah sighed, the creak of his chair as he walked over. "Talk to me babe." I shook my head, not wanting to talk to anyone about this internal torment. It only ever causes problems. "You need to give him a chance to prove he's not like Cole Morgan." He cupped my face, forcing me to look up at him.

"I can't."

"Yes. You can. It just doesn't come easy to you. You don't do letting people in or trusting people completely and unfortunately this is just one of those things you have to do." His shoulders slacked, crinkled white shirt hanging off him from a solid 12 hours wear after his away game yesterday afternoon. "You feel the same right? That's why you ran. Because you're scared of it all ending badly when you say it back again." God, I was like reading a book wasn't I? I nodded slowly and he sighed. "Runnings not going to stop it Morgan."