is it over now? [tom blyth]

6.

Alana has overstayed her welcome. I never told her when to leave, but she has overstayed. When she told me she was coming to Dublin I had expected maybe a few days? A week, tops? We are at 2 weeks now, and with Kira now back in my life (if you want to call it that), I need to be coming home to the emptiest of beds to fill with women I meet at the bar, not the same person every night who has now started questioning everything to do with my last relationship.

"So why did you break up?"

"She thought I cheated."

"Well, did you?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"It's just a question, because if you didn't actually cheat then what was the issue?"

I slammed my glass onto the table. Hard. It shook the vase in the middle that was full of baby's breath and roses that Alana had bought home one day from the markets. Except they were limp, going brown and definitely not the semblance of love that is it meant to be. Maybe it is just a representation of the love between Kira and I. Dying. Or dead already.

"I told you. I don't want to fucking talk about it."

She rolls her eyes dramatically, sipping the wine in her glass before taking another bite of her food. I watch some of the pasta sauce drip off her spoon and onto the front of her shirt. My shirt. The shirt Kira bought me. She doesn't seem to notice, just continuing to eat and avoiding all eye contact with me.

"Why can't we just talk about your exes? Or ex, for that matter," She huffs out, staring out the window that looked onto the moonlit street. I couldn't take my eyes off the red sauce on her shirt that was bound to leave a stain now that she has just left it to soak in.

"Because it doesn't concern you?" I shrugged, taking one last mouthful before pushing up away from the table and taking my dishes to the kitchen. Letting the water in the tap run till it was warm, I leant back against the cold marble, staring at the side profile of the blonde at the table.

"But it does. I am your girlfriend."

I felt every muscle in my body tense in one moment. My skin went colder than the kitchen top and I am certain that my heart stopped. There wasn't a part of my brain that wasn't trying to process what she said.

"What?" It sounded ruder than I planned. It made her jerk her eyes over to me though, shooting gentle daggers in my direction at my abruptness. Maybe more like a butter knife than a dagger.

"I'm your girlfriend?" Her eyes were soft, yet vicious in nature. She knows we haven't discussed this. She also knows that both of us made it clear we didn't want or see a relationship. We made it obvious this was casual, nothing more. It made what she was saying even more shocking.

"Since when?" I said as I turned to the sink, turning off the water so it didn't flood the kitchen and starting to wash the dishes with a little more brute than I would have before she opened her goddamn mouth.

I heard her push away from the table, the legs dragging against the carpet below and she moved into the kitchen, placing her bowl beside me on the bench and leaning up against it where I stood before, our elbows brushing whilst I scrubbed the ceramic pot.

"Well, I thought, considering we've been seeing each other for a while now, maybe that is where we are at?" She said with a soft shrug of her shoulders, raising her glass to her soft, plush lips and connecting her eyes with mine. She knows what her eyes do to me. It was what got me the first night we met.

I will say, the thought of Alana and I as a unity was the slightest bit appealing. She is an attractive girl, for one, and the sex is incredible. But it would be a lie to say that I haven't enjoyed having her here in Dublin, and whilst she has stayed a lot longer than I expected (or maybe wished for), it wasn't bad enough for me to push her out of here.