The closed curtains

Chapter twelve

I already missed the feeling of having Simon next to me. The safety it brought me. I truly felt safe with Simon. That was not a feeling I had with a lot of people. But I knew what was in Simon's heart. We had known each other for so long by then. Going back to military training made me sad. It would take so much time until we saw each other next. Every minute apart from him felt like a million years.

"I already miss you," I texted him. He replied almost instantly.

"Baby, we literally said goodbye five minutes ago," Simon replied. I could imagine Simon's grin when he sent me that text.

"So?" I replied. "I still miss you tho."

"I miss you too," Simon wrote back. It made me smile. I could tell that I smiled like a fool in the rearview mirror. He could still, years later, make me feel giddy. To me, Simon was pure happiness. He could make me smile, even on the darkest of days. The rumors about me and Simon had eaten me whole, the past couple of days. Simon had done his best to keep me out of the black hole I had seemed to disappear into if I was not careful. My anxiety became paralysing at times. Then, there he was digging me out of the grave I was digging for myself when I got out on the internet. Every time. Without exceptions. I loved him. So, so much. That boy could make me survive anything, if only I could come back to him. If only I could sleep with my arms around his waist. With my nose buried in his black curly hair, breathing the scent of his green apple shampoo. I could do anything to do that, over and over. Even survived the hell that was military training. I just sent him heart emojis. He replied with a couple of hearts.

"It won't be forever. Soon, you can come home to me," Simon wrote. I held on to that for the rest of the way back to my least favourite place. I was of course met by Hannes, as if the day could get any worse after going away from Simon.

"His royal highness, you have not taken any more cute couple pictures that the people should see?" Hannes said. I glared at him. He had nothing to do with what Simon and I did or did not do. Nothing to do with our relationship, to begin with.

*************************************

"Baby, I have told you. Don't care about what fucking Hannes is telling you," Simon said. I had sneaked out to the bathrooms late at night. Again. To have some privacy when talking to Simon. Hannes had kept saying snide comments, which made my blood boil. A lot of the comments were about Simon. I could handle him being rude towards me. But not when he called Simon a gold digger or a lazy immigrant. Simon was anything but lazy.

"I know, but he triggers the worst in me," I said with a groan. Simon giggled into the phone, apparently entertained by my misery. "If only murder was not illegal." That comment made Simon laugh out loud.

"Honey, when did you get so murderous?" Simon asked.

"You know, August said that people would cover for me if I ever killed someone when we were at Hillerska. I should check out if he is still willing to be my alibi," I said, jokingly.

"Wait, when did he say that?" Simon asked.

"At that party when I first got to Hillerska," I said. Simon had been somewhere looking after Sara, most likely. He had always been very protective of her. That was cute, and I could relate to being the one protected, just like Sara. Erik had protected me until the day he died. Simon protected Sara until his last breath. I knew he would protect me too, if he had to. He just was like that.

"The party when I flirted with you for the first time?" Simon replied. I almost choked on the water I sipped on from a water bottle.

"Did you flirt with me?" I questioned. "When?" It was a few years ago, but I had no recollection that he had flirted with me. I was quite sure that I would remember if he had flirted with me, because I had a terrible crush on him already. He had introduced himself as Simon at lunch, after he had shoved my privileges down my throat earlier during class. I was already his, if he just would say he wanted me to be his boyfriend.

"Honey, you thought me asking you about me singing the song and me teasingly shouting your name was anything else than flirting?" Simon asked me.

"I just thought you were being nice. And well, a tease when you almost gave our spot away to August and his boys," I said. We both laughed. Simon let a "Dios mio" slip out. I loved his laugh so much.  

Author's note

I am back from the dead (well not really). I hope someone finds joy in reading this short update. I was recently diagnosed with depression, which is why I have not had energy to update anything on here for months. Looking back my mental health was gradually getting worse and worse during the fall. I am seeing a psycologist and I am working to do better, so hopefully I regain some energy to do something creative like this. So I don't promise to update more regularly, but hopefully it won't go months to next time (if anyone is still redaing this). 

Sweden is still in chock I think over the school shooting at a adult education centre last week in the town Örebro, being the deadliest shooting in Swedish history. If anyone who was directly impacted by this shooting reads this, I send you my warmest thoughts. School should be a  safe place where you can learn in peace.  

I hope everyone are doing well and that you enjoyed the chapter. 

Love,

Anonym author