Summer of Experience

Chapter 9- I Don't Know

*Chapter 9: I Don't Know

The walk home seemed to take a million years longer then the walk to the party. The awkward silence felt like a huge weight that was pushing down on me with every passing second. How our relationship, whatever is was, could go from being so open and perfect to something so cold and closed off is a mystery to me. 

It was too good to be true. 

So I sat there, bouncing on his back. Every once in a while he would stop and hike me up further when I would start to slip down. He would give a little puff of air every time. Many times I felt the need to tell him that he could put me down if I was too heavy, but his continued silence made me keep my mouth shut. The fact that my front was pushed against his back might have been another reason fro me not to say anything. I hope he couldn't feel how fast my heart was beating or hear how shallow my breaths had gotten. 

It was embarrassing how out of control my hormones were around him. 

This encounter was acting as a quick way for me to sober up. My whole body was on fire from the close proximity between us. But the fact that he didn't seem to be affected by it was taking away from the experience. It made my mood decrease further then it already was. It suddenly became too much. I couldn't stand being so close to him and not having the same connection that I knew was possible. 

"I can walk", I said, making a move to get down. But this only caused him to hold onto my legs tighter. 

"Meredith, we already went through this.", he said with a bit of an annoyed tone. "You're drunk and I don't want to risk you falling down. We are almost there anyways"

"Tyler seriously I'm fine.", I assured him, "Just let me down please" 

I don't know if it was the tone of my voice or if he was secretly waiting for me to give the offer for him to put me down but within seconds I felt his grip on my legs loosen. I took this as my cue and easily slid down his back and stood on my feet. The whole time he kept a steady grip on my arm until he was sure I wasn't going to fall over. When he let go, I felt a slight chill from the absence of his warm hand and body. 

With that we continued our walk back home in silence. Unfortunately I also noticed the ever present distance that he made sure to keep in between us the whole way. I honestly couldn't understand his hot and cold attitude. It was like he was two different guys. The one who was sweet and caring and a little cocky and made me feel things I had never felt before and then the one who was cold and distant and made me feel like I was nothing but a speck of mud on his shoe. I was not prepared to deal with the complexity of these kinds of situations. I prefer to just read about them. 

Suddenly, a huge gust of wind seemed to come out of nowhere and caused a large set of goosebumps break out on my arms and legs. I crossed my arms tight across my chest trying to keep warm. What was wrong with this place. It was supposed to be summer for god sakes. 

"Are you okay?" Tyler asked, noticing my sudden discomfort with the change in temperature. His arm seemed to move without his permission and made it about half way towards me until he notices his actions and pulls it back quickly. 

Is this guy serious?!

This morning he was as touchy as a person could be with just meeting someone and now he wouldn't even put his arm around me. Like was I going crazy here or was this not the same guy I met on the plane? As I thought about it more and more I got angrier and angrier. The nerve of this guy! After everything we went through this morning and he had the nerve to treat me like this. I mean I know that we weren't in a relationship and barely knew each other, but that didn't mean that he had to act like nothing even happened.