It's Never Just Goodbye // Ed Sheeran

Your Love is a Fucking Drag

Alice

A week into our trip, Oscar's mother set us up with her realtor that she previously worked with. Linda, the real-estate woman, had found several houses for Oscar and I to check out in the vicinity of his mother's house.

I had called my mum earlier in the morning before we had left to look at our first house. I was still uneasy about the idea, but decided that if I didn't move, I would be stuck in the same, simple rotation of my old life. My mother was also uneasy about the decision I had made to move to the states.

She stated that it was a dumb idea to pack up everything and move to another country with a man I didn't know very well.

"I'm engaged to him." I said.

She sighed in her motherly way, "I don't care, Alice. You've been with him for only a year. That isn't long at all."

"I think it would be a nice change." I replied.

"If you're looking for change, moving to Missouri isn't your only option..."

Maybe I wasn't completely excited for the move, and maybe my mum was right, but there was a part of me that wanted to do it. I wanted to move to a place where my friends or my ex couldn't randomly show up on my doorstep. I wanted some normalcy in my life and moving to the suburbs would create a simple but stable life for me.

Buttoning up the last strap of Finley's overalls, I picked him up off the ground, and grabbed his diaper bag. Oscar tied his shoe lace before grabbing for the keys to our rental car. The both of us awkwardly quiet, we took the elevator down to the lobby of the hotel.

The small, private hotel reminding me of the time Oscar and I first stayed in a hotel together. I was hugely pregnant and waddled around the halls. The time where fate had interlaced with weird clichéd love story, and Ed and I ran into each other.

I tried not to think too much of him as I buckle Finley into his booster seat. It was very hard not to think of Ed when his son looks exactly like him. With his large eyes, orangey locks, and small smile, it was hard to look past the fact that Ed was his father. He was his twin.

I buckled my own seatbelt and Oscar started up the engine. My head rested on my fist, I lean forward to turn down the radio. Oscar had run out last night and bought a bottle of wine for a small celebratory movie night. It was basically him happily celebrating the fact he manipulated me into wanting to move here, and was relieved that his plan had work. And I had laid on the bed with a full glass of wine trying to not think of the future.

This being said, he must've forgotten to turn down his music from when he jamming the night before. My heart pounced and my child whined in the back seat, fussy once again because he's unfamiliar with his surroundings, and I quickly shut the music off.

"Sorry." He apologized. "Forgot to turn it down."

"No problem." I mumble.

"Finley, quiet down." He said, but his voice wasn't as shrill like the last time he disciplined a child who hadn't had a nap that day. Oscar nudges me with his elbow and glances over at me. He asks, "What's the matter?"

"I just have a headache." I retort. My head was heavy with thoughts of Ed now which I couldn't help. I started to wonder how women go about their days with another man and a new life when their children are constant reminders of the other man. I had to be the only one who constantly lived in the past and still loved a boy that was in my life during my high school years.

I was the only woman that still loved her ex-boyfriend that shouldn't have meant that much to her. He existed in a childhood premise. My life with him was immature and reckless. He has moved on and here I am stuck in love with a man that was only a teenaged lover.