Play Date; Ryden

+Year Three

"Just go. Please, Ryan. It'll be fun!" Melanie begs while I tap my pen against my notebook.

"If you want to go so badly, why can't you go by yourself?"

"You can't just show up to a party all by yourself, you'll look lame!"

I sigh and roll my eyes. "I'm gonna need a few drinks for this."

"Yes! Thank you!" She smiles sweetly.

"But if I get uncomfortable at all, I'm leaving."

"You'll be drunk. I've never met anyone who gets uncomfortable while they're drunk." She tells me like she's 100% positive.

A few hours later I'm shuffling around my dorm looking for something decent to wear and drinking an old beer. Brendon and I never went to parties, we were entertained by just sitting there and looking at each other.

I take another big gulp of my beer as I put on a pair of black jeans. I start to feel the liquid courage come to my brain.

You know what? All of my life has revolved around my relationship with Brendon. It's like a fucking jail. Or is it prison? I think it's prison. But anyways, it's like a fucking prison. I'm free, you know? I've been trapped by this one guy, for-like-ever. I just gotta get out there and fuck some random guy. Because I can't spend my college life moping around because I don't have the love of my fucking life with me. What the fuck did I just say? Anyways, yeah.

By the time I ran those words through my head a few more times, I was pumped. I was jumping from foot to foot and punching at the air like a boxer getting ready for a fight.

Everything else was a blur until the next morning when I finally woke up with a throbbing headache.

"Finally, he arises." Melanie says with a disappointed sigh.

"Fuck." I groan.

"The party sucked. I didn't even get slightly drunk. You had way more fun than I did."

I let out another groan and Melanie continues on with the story. "I didn't know you were into girls." I lift my head off of the ground in confusion.

"You were totally flirting with Hayley Williams." She nods.

"I don't even remember leaving the house, Melanie. How am I supposed to remember flirting with someone?"

"Well, are you bisexual or what?"

Once again, the downfalls of being with the same person for half of your life. The only girl "interaction" I had was with Ashley in fourth grade, and I still liked Brendon at the time.

+++

Everything got dark. I couldn't drag myself to do anything. Days got slower and harder. They all mend together in my head because I felt the same way every day.

I would get home and cry because I had no motivation. Sure, I have my entire future in front of me, but it's pointless when your future is a reoccurring scene of your past.

Sleep was all I wanted to do. But I couldn't, I lay awake crying at night and wake up exhausted.

To sum up how everything felt to me, it was gray. Not a shiny silver, not a stainless steel, just a dull gray. An ugly gray, to say the least.

It's like having a bland taste in your mind constantly.

I could laugh sometimes, at an everyday conversations, but all around, it's just a little thing that gets hidden between the mush of ugly gray.

Lynn started off as one of those mutuals you would see around and make a sarcastic remark to just to pass the time. But she was completely interested in my relationship with Ryan. I swear, I wrote a complete novel in detail of my feelings as I told her everything. I think that was what started this feeling of bland gray, reminiscing on my times with Ryan. Each day, it grew worse and Lynn began to catch on.

"It will be okay." She told me randomly one day. "You know it will be. I know it will be." She nods.