I Should've Known

Chapter Ten - Greetings.

Chapter Ten: Greetings.

The beeping of his phone woke him up.

Ed was lying on his stomach and his face was buried on his pillow. He groaned onto the pillow as soon as the beeping of his phone startled him and woke him up. Still with closed eyes, he searched for his phone with his hands and successfully grabbed it from his bedside table without knocking the lamp off. With one eye open, he squinted at the screen of his phone but he couldn’t read the words clearly.

Cursing his awful eyesight, he propped himself on one elbow and reached for his reading glasses from his bedside table and put it on. He then read the words on the screen: ‘forty-three unread messages, one unread multimedia message’. And that mms was from ‘Tay Swizzle’. He was suddenly awake, his sleepiness completely forgotten, and with both of his eyes fully open, he propped his elbows up and smiled as he opened the multimedia message from his best friend.

It was a video from Taylor. He was quite excited to watch it, and was actually grinning like a little child who is ready to open his birthday gift.

But wait, wasn’t it his birthday? Never mind.

It was his blonde best friend, smiling widely and waving at the camera – at him. She was bringing along with her Meredith, which was meowing softly as Taylor smiled at the cat. She then turned back to the camera, her toothy smile still carved on her face. “Hey buddy!” she began, with that American accent that he loved hearing.

She lifted Meredith’s paw and waved it to the camera. She then tried to imitate the British accent (where she was struggling a little bit), as she told him, “Your blonde American best mate and her adorable grey cat are greeting you a happy twenty-second birthday!”

Ed chuckled, not feeling sleepy anymore. All he wanted was to watch the video – watch Taylor awkwardly smiling at the camera. She had always been awkward in everything, but he didn’t mind at all. He was exactly like that too anyway, so no problem for him.

“I was thinking of singing ‘22’ to you, since it’s your twenty-second birthday, and it fits perfectly, but you’re a guy and—oh, great.” She scratched the side of her head for a while and giggled at herself. “I’m sorry! I didn’t get ready for a speech or whatever. This is just an impromptu birthday greeting, so yeah.

“Anyway, once again, happy birthday to my favourite ginger in the whole wide world! You’re twenty-two now, and please know that I love you, okay? I really love you. And thanks for agreeing to be my opening performer for my Red Tour.” Taylor paused for a moment and sighed as she looked down at Meredith and brushed its ear. She then lifted her head again and focussed at the camera. “You’ve made it this far, just by your own. I know that you’ve got a long way to go, and for sure, it’s gonna be a successful journey. Ed, you’re an amazing artist. You deserve everything that you have right now. Forget about the haters. Forget about the media. Just do what you wanna do and make yourself and your fans happy. They’re looking up at you, Ed. I know they all are.

“You’re still young. Someday, your name is gonna line-up with those legendary artists – The Beatles, Oasis, Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd. You are going to be a legend. I can feel it. That’s why I’m very happy that we ended up as best friends. I don’t know if I could still find some other guy like you. You are unique. You are special. Thank you for being my buddy – for everything.

“I think I said enough already,” Taylor winked, her red lips curving wider. “But words will never be enough, right? God, to be honest, I want you here. I wanna spend your birthday with you, but too bad I couldn’t. I do hope that you’d come home right away though. I wanna see you again. I just really miss you. So, so much.” Once again, she sighed. When she spoke again, her voice was quieter and sadder, which made the redhead frown a bit. “I guess that’s it. Happy Birthday, Ed Sheeran. I love you. I miss you. And please be here as soon as possible.”