Love & War | Brad Simpson ✔️

21. "Challenge accepted, Ella"

I blow out a sigh as I walk up to the apartment building where Seb resides. I glance across the car park and I see his car is here so I know that the journey isn't a wasted one. His car is once again completely black and clean of graffiti so he must have already gotten the paint job he wants me to pay for. I hope the drive he made to the garage with a giant penis painted down the side of his car was a long one.

When I reach the entrance to the building, my eyes scan over the buttons until I find the one that reads 'flat 6'. I hold the button down for a few moments and wait.

"Hello?"

"Is that Seb?" I ask, checking that I have got the right flat.

"Yeah, who's this?"

That girl who spray painted the word 'prick' across your car.

"It's Ella" I say, "can I come up?"

"Yeah" he replies and then door clicks, signalling that he's opened it. I make my way up to the second floor and knock against the wood of his door. He appears a few moments later, and I'm expecting him to be really angry and start shouting at me. He doesn't but his face is unreadable.

Best to just get it over with.

"Five hundred and forty-two pounds," I say as I hand him the cheque, sarcastically adding, "don't spend it all at once"

"No need" is his reply as he pushes the cheque back into my hand. I frown at him in confusion.

"What?"

"It's already been paid for" he informs me.

Eh?

My confusion multiplies tenfold.

"You gave my brother the bill to give to me-"

"I did," he says, "but your mate, Brad, came round yesterday, he beat you to it"

"Brad?"

What the fuck?

"Yeah, he gave me a cheque so it's all sorted" he explains, "I assumed he was doing the dirty work for you"

"If I have the balls to spray paint my initials on y0our car, then I have the balls to come and speak with you about it"

"Fair enough" he nods, before the two of us fall into an awkward silence.

"Okay, well, bye then-"

"Wait," he says, stopping me before I'm about to leave, "look, I'm sorry... about the stuff I said that night, I wasn't thinking and I was drunk and I didn't mean to make you feel bad"

"Well, you did," I say bluntly, making him wince, "You obviously just wanted sex, which is fine, but I'm not about that, I just wish you'd told me that initially so we didn't waste each other's time"

"Well, saying you just want sex doesn't exactly go down well with a lot of girls"

"So leading them on and then getting pissy about it when they say 'no' is better?"

"No, it's not" he admits, "like I said, I am sorry"

"Well, I appreciate that," I tell him, "and I apologise for vandalising your car, even though I think it was an improvement" I add snarkily, just to lighten the mood; Seb give me a sarcastic smile, "but I guess I took it a bit too far"