Love & War | Brad Simpson ✔️

27. "Relationship purgatory?"

I wake up the next morning with an achy back and a crick in my neck. When I open my eyes, it takes me a good few moments to remember why I'm in a car - Brad's car - in the middle of a car park. Thank God Brad has got tinted windows because I'm pretty sure I look hellish right now.

I sit up and for the first time, I notice that Brad isn't in the seat beside me like I expected him to be.

Figuring that he can't have gone far, I take my phone from out of my bag and check the time. 9:36 am. I guess my body was catching up on the few hours of sleep that I'd missed out on last night. I see that I've had a missed call and a text from Tris asking where I am because no one was in when he got home. I decide to call him back.

"Hello?" He answers when he picks up.

"Hey, it's me" I croak through my first words of the day.

"Hey, you okay?" He asks to which I hum in response, "where are you?"

"At home"

"Oh?" He says in confusion, "I just got here but you're not in your room-"

"No, I mean I'm in Exeter"

"Wait, what? Why?"

I then proceed to give him a brief summary of Gemma's accident and how Brad drove the two of us down here last night so I could see her. Tris says he sends Gemma his love and to keep me updated on when we're coming back home. We both say bye and I end the call. Whilst I'm waiting for Brad to return from wherever he's gone, I have a quick scroll through my social media pages. On inspection of Gemma's Snapchat story, I find an amusing selfie of her in the hospital bed, sticking her tongue out cheekily and making a peace scene with her fingers, the caption reading I survived bitchesss.

Typical.

I send her a message to see if she's awake at all. She texts me back saying that she is and that they're letting her have visitors at the hospital's normal visiting hours today between 6 pm and 8 pm.

I'll come and see you later on then :) I message her.

Okay, bring Brad again, I wanna have him on my Insta

I roll my eyes at her fangirl tendencies coming out, even when she's still recovering from colliding her car with a tree.

I start to reply to her asking about the private conversation that she and Brad had last night, when the car doors unlock and the driver's door opens, revealing the man himself. He's holding a cardboard drinks tray with two takeaway cups on it and a paper bag that has an aroma of bacon drifting from it.

"Morning" he flashes me a grin as he hands me the drinks.

"Mornin'" I reply as he climbs into the driver's seat and shuts the door behind him.

"I got you a tea," he tells me as he takes one of the cups out of the tray for himself, "and I bought us both a bacon and sausage butty"

He pulls two wrapped sandwiches out of the paper bag and hands one to me. As he does, I feel any hatred I still have for him dampen tenfold.

"This is what I meant when I said that sometimes I hate you less than usual" I sigh as I unwrap my sandwich and take a big first bite, "thanks"