broken walls / calum hood

pretended she was you

11. he pretended she was you, hayley

The fresh air is just what I should need to clear my head. But Calum's presence is messing with my thoughts. Max is pulling in every direction possible. And then Calum takes over and the cheeky little thing walks calmly beside him within two seconds. It's magic.

Calum lets out a short laugh. "You know, this is the kind if stuff couples do."

"What, walking the dog together?"

"Yeah," he says, "but like, I don't do relationships. I'm here only because your dog is cute."

"Ouch. What happened to you to make you so cold hearted?"

"We've hurt each other plenty of times. Not showing emotion is a good way to cope."

"I heard this rumour," I say. I guess it's about time we clear things up.

"About what?"

"About you smoking weed and crying to Luke on the phone after we broke up."

"Of course. Fucking Luke," he mumbles, "I knew he'd tell you."

"So what's the story?"

"It was just after the breakup. At the time, I didn't think I could feel any lower than that. So we, uh, I got high and walked around town. Ended up in a playground. An angry parent found me in the morning."

I pretend not to hear the we. Who was he with? "You were sad?"

"We broke up! Of course I was sad about it."

"You were with other girls, though."

"Just one," he says. Then he meets my glare and he corrects himself, "Okay maybe like a couple more, depending on what kind of stuff counts," he says.

"What does that even mean?" I don't want to get upset by what he's telling me. But I still feel crushed. "Never mind, I don't want to know."

I really don't want to know.

"Alright, so I was an idiot. If it makes you feel any better we stopped seeing each other because she thought I was developing feelings for her," he takes a breath, and then says, "I pretended she was you when we–"

"You did not."

He looks down for a moment, then back up at me. Embarrassment shows in the small smile playing at the corner of his mouth. "Yeah, I did."

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