Temptation

-3-

           

"You don't need her," Mikey said between hashbrowns.

            "Yeah, you've got us," Brooklyn pulled out the same line that Andy had used. He was sitting next to me now, his leg pressed against mine to let me know that I wasn't alone, but I was in the ways that mattered. I had broken the news quickly and casually, like ripping a bandaid off. It had to be done, and it was better this way than a slow realization that she was no longer around, threaded with questions about her.

            The boys had liked Sophie – She and Brooklyn had a secret handshake, she was friends with Mikey, had Andy help her paint her toes, played video games with Jack, talked business with Blair, and laughed over how she was name twins with Ginger. We would all be losing something here, but none of them quite understood the extent of what I was missing.

            I missed her beside me and inside me and falling asleep with her on overnight Facetime calls, and how she'd queue outside of the venue for shows to get the "full fan experience," and how I would kneel down and hold her hand as I serenaded her. I missed being close to her just as much as I missed being far from her, because I had always known that she was coming back.

            "You okay? You've barely touched your food," Andy said, and suddenly, the thought of a microwaved egg on top of a frozen sausage patty disgusted me.

            "I'm not hungry," I said, sliding my tray away. Brooklyn looked guilty for a moment before reaching out for the rest of my breakfast sandwich.

            "Are you kidding? He's already taken a bite out of that!" Mikey tried to slap it out of Brooklyn's hand.

            Brook scowled at him, saying, "So what? I've chewed up gum that he's spit out. This is nothing." He shrugged and continued eating.

            "I think you've made me lose my appetite with that comment," Mikey grimaced.

            "Oh well, more than me."

            "The things that you'll do just to get some food..."

            "Oh, shut up." Brooklyn said.

            "To be fair, Brooklyn will eat anything," Andy added in.

            I grinned a little as the spotlight shifted off of me and instead onto Brooklyn's eating habits. I let my mind wander a little as they argued, and it brought me back to the first time that I'd had a date with Sophie here...

            I'd been nervous to classify such a casual thing as a "date," but she had kissed me and said that anything would be the best time ever as long as I was there. She'd been so excited that there was one so close to the flat – She'd insisted that we walk, and she'd skipped into it, as if entering a fast food chain wasn't one of the most common things in the world. I'd never forget how her face looked when she got a brain freeze from her McFlurry, or how she bopped me on the head with the spoon when I laughed at her.

            Her nails had been alternating orange and purple that day, and she smelled like lemon. She'd danced to the Justin Timberlake song that had been playing, and one of her flip flops had fallen off and slid halfway across the shop. She didn't lean on me, one foot in the air – She'd simply walked over and grabbed it, no second thoughts.

            I thought of the last time that we'd been here together – She'd let her hair down and she was wearing a beanie. She'd let me take a sip of her cocoa, and I'd tried to braid her hair without much success. I hadn't realized how fucking lucky I was when I kissed her. She was probably planning the fall out in her head right then, and I had never seen it coming. I was hers, and she was mine, and that was an undeniable fact. Now I didn't know anything at all.

            As I slowly filtered back into the moment, I heard the song that was playing in the background – Mirrors. I stood up abruptly and left the restaurant and the smell of chips and misery and routine. I felt the sunshine wash all over me, and I was pretty sure that my heart had left a trail of blood behind me. Everything was ruined. Or maybe it was the other was around – Everything was exactly as it had always been, and I was the one who was ruined.

            I stood on my own two feet as I crumbled. Life went on, for sure, but never again would it be the way that it used to be.