Denying Dylan | ✔️

(1) "She's not a bitch,"

Seven years later.

December.

Dylan!" I sigh happily after I've swung the door open to reveal my best friend standing clad in a large winter jacket, pulling the collar tightly around his neck as the snow falls lightly from the dark night sky outside. "What a pleasant surprise."

He gives me a confused look, cocking his head to the side as he furrows his brows. "Did you not just text me ten minutes ago and ask me to meet you at this address?"

A brief but fatal glare which leaves no room from misinterpretation quickly shuts him up and I start to pull my jacket from the hand made coat rack standing next to the door.

"Oh? You need me to come with you!?" I say loudly, ignoring the puzzled look that's growing more prominent by the second. "Sure lets head off."

"Bea?" A droning voice sounds from the other end of the hallway as my current flavour of the week comes sauntering towards my best friend and I. Paint splatters decorate his shirtless torso, scruffy harem pants and wild beach blonde curls that descend half way down his chest. "Where are you going baby? Who's this?"

"Oh, this is Dylan, my friend and he needs me to go with him to visit his sick Grandma," I quickly lie, not daring to look at Dylan in case my resolve slips and I curl over in laughter. "Sorry, I'll call you!"

"I thought we were gonna embrace some Titanic vibes Bea," he waves his hands lazily as he speaks through a slack jaw, "you were gonna be the Rose to my Jack!"

I cringe at the earlier proposed role play suggestion and decide that I can't take another second of this abysmal disaster.

"First of all," I begin with a clipped tone. "Titanic vibes? Really? I know that painting was a big part of the movie or whatever but literally hundreds of people, including kids, died on that ship! Don't refer to your weird fantasy as Titanic vibes. It's a little sick!"

I ignore the hurt in his droopy eyes as he runs a hand through his knotty blonde locks. This part was never easy but this break up felt a little less excruciating than the rest, due to the fact that this guy is beyond strange.

"Second of all, that painting over there," I point at the canvas hanging on the corridor wall, made up of red and purple squiggly lines and white circles that had cost him more than a small college fund, "I don't get it! I know you said it was like super deep and mesmerising or whatever. But I know toddlers that could do a better job than that! This," I wave my hand between the two of us, "is over. We're too different. I don't get you. Sorry. Bye!"

I swing around and link my arm with Dylan's, the two of us walking down the concrete steps and on to the cold, winter streets of Upper Manhattan.

The snow has halted its light fall. Street lamps and Christmas fairy lights decorate the streets as far as I can see. Home doors sport extravagant wreaths. The wealth of this end of the city is displayed obnoxiously with over the top Christmas displays and decor that could only be bought by the high and mighty.

Dylan and I walk quietly, the crunch of snow under our footsteps, my arm wrapped around his as I silently process my most recent break up. I grieve for a moment and then I'm fine. Because I'm Bea Blake and I sure as hell don't get worked up over the downfall of one brief relationship.

"I've never actually been there for a break up," Dylan finally breaks the silence as we step over a frozen puddle on the sidewalk. "You're pretty ruthless. Jett took it well though."

"Oh no, that was Max," I correct him, "it wouldn't have lasted. I don't know what I was thinking getting involved with an artist. It was a disaster waiting to happen."