Sanity || j.d

17

“Hey, I think I’m gonna go now.” Kate shook my shoulder as I rolled over, sitting up. She’d stayed in the spare room and probably already had breakfast and showered by now. “I have to be at work in half an hour. Bye, thanks for letting me stay the night.”

“Bye.” I mumbled back, pulling the pillow over my face, then I remembered that I had to check on him. I hauled myself downstairs after lazily dressing. “Josh.” I called, opening the front door, dumping my backpack in the kitchen and preparing a quick breakfast for him. “I made breakfast.” I opened his bedroom door to find him still half asleep, his eye even more blue than last night, but the swelling had gone down a small amount.

“Morning sunshine.” He grinned, looking across at me. I smiled and set the breakfast on his lap after he’d sat up a little.

“I’ve got you a couple of panadol too, so please eat up.” I explained, gesturing to the two pills next to the glass of water.

“Your cheek’s really red.” He lightly brushed his thumb over my cheek, which surprisingly still really hurt. I winced, and he moved his thumb away from my cheek and instead tilted my chin upward. “It doesn’t look too bad I suppose.”

I shrugged it off and sat down on the bed next to him. “You didn’t tell me Kate was back in town.”

“I didn’t think it was relevant.” He argued.

“Are you going to tell her?”

He shrugged. “Does she really deserve to know?”

I shook my head. “I suppose not, but you didn’t inform me that you and her were back together either.”

“Again, it wasn’t relevant.” 

I sighed, giving up on my point of this conversation. “Eat.” I ordered, pushing the tray of food closer to him.

“Not hungry.” He lied and his tummy grumbled on cue. I looked at him pointedly and then down at the food.

“Eat.” I repeated. He shook his head. “You know you’re not doing anything to help yourself. You’re hungover, you have a black eye, you’re lucky your girlfriend’s even your girlfriend and you’re-”

“Don’t talk to me about that.” He growled. “You’re the girl I cheated with, you play a part of this story as well.”

“I know.” I stated. “But it’d be better if we just told the truth and moved on that way I wouldn’t have this guilt hanging over my head and maybe you’d have a little bit more self confidence.”

“Guilt hanging over your head? What about me? I’m the guy that cheated. With my best friend on a girl I wasn’t even dating at the time.”

There was a brief silence as I took in what he’d said. “You and her weren’t even together.” I posed it as a question rather than a statement. “So I’m not guilty? And technically speaking you’re not the one at fault. Neither of us are; because you didn’t cheat.”

We both overcomplicated things so unnecessarily that it did both of our heads in.