3:26 am

t w o

t w o

10:47 pm
quinn
surely it's not too late to reply, right? only complete psychos go to bed before 11 pm!!

10:47 pm
quinn
im sorry for not answering last night (aka at three in the MORNING)

I bit my lip as I stared down at my phone screen, anxiously awaiting a response from Holden. Ellie had left me alone to take some more orders as people filed in, and I could feel myself starting to sweat from how nervous I was.

10:49 pm
holden
quinn... im sorry for texting you last night (fine, this morning) i had a couple more drinks than i want to admit. it was stupid.

10:49 pm
quinn
right...

I sighed and sat my phone down on the bar before laying my head down on the counter, slowly and gently hitting my forehead against the wood. Of course he hadn't actually wanted to talk to me, it was a drunken mistake.

I felt my phone vibrate and I suddenly stopped.

10:51 pm
holden
i shouldn't have used drinking to finally text you. i just couldn't bring myself to do it any other way. i have been wanting to text or call you, for weeks now, but i haven't been able to bring myself to do it.

My eyes widened and I frantically set my phone down. I looked around, searching for Ellie, but I couldn't find her. How was I supposed to respond? What was I going to say?

I bit my lip and began to type, thinking it was better to send a lame response than to make him wait.

10:53 pm
quinn
i hate to say it, but im using drinking to text you back.

10:53 pm
quinn
i can't really reverse it now, im not sober right now

10:55 pm
holden
sounds like neither of us have changed. we've always been a little afraid of ourselves

10:55 pm
holden
of our feelings

10:56 pm
quinn
why have you been wanting to talk to me?

10:59 pm
holden
well... that's sort of a long story. this is going to sound crazy, but just hear me out, okay? sort of recently this guy was hired at the business im working with right now and he goes by quinn. when i met him and he told me his name, i was hit with every memory i had of you. i hadn't thought about you in a really long time. it's been three whole years since i saw you, but everything came flying back to me. anyway, i sort of brushed it off... it was just a weird thing, but then my landlord told me that someone was moving in beside of me and told me her name. it's quinn. when he told me that, i almost wished it was you, just because i thought it would be funny and i don't know, i couldn't imagine you moving to new york, but i would pay to see it. then last week, the guy i work with tells me his wife is pregnant and they want to name their kid quinn! i guess im just some sort of idiot who listens to signs and shit like that... you're the only quinn i have ever lived to know and now they're all around me? i just took it as a sign that i needed to see how you were doing.

10:59 pm
holden
i guess i know you're alive now, and you haven't gotten any less bitter, so im relieved.

As I read Holden's text, I couldn't keep myself from chewing on my lower lip. Knowing I had been on his mind sent some sort of feeling through my body, and I didn't know how I felt about it.

11:01 pm
quinn
that's definitely strange. i guess it's best that it happen to you, because if i started meeting a lot of holden's i'd be fucked. i wouldn't have had your number.