Been Here All Along

07| army man

"Everything happened way too fast, couldn't stop until we crashed." - Jonah Marais

   A few yards away from where the party was taking place, Ian was sitting in the sand and running his hands through it as he gazed off at the horizon.

"Hey, E," I mumbled, taking a seat next to him. I was sure to put some space between us. "Everything okay?"

"It's fine." He looked away from the ocean as he shrugged. "It's weird to be back when everything is so different."

"I don't think anything has changed much," I defended. Maybe that's hard for me to tell since I've been watching everything develop over the past four years. Last he saw this city was when he was 18 before he left for the army.

"You've changed," Ian mumbled so quiet I could barely hear him over the sound of the waves hitting the shoreline. "You really like him?"

"I do."

"Well, good." Ian finally looked at me with a forced smile. He was trying to convince me that he really was fine, and I wanted to believe him to make everything easier, but I couldn't just ignore it.

He's hurt that in the four years he was enlisted, I managed to move on, which wasn't the easiest task to do by any means. Accepting that Ian and I had to go our separate ways was the hardest thing I've ever done.

"This isn't fair, Ian," I murmured, leaning back on my hands and staring out at the ocean.

"What's not fair?"

"This," I emphasized the word this time as I motioned to him and I. "You coming home and being hurt that I managed to move on, like it wasn't the most time consuming thing I've ever done." And it still is. I'm not even positive I'm completely moved on from him, and that is the unfair part.

"It's not like we wanted to break up, Jos." You're telling me. That thought had ran through my mind on repeat for about a year. The fact we never got proper closure is a huge part of the reason I struggled to even give Joel a chance.

The amount of 'what if's' and 'ands' and 'buts' that ran through my mind were endless.
What if Ian comes home sooner than we expected?
What if Ian finds out?
If I say yes to Joel, does that mean I am accepting I will never be with Ian?
Joel's a great guy, but Ian's THE great guy.
What if I lose Ian forever?

It never ended, and that's what wasn't fair.

"But we did." I looked down the shore at the party that was being thrown for Ian, despite him not even being on the premises. "I don't want you out of my life, E, but you have to know we will never have what we used to ever again."

I think it's unhealthy how physically painful that was for me to say.

I stood up with a deep sigh and held my hand out to help Ian get up. He bit has lip with his thinking face on before he chose to grab it and get up.

"Friends it is."

It visibly hurt him to say that, and it kind of hurt to hear it aloud, but it wasn't all bad. It kind of felt good to know Ian was okay with being just friends.

Ian and I walked back to the beach and sat down together at our spot Joel had claimed. Joel was still conversing with an inebriated Steven, who was wobbling around by the campfire that Joel was shielding him away from. From our distance, we managed to catch each other's gazes and exchanged smiles. I watched as he dragged Steven away from the fire and left him at a spot by some random girls, then he came to join Ian and I.