Collide / David Dobrik

20 / Apologize

"Can we talk?"

David opened the door to his house, not expecting Sam Hayashi to be standing there.

"Um" He looked behind him at Natalie sitting on the couch. "Yeah, sure"

He moved over to allow Sam in.

"Hey Nat" Sam said, putting a hand up and waving.

"Sam?" Natalie laughed.

David gave Natalie a look, who, although confused, migrated to her room. David led Sam into the podcast room, shutting the door behind him.

"Can you tell me your side of the story?" Sam asked.

"My side of...."

"The whole thing. Start to finish"

David shook his head. "My logic was really fucked up, and you don't want to hear it"

"No, I do. I need to understand"

David stared at Sam, who appeared to be serious. She didn't look like she had any ulterior motive.

"Why are you here?" David asked.

"Because, like I said, I need to understand. I can't fucking understand what even happened, or why Caroline still speaks to you, or how it was even you in the story. I need to understand"

David breathed in. "Ok"

David proceeded to tell Sam about how shocked he was, then how excited he was, then how devastated he was.

"At the hospital I was just numb. And I stayed numb for a while, and looking at Caroline just..." David trailed off. "Sam, I really think it should stop here"

"No" Sam softly urged, putting her hand on his. "Keep going"

"It fucked me up so badly. It was so fucking stupid and looking back I can't even imagine feeling like that about her, but I just couldn't even look at her. I can't- Sam, I literally cannot even explain to you my fucking logic on that. I don't even remember the conversation we had, I just remember I was editing and I looked up at her and I just... don't even know what happened next. The next thing I knew I was laying on the floor in my bedroom in hysterics. I don't even know how I drove home or how long I was laying there but Alex came in and I just told him I broke up with Caroline and he didn't push it."

Sam was silent, looking at David who was now crying.

"Sam, I have no fucking clue what I said to her. Not a clue. When we talked about it she didn't even tell me. She just said I left"

Sam inhaled again.

"Why didn't you come back?"

"I... don't know, Sam. I think about it every fucking day of my life. It feels like, it feels like this one time when my friend had a cavity and he just kept refusing to make the dentist appointment to just go get a stupid fucking filling and fix it because he was so nervous because he knew he had let it go too far. Then more time passes and he knows it's gonna be a root canal, and more time passes and he knows it's gonna be an extraction, and it's all he could talk about but he just couldn't bring himself to do anything about it. That was me, except I never fucking told anyone, and Caroline's not a fucking rotting tooth. Every day I considered going over but I never did. I have no fucking clue why"

Sam nodded.

"She means so much to me. She has always meant so much to me and I think after a while I realized that going back might not do anything but hurt her"

"So why did you reach out to her last month?"

"I saw her at that party and she looked.... fucking terrified of me. She looked at me like I was about to kill her. That's when I knew that nothing would fuck her up more than me never saying anything. Every day I didn't say something to her it made it worse."

"You regret it"

"I have never and will never regret anything more. I wish I could explain that. I regret leaving her, I regret giving Liza and my friends vague details about what happened when we broke up knowing she would defend me because what I said was not even close to the truth, I regret everything"

"Thanks, David" Sam said, standing up. "I think I understand"

And with that, she walked out of the room. About an hour later, David was sitting on the couch editing yet another video.

"Enough" Natalie said, walking into the living room.

"What?"

"What happened?"

"When?"

"Don't play stupid" Natalie said, taking David's laptop off of his chest where it was resting and lifting it up, placing it back down on the coffee table. "Alex decked you in the face, Sam is coming to have serious conversations with you, Liza is ignoring my texts, what the hell is going on?"

David sat up. He looked Natalie in the eye and he told her everything. Natalie froze as it all came out, simply staring at David.

"You never told me?"

"No..."

"All these years and you never told me? David, we were talking every day when you were dating Caroline and you never told me any of that?"

David shook his head.

"I wish I had known. I would have convinced you to apologize"

"Well, it's a little too late for that now"

"I guess it is"

And with that, Natalie left the room.

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It's too late to apologize...

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