sound of your heart

36

{play song attached 🤠.. 😔}

\\

"You dropped this."

I mindlessly stared at Shawn blankly for several moments, before somehow managing to snap myself out of whatever daze I had inevitably fallen into. I hastily snatched my twenty from his waiting hands, and shakily clutched it into my clammy ones as my eyes frantically darted around the buzzing coffee shop.

I couldn't look at him. I refused.

"Beyoncé." I heard his deep, handsome voice utter a second time; and forcefully had to clench my body to avoid visibly reacting to the sound of it. I was so, desperately determined to hold myself together; despite how intensively I was crumbling on the inside.

I couldn't believe I hadn't seen, or spoken to Shawn in over a year, and yet he still managed to withhold so much power over me. Though I highly doubted it was intentional, or that he was even aware of what he'd inevitably done to me; because I honestly wasn't sure whether or not he noticed how distraught I truly was, given how well I was masking it.

I prayed to God he didn't notice... how horrifyingly embarrassing would it have been to be accused of so obviously being in love with someone else's fiancé?
I couldn't even begin to explain the painful intensity of the shame I'd already felt for acknowledging it myself— I didn't want to imagine how horrible I'd feel if Shawn were to notice as well.

I pinched my eyebrows tightly together and attempted to focus my disarrayed attention on a tiny, barely noticeable blemish that marked the worn wooden floors. I usually held myself together remarkably well in almost every situation that made me overwhelmingly uncomfortable somehow; but for whatever reason, I couldn't even manage to get my thoughts together well enough to speak like a literate human being. Everything was so painfully tangled and jumbled within the loose barriers of my heavy subconscious....

Words couldn't quite describe how I felt in that exact moment; but the way my heart was painfully slamming against my chest gave enough indication that I was, understandably, mere seconds away from having a literal heart attack.

Why the hell was Shawn here?

I had hauled my ass back to Texas for the sole purpose of starting completely over, almost as if my time in New York hadn't even happened; and diminishing any unfortunate possibility of accidentally running into Shawn. And I had been doing great, so fucking great, without having the possibility of seeing him weighing on my conscious. Because it's one thing to yearn for a lost relationship when the man you're still obviously oh, so, deeply in love with was living comfortably across the country....

But when he's standing directly in front of you, possibly looking more handsome than when you'd last seen him over a year ago; and giving you that look that had once effected you so strongly that your knees instantly weakened, and you couldn't help but feel anything except an overwhelming sense of the utmost love and appreciation for him–

Shit.

"Bey... will you please look at me?"

Shawn's voice was so deliciously deep, and had thankfully continued to obtain that perfect twinge of raspiness that I genuinely hated myself for still pitifully falling over.

I didn't want to look at him— and thankfully, the barista repeating "Next!" for the third time within the last few seconds had removed me from the uncomfortable instance of doing so.

I swiftly turned around, using every ounce of strength I obtained to ignore the prominent aching in my chest, and forced a pleasant smile as if I didn't feel like I was dying on the inside.