The Dip and the Resurface

Part 14

Ivy

I had been in bed all day thinking of him. How could he have deceived me like this? He didn't seem the type.

My reaction to his behaviour had started out as anger where I had cursed his every move since the day I had met him. I wondered if he had weighted every word with me from the beginning to try and figure me out so he could use it to lure me into bed. Was he really so cunning?

Later, my anger turned to disbelief, regret, and humiliation. How could I have let a stranger walk into my life so easily? I should have guessed that he would be like this. Weren't musicians supposed to be assholes? In my line of work I sure met my share of them. Tyler had seemed different but as it turned out, he wasn't. He probably did this to tons of girls on a weekly basis. I felt sick to my stomach and wondered if Josh had been in on it too. Whether they were each others wingmen. I thought about how they might already be considering and planning who'd be the next victim in their little act. This just made me feel even more sick to my stomach.

I tossed and turned in my bed all day and every time I moved in my sheets, the smell of Tyler hit my nostrils. His scent seemed to be everywhere within my small bedroom and in a fit of anger, I stripped my bed of linens and threw it all in the washing machine without having a clean set to spare.

Although I was angry and hurt, I still kept checking my phone, hoping to see a text from him where he'd apologise and tell me it had been a big misunderstanding. That he'd show up at my doorstep with an explanation behind it all. But he didn't do any of it.

When the sun went down, I finally decided to have a shower. After last night, I felt so dirty. I couldn't believe I had let him do all those things to me. Things that seemed more than welcome at the moment but that I regretted deeply now that I had understood his intentions behind asking me out.

I had spend so many hours in the months we'd been apart thinking about him that I wondered if I might have build up an unrealistic expectation of him in my head.
I was so confused! His behaviour on our date had seemed genuine; he had been caring, and sweet, and wonderful.

Standing under the shower head, I let the water wash over me while I thought of Tyler's words from yesterday; he had called me beautiful. And I had kissed his tattoos and called him handsome and cute. In that moment I had felt so lucky.

Suddenly, the tears started streaming down my face without warning. I didn't know whether it was because I felt humiliated or if it was because he had dumped me when I had actually started to care for him. I shut my eyes, trying to keep out the painful things he had said this morning, but the tears kept flowing down my face anyway.

I ended up leaving the shower more confused than I had been before I jumped in.

I dried my hair and put on a clean pyjamas before I went into the living room to watch some TV and (hopefully) block out any thoughts of him. The first thing I saw as I entered the living room, however, was Tyler's black adidas jumper on the floor next to the sofa.

With a gulp I stepped over it and sat down on the sofa, trying my best to ignore its presence.

But the jumper kept distracting me and eventually I had to pick it up from the floor and throw it somewhere so it wasn't constantly in my sight. The minute I touched the jumper, Tyler's smell hit me and everything came crashing over me again. I don't know why I did it - maybe it was self-torture - but I ended up pulling the jumper over my head, delving into his distinctive smell.

That was when I realised just exactly how screwed I was.