Pushin' Me Away • {Joe Jonas}

06. d e s p e r a t e l y

Lex spent the next forty-five minutes telling Joe everything. From what had happened at the club, to why their relationship had gone down like it had, to everything with Nick, and everything in between. She cried on and off the entire time and Joe was quiet, tearing up a few times himself. When she finished speaking, he was quiet for a long while and she desperately wished she could get inside his head and read his thoughts.

"Fucking Christ, Lexy," he said eventually, raking his hand through his hair and sighing heavily. He closed his eyes and buried his face in his hands, scrubbing at it with them like he was trying to cleanse himself of all the bad shit.

When he looked up at her again, he stood and made his way to her where she was sitting on the other end of the couch and, in one swift motion, pulled her up and into his arms. He held her tightly, with more emotion than he had in a very long time, and she started crying again, burying her face in his chest and holding him desperately, like he might melt away if she let him go. Joe's chest started shaking with quiet tears as well and they just held each other and cried for a long time.

When they finally pulled apart, Lex couldn't quite manage to look him in the eye. She didn't know what happened now that he had all of the information, but she did know that at the end of everything he'd be going home to his girlfriend, a fact that forced her to try and distance herself. She sat down a few feet away from him on the couch and he sat too, not quite looking directly at her either.

"I wish you would've told me," he whispered eventually, shaking his head. "I get why you didn't, but, fuck, do I wish you had. It would've changed everything."

"I know. I just... I was too scared. I'm still terrified to have told you, if I'm being honest. I just always thought that if I kept it to myself, then it didn't really exist. But as it turns out, I think maybe that made it exist more."

"I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry I left you that night. I just... it was stupid and I should've been there."

"Don't do that. I spent years blaming you, but it's not your fault, not at all. If he'd wanted to do it, he would've probably done it whether you were there or not."

"And you've really been hooking up with Nick for years? Honestly?" he asked her, and she could hear the edge in his tone that she knew could very easily lead into an argument. She nodded.

"Yeah, I have. It wasn't anything real. I just needed... I needed someone, and he was there. It wasn't even about the sex, it was about the fact that he's one of the only people I trust fully and I'm completely alone most of the time because that's how I've made things for myself and normally it's fine. But sometimes... sometimes I just needed someone and Nick was there," she told him, trying her best to keep her tone steady. The absolute last thing she wanted to do was argue about Nick.

"You couldn't have found anyone else?" he asked, his gaze averted from her again. He scrubbed his face with his hands once more and she shrugged.

"It doesn't matter, Joe. It doesn't matter because he was there when you weren't. I know I shut you out and made it really hard to be there for me, but you're the one that moved on first. You're the one that stopped trying," she told him, still trying to keep her tone steady but also feeling the annoyance raise inside of her.

She genuinely couldn't quite believe she'd told him everything she had and the thing he had the most to say about was that fact that she'd intermittently slept with his brother for a few years. Obviously she'd known that would be a point of conversation, and agreed that it should be, she just hadn't quite expected it to be his focal point.

"Oh, come on, Lex. Don't make it my fault. You could've been friends with him, you didn't have to sleep with him," he spat back at her, officially fully angry.

"I told you, most of it was friendship and companionship, Joe. It's not like I was in love with him or anything. We were never even in anything I would call anywhere near a relationship," she told him, still trying to keep calm. She didn't want to argue with him, she really didn't.

"I just can't believe he's the one you let in after you fully shut me out."

He was still angry, but there was also a huge undertone of hurt in his tone and it stabbed her right in the heart.

"It was years later, Joe. It's not like I immediately turned to him. It took me years to even entertain the idea of letting him in, and even when I did he wasn't all the way in. I told you I just told him the full story less than twenty-four hours before I told you."

"Yeah, but still. You pushed me out so that you could fuck my brother years later. That's... that's something else, Lex."

"I know it's fucked up, okay?! I know! It's not like I planned it and I've been stewing over how fucked up it is since the day it started happening, but I'm not in love with him. I'm in love with you, you fucking asshole. I've always been in love with you, and I probably always will be," she blurted before thinking about it enough to stop herself. Joe's eyes went wide.

"What did you just say?"

"I said I'm in love with you. I said I've never stopped loving you, not for a second, and I'm not sure I ever will."