Demi Lovato Imagines

The Breakup

Empty. 

That's all you feel. 

Like a plastic bottle drained of all dredges of water, left to rattle around the footwell of someone's car, its hollowness sounding echoed and dull.  

You scratch your nail against the polystyrene cup, chipping away at the geometric pattern reminiscent of the nineties, cobalt blue and teal, tangerine orange and magenta. The texture makes your skin crawl but you just continue, biting the inside of your cheek until saliva fills your mouth, snaking in between your teeth. The crunch of paper left screwed on the tray has a different pattern with different colours. You wonder whether the owner of this sandwich joint noticed the discrepancy before placing the order or if it was something he only realised later and didn't bother rectifying. You're sure there's a term for people like that. High on agreeableness, low on conscientiousness. You doubt he's narcissistic. But you're psych paper isn't on Mr Smith or whatever the real name of the owner of Smith's is. And so you push the tray an inch or two further away from you and flip open your laptop again. 

You've only been working another ten minutes or so when your phone buzzes from beside you and you check the screen before you can even exert a fraction of self-control and focus towards the task at hand. It's Anna. Or Annalise, as she so insists on being called. But you call her Anna all the same and she seems to secretly enjoy your playful defiance, rolling her eyes with a wry smile when you added her contact into your phone with no more than four letters. Take it or leave it, you teased, shrugging. She slapped you on the shoulder and asked you to join her and her friends for lunch. 

That's how you met Johnny, actually. Through Anna. She introduced him to you about a year ago at some pub near campus while everyone was playing a game of 'Snakes and Ladders' and Sam was whinging on and on about swapping to Uno because it's wayyy more fun and requires more than just luck. It's strategic, guys. 

"Class finished four hours ago," Anna groaned, shoving her watch in his face. "No one wants to think about strategies right now."

That's when he walked in. After Anna had said that. He headed straight for her, hands stuffed nervously in his pockets, rocking back and forth onto the tips of his toes as he scanned over the people crowded around the table. There was obviously no one else he recognised and so when you were the only one who looked up for more than half a second without returning to the latest dramatic catastrophe of someone's counter being devoured by a snake, he sank into your gaze, dark eyes shining behind his glasses. Perhaps it was the heat of the pub but you were sure you saw his cheeks flush slightly. 

"Johnny, this is Y/n," Anna chirped, pushing him forward towards the empty space beside you before disappearing back to the bar to get another pint. It was a Friday and so no need to get up early the next morning. 

"Hi Johhny," you said stiffly, giving a little awkward wave as he held himself as straight as a board to your left. Sam cheered as his counter reached the top row of numbers first, all thoughts of Uno erased from his mind. 

"Hi," he said, "It's nice to meet you."

"You too. You study here too?"

"Uh, yeah. Freshman. I dropped out of USC but couldn't just transfer over. So I need to start from scratch, basically."

"Sucks," you hummed, not thinking it wise to bring up how much money would have been lost from such a scenario. "You stayed on the same course though, right?"

"Yeah. Philosophy. No, it was just the whole vibe at USC that got me. A bit too 'work hard, play harder' if you know what I mean?"

You didn't. Not really. Because looking up at your group of friends who see a Friday evening of board games at the Student Union pub as being wild and spontaneous, you realised a social life in which you wake up the next morning, covered in vomit and with no recollection of the night before is not on the cards for you. Which isn't an issue, if you're being completely honest. Yet the quiet, secure, benevolence of it all did make you feel a little lame and so you felt yourself shrink into the booth away from him.