Don't tell my best friend.

15. Mixed emotions

Everything after that day was a blur, I got back to work. Feeling as good as I could. Still had pain in my throat from time to time, but I just had to suck it up and be a man.! It couldn't be simpler, but also was the thing about Raphael and Lea, who showed up at my house the same night, making me forget completely about Max. As if they hadn't been gone for almost 2 days, ignoring most of my text and replaying with short messages. Had Lea and Max kept seeing each other in secret? Or was Raphael also aware of that? What will be Raphael's reaction to this, will he agree to it?

We spend a good night, just like we always had, food, movie and the three of us in a bed, me in the middle as usual. Raphael playing with my bald head and Lea holding my hand in hers. I felt so loved in between the two of them but I was also feeling something else, a stronger bond coming from them. Have they planned to ditch me and had been stuck with me out of pity? So many wild thoughts were running through my head I couldn't make any sense of anything. I loved these two, I loved Lea since the very begging, we had lived being true to each other, not lying to each other, a real true friendship one of those that is hard to find. I loved being with her, we had over 6 years being friends and sharing everything until we literally shared everything including this guy right here next to me for whom I had fallen in love in a way I did not consider possible and made me lie to my friend, that wasn't the behavior of a true friend. I should've been able to tell her what I felt instead of lying and keeping it as a secret from her, who anyway ended up finding out in the worst way and used it against us, to trick us. But I didn't I was blinded by my feelings for him, by the realness of the whole situation. I was waiting for someone to wake me up and everything to be just a nice beautiful and sexy dream.

But instead, I got a buckle of cold water thrown at me, but not from a dream, from Lea. Raphael had been someone extraordinary not anything like the dulls I had dated before, he was different, he got me in a way I could not think was possible, he could read me, he understood me and was patient with me even with my anxiety, my insecurities, and all my mess. He learned to deal with me, in a way I wasn't able to, sometimes I just locked myself in my room to avoid contact with anyone, as If I needed to reload from all the pressure that society puts on me. But he knew I needed that peace, so he gave it to me, he came to my house and laid next to me, not saying, not doing anything, instead of pushing me to do things I did not want to.

How could I not love that from him, how could I push that away when he made me feel alive like I hadn't in a long time. I was selfish from keeping that from my best friend, but then there was Max who had been with me when I needed someone to speak to and couldn't talk to Lea. He listened to me, he comforted me. And even if what I did was fucked up he never left my side, he was always there for me, no matter what happened or what I needed, sex, someone to cry to or someone to listen to me. He was there and yes I had without noticing develop affection for him, I never admitted it, but it was there, I did not open with everyone, but I was able to be myself with him, not needing to pretend to be someone who I wasn't. He liked my stupid ass just fine.

"Are you here with us?" Asked a concerned Lea, as she looked at me with a worry smiled on her face. "Yes, I'm". I said to her. As I stood up and went to the bathroom locking myself up and pouring some cold water on my face, I needed to clear my thoughts. I couldn't stop thinking about Max, but I wasn't sure I should bring to collision just yet, I needed to figure this out by myself first, so instead, I took out my phone, sent him a text to meet me tomorrow at the cafe, locked my phone and went back to them.