Ones and Twos

Basic.

"You need to talk to Ian. I refuse to be your middle man this time round."

Emily was designated to her kitchen counter, mixing ingredients for punch into a bowl. Her make-up cat had been easier than she had prepared for and she knew she'd not fail. The thought called for celebration. Makena was browsing through the shows she had downloaded in her laptop in search of something that would keep them occupied through the night. 

"It's complicated."

They settled on 'Insecure'. Emily served them the punch in long black ceramic mugs. She had brought out the blankets and pillows earlier and Makena had arranged them on opposite sides of the sofa. Emily sunk into her side with a heavy sigh. Now that Makena had talked about Ian, she couldn't put off thinking about him. It was inevitable that they would meet, they shared friends. But Emily couldn't reconcile with breaking his heart.

"I like a girl." She continued. Saying it loud let loose something in her. She hadn't been able to stop replaying Noora in her head. The smile, in all their varying degrees, in her eyes. The intensity of those eyes searing through her skin, scorching the fright out of her. Emily had looked right at her and had wanted to close the hair's-breadth between them. How would it feel? How would kissing her feel like?

"Is that the reason? You and Ian-"

"No." Emily interrupted. "That's different. I love Ian, I just_ don't know."

"He's hurting Ems. He's been drinking more, shutting everyone out." She murmured. "He won't even talk to Kevin."

"I know. I'm sorry, I never meant to hurt him."

The first time Ian had told Emily he loved her, they had been having cocktails at a high end restaurant for their three month anniversary. Their seats overlooked an empty pool whose surface rippled with the draft ever so often, glimmering silk-like under the overhang string garden lights. She had felt beautiful then, her hand in his, and loved. After, when he'd kissed the breath out of her at the restaurant patio, the taste of alcohol that stained his lips lingered in her mouth long after. She'd remembered it fondly, a taste of him kept with her as memory and fuel for longing for when she'd be with him again. 

Ian had been a fun occasional drunk then. She didn't mind, she enjoyed drinking almost as much as he did. The first six months of their relationship were doused with intermittent alcohol highs. She was no saint. She loved drinking, and she'd loved doing it with him once. But somewhere along the line occasional morphed into every other day and then into every day. Ian couldn't go a day without getting plastered. He carried alcohol everywhere with him. Both literally, in his bag and metaphorically. A faint smell of a diluted spirit had twined itself into him, his breath, such that it preceded him.

For a while she'd tried to understand. She'd tried to keep up with him. But when the race is drinking, which do you feel bad for? Wanting to catch up with him so he doesn't feel so alone in it, or not wanting to catch up because you know he's running himself off a cliff? Emily had tried doing both, and she knew that whichever, it would never be enough. Ian needed actual help. When he'd started spiralling, Emily had asked to know what the problem was. There had to be_ and she'd begged, she'd nagged_ but the bottles piled up and his walls did too. It was worse now because she felt guilty for enabling him in the beginning. Maybe he had been right after all. She'd tried fixing him so that she wouldn't feel as bad as she did for being implicit in fanning his self-destructive tendencies to the flame it was now.

"I'm not blaming you Ems. I know Ian has changed, the guys may not see it but I know he's not always been like this." Makena sighed. "I just thought if anyone could get through to him, you would. You've always had some insane connection between you."