The Broken Mirror

Chapter 6: Flashback-I Love You

January 21, 2011

Things have been going really well for my lately. I never expected to be able to say this but the day that confirmed that I could has come and gone quicker than you could snap a finger. I'm also quit thankful that it did, not for my own sake, well kind of but not for personal selfish reasons. The more Benjamin and I have hung out with the each other, the more insistent Maddy has become with the fact that we were dating, even though we weren't. We were just really good friends of opposite genders who just happened to enjoy being in each other's company. Until now that is, or about a month ago.

About a month ago, Benjamin and I went to that same cafe together, the one where I was invited to and Maddy kept insisting that it was a date when it wasn't, the one where we were originally intending to get a pot of cheese fondue but the cafe was all out of the cheese. Yup! That one. While we were there, Benji asked me to be his girlfriend, or something like that. Through all of his stuttering that's what I picked up out of it all. I can remember that day very clearly. The basic gist of it all was that Benji asked me that question, stuttering all the way through. To me, it was very obvious with the words my and girlfriend asked in a tone that sounded like a question pieced together to 'Will you be my girlfriend?" I smiled right away and said yes. The same infectious smile of his that is almost forever present upon his lips grew larger than I thought would be possible and his facial expression gave the impression that he felt as if he was on top of the world, floating on a cloud. Any onlookers would have sworn that he had proposed and I had said yes right away. Looking back at the memory of is all I even think that myself, but I know better than to think that. I did experience it after all. As soon as I had gotten back to my apartment, Maddy had called me and demanded that I tell her every detail about Benji and I's meet up that now looking back on it appeared to be more like a date, even though I was reluctant to admitting that in the past.

As you could probably guess, Maddy was absolutely ecstatic about the news. There was about five minutes of her squealing in my ear, then another five of her going 'I told you so' then about ten minutes of her going on about how cute we'd look together. Usually I hate hearing these kinds of things but I could see why she was so excited about it, and in all honesty I was as well. I also know that when she has a boyfriend I'll be doing the same to her so I should let her do so to me if I plan on doing so to her in the future.

Silently, I snuck into the bedroom that Benji was currently in. I've been listening to him play his guitar for at least the past hour while I did up some stuff for work but now that I was free from that I wanted to watch him. I wanted to watch him but I knew that if I wasn't careful and he saw me, his concentration would vanish and that would be game over for me. Now this feels like a video game where I'm trying to sneak past a big guard by a door that I need to get through to get an award or fight the final boss, but at least in this circumstance I won't need to worry about getting killed and having to start all over. This also wouldn't be anywhere near as hard either, so long as the wooden floors are on my side today and don't decide to creak when I put less than a pound of pressure upon them.

A few steps inside and it was evident that the floorboards had decided to not work against me and give my presence away with a single squeak. I couldn't possibly be anymore thankful for that. In the end, I was able to make my way around Benji, onto the bed mattress, and sit cross-legged behind him without him even taking notice of me, yet again he doesn't even know I'm here.

I was only able to stay completely still and silent, not giving myself away, for about two minutes before I couldn't prevent myself from squirming around. No matter how entertaining and amusing Benji's acoustic guitar noodling may be, it wasn't enough to keep me still. Much to my surprise, his noodling gave way to an actual song. The song that he was playing sounded awfully familiar, but as he got farther along into the guitar part it had hit me, and hit me hard. I couldn't help myself but grin. He was starting to play my favorite song. Yellow by Coldplay. I had never heard Benji sing before, so I couldn't help but let anticipation run all through me.

"Look at the stars, look how they shine for you and everything that you do. yeah, they were all yellow. I came along I wrote a song for you, and all the things you do. It was called yellow," He began to sing. His voice was just so gorgeous and sweet I almost fell asleep. I ended up swaying my head back and forth with my eyes closed, doing nothing but enjoying the beauty of his voice accompanied by his guitar playing.

"Your skin, oh yeah your skin and bones turn in to something beautiful. You know for you I'd bleed myself dry. For you I'd bleed myself dry," He continued, me still in my state of total awe. "It's true, look how they shine for you. Look how they shine for you. Look how they shine for you. Look how they shine for you, look how they shine for you. Look how they shine. Look at the stars. Look how they shine for you, and all the things that you do," He finished. As soon as the beautiful sound had ended, my eyes were wide open. No matter how much I wished that it would continue on forever, I knew that it would come to an end sooner or later, plus the song is only four and a half minutes long.

"That was amazing," I complimented, speaking at a normal volume. I had already heard him play some, and sing as well, so I really didn't care about being detected. The chances of him playing another song were very low anyway so I figured that I might as well give him kudos for his wonderful solo acoustic performance of one of my favorite songs.

"Holy shit I didn't even know you were there," Benji said in response to my speaking. I think it's fair enough to say that my mysterious appearance was a surprise to him. "How long have you been here?"

"Almost ten minutes," I answered, a little smile picking at the corners of my lips. "Yellow is like, my favorite song of all time and you just nailed it."

"I'm glad you liked it," He said.

"Can you play anything else?" I asked out of curiosity.

"Spit out a song and chances are that I can play it," He responded. I looked up at the gray ceiling for a second to think. I immediately had a suggestion.

"She Will Be Loved by Maroon 5?" I questioned, this being the first song I had thought of.

"I actually just picked up that song," Benji answered. "I can play the melody on guitar and I can play the guitar part. I haven't had time to practice the guitar and vocals together and I don't want to potentially embarrass myself in front of you so I'm just going to play the melody on guitar."

"Okay," I replied. I looked around the room but soon grew bored of it. There wasn't a hell of a lot in the room, therefore nothing that caught my attention.

Out of not being able to help myself, I started fiddling around with his curly-ish auburn hair. It was bouncy and curly and I just couldn't help myself. I highly doubt you would be able to either. I twirled the little curls in my fingers and attempted to brush them, but one of the hardest things to do is brush curly hair so I stopped trying to and just let my fingers linger there.

"What are you doing?' He questioned. Benji most likely knew what it was that I was doing but wanted to know why.

"What does it look like I'm doing?" I returned, supplying him with a question that would help him answer his own.

"Attempting to brush my hair it would seem," He answered.

"I tried but my fingers almost got stuck so I stopped trying," I commented, starting to giggle at the thought. At the sound of my giggle, Benjamin started to sport his own laugh. The sound of guitar playing soon stopped and I was blindsided. Benji had taken hold of me by the waist and pulled be down to his side.

"I love you," I heard him say. This took me by surprise. We've known each other for seven months if I remember correctly and dating for just over one. It seemed rather misplaced for him to have said this, but the mere sound of those words coming from someone that was from my family put a warm and fuzzy feeling in the pit of my stomach. I smiled a grin even larger than the one originally on my face and rested my head on his shoulder.

"I love you to," I returned.
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Hey y'all! I hope you enjoyed reading this cutesy chapter that happened to be right after one that's actually quite sad. I hope that reading this made you feel just as warm and gushy inside as it did me while writing it. It took me forever to figure and decide what flashback would be best for this chapter and it ultimately came down to this one. Please comment telling me what you thought! I'd really appreciate it. :)