Perfect Now [l.t]

Café chaos ⛅️

JAYS' POV
"Okay, yeah I'll FaceTime you later. Bye Lou." I speak into the phone before hanging up.
Part of me assumed that after the premiere he wouldn't speak to me as often, if at all, but much to my extreme delight, Louis and I have been either FaceTiming or phoning each other at least once every day, as well as messaging in between.

We may have spoken for longer but May and I are about to leave to meet Esme at the café. Hopefully we can sort this out and put it all behind us because I miss speaking to her, even if it has only been a few days.
I also just want to hear if she's okay because she seemed fine with us one minute and the next minute she was off with us. I've racked my brains over and over as to why she's acting like this but I can't settle on a theory.

"Jay! Are you coming or what?" May shouts up the stairs.
"Yes!!! Calm down hun , I'm on my way." I yell back.
As I run down the stairs, my phone pings and I see a message from Louis: 'good luck, hope it all goes well love ❤️xx'. I type out a quick reply as I slip my shoes on and open the door. May is waiting at the bottom of the path so I lock up behind me before walking to her.

On the way to the café, I let May drone on about what she's going to say to Esme and how she will respond to any arguments.
As we approach, I can see Esme from a distance, sat on a table outside with what must be her usual cappuccino.
May walks straight into the building to get our drinks, ignoring Esme in the process. I sit myself down opposite her. "Hey stranger." I greet her warmly.
She grimaces , "Hey."
We sit there in silence, neither one of us knowing how to approach a topic that doesn't involve the premiere and the following events.

Shortly, May comes out with my hot chocolate and her tea. "Thanks."
"No worries." She says sitting beside me and glaring at Esme. "So Esme , what have you got to say for yourself?"
"May, calm it, we've only just got here."
"So? This is what we came here to do, right Esme?" My sister turns back to Esme.
"Right." She huffs.
"Sooo.." May prompts.
"Let me start by saying that I didn't intentionally ditch y-"
"But you did." May interrupts her.
"May ! For gods sake , please just let her talk!" I scold.
May rolls her eyes and gestures for Esme to continue.
"At the afterparty, Harry suggested for us to go somewhere for a while so obviously I agreed," May looks like she's about to interrupt again so I gently kick her under the table. "And then when Harry and I were out, we lost track of time so by then it was really late and I didn't want to wake you guys up, so I stayed in Harry's room. Then , before we went to sleep, we were talking and he asked if we could go out the next day and do something together , again of course I said yes and so that's what we did. Around the time we would've been leaving to go home, we were too far away to make it back so I decided it would make more sense for him to just take me back home whenever but then I realised I'd left my stuff so Harry texted Liam and he'd said you guys had taken it with you. So there didn't seem to be an issue from my side."
"That's not the point Esme! Jay and I don't care that you went with Harry as much as we care about the fact you didn't tell us where you were going or what you were doing! As I said earlier on the group chat you could've been hurt for all we knew, what was stopping you from texting us and letting us know what your plan was?"
"I ran out of credit so I couldn't text you after that one text I sent!"
"Harry's got a phone hasn't he?"
"Yes but you know me, I don't think like that and I didn't think it was a big deal! It was pretty obvious where I was."
They continue to argue back and forth as I just sit back and listen, waiting for them to get it out of their system.

"Jay, why aren't you helping me? You have to have an opinion!" May pokes me.
"Well, my main issue is really that you guys are still arguing but also the thing that bugs me about all of this is that Louis was nice enough to invite us all to the premiere and you didn't even stay for the majority of the afterparty. We were supposed to have fun together! Even if we didn't hang out at the party, we had the hotel to go back to and we were going to have breakfast together, whether the boys were there or not. It's also quite rude how you didn't even thank Louis for paying for the hotel room that you didn't even use or the prepaid breakfast which you didn't even have, the least you could've done is had the breakfast with us. I get that you had fun with Harry and you like him and that's great , I'm happy for you but Louis was the one that made it all possible so I just think you could've been a bit more thoughtful and grateful," I take a deep breath. "But I really do just want to get past this now, we've said our bits , surely we can just move on now?"
"Sure , we can move on if May is prepared to. But may I just add, none of this would be happening if it wasn't for me, without me Louis would've never messaged you."
Mays head snaps back to Esme. "What do you mean? Louis messaged Jay off his own back."
My eyes grow wide as I see Esmes growing discomfort and remember the strange look on her face at Disney when Louis messaged me. "But Esme, that's wrong isn't it.. Louis didn't message me first, in fact Louis probably had no intention of messaging me but you pretended to be me and texted him first."
"Yes that's true but I can explain Jay."
I stand up with the chair clattering on the concrete slabs. "There's nothing to explain. How could you?" Without another word I turn and walk away, attempting to wipe the waterfall of tears flowing down my face.