Love Hurts, Doesn't It? ✔️

Chapter 10

Thirty minutes later, which was filled with erratic pacing and a near nervous breakdown, I walked towards the entrance of the bowling alley in search of Ian since he hadn't come back inside.

As I approached the front exit, my palms started sweating really bad and my heart was thumping at a hundred beats per minute.

I stopped at the exit and tried composing myself, I shook my head to calm my racing thoughts and tried to level my breathing.

Why I'm I so nervous? I thought.

I knew why though, Ian and I rarely had arguments these days and if we did it never lasted and he was always the one to come to me. It all just made me wonder if there was more to this than what I told Chanel about.

After gathering myself, I pushed the door open and walked into the afternoon sunlight, I shielded my eyes to help adjust to the bright light and searched for him.

Not far from the entrance I saw him sitting on a bench with his head down and eyes out of focus like he was thinking, I let out a deep breath and walked towards him. As I approached him slowly he looked up at me and gave me a sad smile.

"Hey", I said gently.

He just smiled again and patted the spot next to him wanting me to sit down, I slowly lowered my self and turned to him to read his expression, but his face was blank and stoic, he didn't look angry, he just looked really distant and I wanted to know so bad what was bothering him.

"Are you okay?", I softly asked.

He took in a deep breath and closed his eyes, "You know one of the disadvantages of pretending that your life is perfect?", he asked rhetorically, "It's that at the end of the day, no one gets interested in knowing the real you, all they want to know about is the you that you put out there in the first place", he replied.

His voice sounded so sad and pained at the same time that it confirmed my earlier thoughts of our outburst being more than what I told Chanel.

"Ian? You're going to have to come down to my level of understanding".

He opened his eyes and turned to me and that's when I noticed the tears in his eyes. I was about asking him why he was tearing up but he raised his hand as a gesture to silence me.

"Some things are better left unsaid right now princess, wanna head home?".

I didn't bother arguing with him because his tone alone showed he wasn't up for that conversation right now, so I swallowed the bitter pill and let it slide for the main time and just agreed to go home now and call it a day.

We walked back into the bowling alley to return our bowling shoes and get our own shoes back.

When we approached the counter I found out that Chanel wasn't there and another girl stood in her place, I didn't think much of it, I just assumed she was on a lunch break and shrugged it off.

Ian called a cab for us because we both weren't ready to face nosy people on a bus and we were home before we knew it.

When I got home I walked into my bedroom with so many thoughts and questions that needed answers racing through my head.

I could feel the pang of the upcoming headache again at my forehead so I walked into my bathroom to get some pain killers to numb the pain.

After swallowing the pills with water, I walked back into the room and flopped on my bed going through all that happened today in my mind.

There are so many things to sort out, I thought.

Not only do I have this Cole drama and mystery caretaker on my mind, but my brothers weird statement earlier kept ringing in my head.