Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
VIOLET
I reach for Ezra and wrap my arms around him. “I’m so sorry,” I say, reassuring him it’s okay to cry.
I’ve never seen him cry before. Zayn used to say men don’t cry and that it’s a weakness.
I know better. Men do cry; they need to.
They feel just as deeply as the rest of us, even if the world teaches them to hide it.
And in this moment, Ezra letting himself break isn’t a weakness. It’s him being human.
“I felt the same way with Zayn. I felt more alone when I was around him.”
Ez shifts his body out of my arms. “Did you ever have a clue it was Rya?”
I shake my head with a bitter laugh. “No. I was so blinded by our friendship I didn’t see it. But now that I know, things are adding up.”
“Like what?”
I take a breath. “I have a customer who lives close to your place, and one day when I was dropping off her order I saw him in that area heading towards your house. But he said he was driving to a customer’s house to fix their car.”
Ezra’s jaw clenches, and he runs his hand down his face. “That’s nice to know they might have done it in our home. What else?”
“Remember when I told you both about the perfume I smelled on Zayn’s shirt?”
His eyes shoot up as he nods, remembering what I told him and Rya.
“Well, it was hers. We bought the same one when we were in Vegas,” I say flatly.
“He played it off as if my perfume gets on his clothes when I spray it on me.” I shake my head in disappointment that I missed the signs.
“He’s too big of a dumbass to know what perfume of mine was on his clothes.
The only way he would have known is if he had asked her.
” The more I talk about it, the more keeps surfacing.
“And the way Rya would act when I told her I thought he was cheating on me.”
“How did she act?” he questions with concern in his voice.
“She would always try to convince me he wasn’t cheating, and that he would never cheat on me.
” I put air quotes around ‘never.’ “She would almost get defensive. And yeah, she’s my best friend.
Or was. But wouldn’t a true best friend be like ‘let’s go find out if this fucker really is?
’” I shake my head. “You know a true best friend would be on my side regardless if he was cheating or not.” I let out a heavy breath.
Talking about this makes me angry all over again.
“And what’s up with her liking Rufus Du Sol?
She hated that kind of music. For the life of me, I couldn’t ever get her to listen to them, and now all of a sudden she listens to them.
She only listens to them now because Zayn listens to them.
Or she was trying to like what he likes,” I say sarcastically.
“Oh, and remember that night in the city when we couldn’t find her?” I ask, catching Ez’s gaze. He nods without a smile as if that night is clicking for him too. “How the hell did Zay know where she was?”
Ezra nods his head and lets out a sigh like it finally clicked.
“His text messages of him breaking it off with her were around that time. And that night when she got drunk, she was so pissed off.” Flashes of her red, angry face surface in my mind.
“She looked at me as if I had ruined her life. I remember questioning myself what the hell that look was all about. But I brushed it off because she was drunk. I thought maybe she didn’t realize it was me. ”
I take a breath and then continue on, letting everything out. Everything that I questioned now all makes sense.
“And remember when you two came over to talk to Zay about it and she acted like she was getting cheated on? And she slipped and said something like ‘are you cheating on me?’” Everything makes my whole body feel heated. The way Rya was looking at me with such hate is the same way I feel now.
Ezra’s shoulders slump as he rests his back further onto the couch. “I can’t believe how fooled we were.”
Being fooled hurts in a way I didn’t think possible.
Not only the betrayal but the fact that it came from the people we trusted most. They lied to our faces while sneaking behind our backs.
I keep replaying every day repeatedly in my head, and it all adds up.
It all makes sense now. And I was so blinded by their friendship. We both were.
“Rya definitely blamed all this on Zayn.”
“Of course she did. She’s never responsible for anything,” I say, shaking my head. “You haven’t talked to her since she told you everything?”
“Nope. What’s the point? My feelings have never mattered to her, and I’m not going to sit there and watch her pretend like they do now.”
“Did you kick her out?”
“No.” He laughs. “To my surprise, she left all on her own.” He sighs.
“But she comes over almost everyday begging me back, and the landlord won’t let me change the locks.
” He yawns as if all this is causing exhaustion.
“I don’t want to be there anymore. I’d rather leave and lose my deposit so she doesn’t know where I am.
I’m too exhausted at this point to deal with her.
It was exhausting before, and now I’m just… done.”
I guess it’s true what they say: you get to a point where you’re just done.
Everything slowly creeps in, to the point of exhaustion.
All the repeated conversation, arguments, tears, and lies.
It’s all too much; one day you wake up and it’s like something inside you has switched off.
The hurt is still there, but the fight is gone.