13
Ella
3 Years Ago—October 2015
“G et me another tea, bitch!” Hannah calls from the sofa.
I roll my eyes and scoff. “What am I, your personal slave?”
“Well, yeah, you’re the host!” Lily calls without even looking up from her laptop screen. “So, you got two coffees and a tea on order. Chop, chop!”
“And water! Don’t forget about me!” Cate calls as she runs into the lounge.
“I’m on it, you bunch of lazy arseholes!” I retort with a laugh.
“So, wait, I’m meant to like, do the first bit, right?” Lily asks. I finish the water and tea, put them on the coffee table, and move back to the kitchen.
“Yeah, you’ve got the important bit – introducing us all.” Cate snorts. “I’ll swap my bit for yours?”
“You wish,” Lily retorts as I take the coffee to the table.
“Can I have mine here?” Matty pipes up blandly, not even glancing up from his laptop. His fingers press on the keys quickly, but I’m sure he’s probably not concentrating. There was a reason he suggested in the group chat that we go to the coffee shop. This place is distracting for us both, and we know why.
“Sure thing,” I reply, taking it over and trying to remain calm. My heart turning into a war drum and my distinct want to touch him takes over, but I focus on the coffee that I refuse to spill.
It’s been awkward glances and smiles for the past month of being just friends . Though somehow, we’ve still been normal. But if we touch or share glances alone, there’s something electric between us and a knowing glance every time.
My life is dull, nothing is as bright as it was. I’m the caterpillar crawling into the cocoon for the long process of transforming into a butterfly. I know, though, if we remain friends and never anything more, that end result will never come and I’ll forever be stuck in the cocoon, waiting for something that will never happen.
The ugly duckling may turn into a swan in the end and be majestic, but that doesn’t make his journey any less painful before that transformation.
“Here you go.” I hand out the mug to him. He looks up and takes it. The moment our fingers touch, the spark lights and catches fire. When I look into those dark eyes, the desperation to touch him again overwhelms me. I want to grab him, run my hand through his dark curls, tangle my tongue with his until I can’t physically be closer to him.
He’s my winter – summer is overrated – the chilly weather, the gingerbread house, the snowman and red noses, the hot chocolates. He is the excitement on Christmas morning when you see Father Christmas has visited, he’s the warm fluffy socks and lazy Sundays with blankets, and I want every part of him.
“Thanks, Ella.” He smiles.
Everything inside me dulls and comes to a stop at the awkward mention of my name. Winter has suddenly melted all around me, and I miss it. We can still be friends with nicknames – or is it that he knows what he does to me when he calls me Ells Bells?
“Cheers, biatch,” Hannah interrupts, closing the book on the confusion of love and hurt between Matt and me. She takes her mug and I sit back down and put my laptop back on my lap. I find the message tab on my social media flashing. I click on it and see Matt’s message containing a picture of bluebells, and nothing else.
I glance up at him and our eyes meet, the look of fiery need passing through the air, but the same knowing that we can’t, and shouldn’t, do anything about it. There is no longer any doubt in my mind; I’m truly, deeply, and undeniably in love with him. It’s tragic, like a Shakespearean tragedy, because I can’t have him. If I do, he’ll hurt, and to love someone is to want what’s best for them, even if it means letting them go.
∞∞∞
I glance at my phone to see three missed calls from Dean over the past three hours. I roll my eyes and look back at him across the lounge from me, needing this to hurry up. Matt is due here in an hour and I don’t have time for Dean’s crap.
“So, you have been ignoring me then, judging by the uneasy look you’ve just given me.” Dean smirks.
“Yeah, because I’m busy, Dean. Making friends, doing work, you know.” I wave it off.
“Met many people yet?” he asks.
“A month is a long time,” I mention. “So yeah, I’ve met a few. In the middle of a presentation at the moment.”
“Oh, sounds, er, fun,” he says awkwardly. “Been to many parties?”
“Yeah.” I nod, wishing he’d leave. It’s been like this since we found out about the marriage, and I can’t take it. We haven’t seen each other since I moved here, over a month and a half ago now.
“Your dad picked well with this place, it’s lush.” He looks over the penthouse lounge and kitchen, admiring the views from the windows.
“Yeah, I’m lucky,” I reply. “My friends love it. It’s become the place to come to work.”
“Doesn’t surprise me at all. You’re enjoying the course?”
“Yeah, I love it so far. Hard work, but loving it,” I enthuse. He smiles and nods. “Did you want another drink?” I kick myself for asking, but I can’t be rude to him; we’re still friends after all.
“No, I better get going. I just literally popped in on my way to get everyone lunch in the office. I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself, Ella.”
He stands from the seat and approaches me when I stand to show him out. When he puts his hands out, I let myself into his hug, a little obligation mixed in there. It feels warm and comforting, yet all wrong and awkward at the same time. I just need to bury myself in Matty’s warm embrace instead.
“Ella, I wish we wouldn’t be so distant with each other since this… since this all happened,” he says. I shift awkwardly, biting the sleeves of my hoodie. “We were friends. I’d like to think we still are. Things might be awkward with the situation and all, but I’d love for this to be our turning point again.”
I look into the hopeful sea of his eyes and remember all the good times: running around, joking with each other, going out and shopping or watching films in the cinema when we should have been in school or college.
“I’d like that too,” I admit.
“Good!” He smiles, the hope shining as it wins the battle of sadness in those eyes that once filled me with the comfort of friendship, but now something else entirely.
“Sorry, I have to get back to my essay.” I gesture back to the lounge, and he nods, bracing himself to leave.
“I’ll let you get on,” he says and waves as he leaves the flat.
∞∞∞
“So, what he expects you to just carry on as if the past two years haven’t happened?” Matt chortles when I tell him about what happened an hour ago with Dean.
“Yeah, he thinks I can just happily accept what’s happening and have things be how they were before I was told. I think he thinks I’m happy about it when it’s obvious I’m not.” I shrug before passing him his coffee. The slight touch between us stops time around me and I glance into his eyes, imagining his lips over mine again, imagining how it would feel to have his lips across my body. I could drown in the brown pools of his eyes and not want to surface.
“Have you actually spoken to him about it?” Matty asks as he perches on the edge of the sofa.
“Well, yeah, we have over the years,” I answer, and try to change the subject. “So, what did you want to go over – for the presentation?” I swallow my nerves, trying to focus on the reason he said he was coming over and ignoring the obvious tension between us.
“I didn’t come here to talk about the presentation, Ells Bells,” he announces. It doesn’t surprise me; we both know how awkward it’s been between us lately. I grab my can of drink and sit on the other side of the sofa facing him.
“Then what did you come here to talk about?”
He sighs. “You know what I want to talk about.”
I take a sip of my drink, savouring the bubbles as they fill my mouth and burst down my throat, singeing me with the cold acid before putting it on the coffee table. I wish I could dissolve away to avoid all of this. As much as I know what he’s going to say and I know I’m going to agree with it, I know it’ll all end in hurt. None of this is going to end with a happily ever after into the sunset.
“I’m going to put my cards on the table here: we’ve tried being friends, and it doesn’t work. It’s too awkward. I love you; you love me. It’s obvious. We can’t carry on like this. Every time I look at you, I want to scoop you up, kiss you and never let go. I know you feel the same way, I can see it in your eyes.”
I savour his words like a child would hide sweets; hiding them all so I can have them when no one else is looking and scoff them all at once.
“Ells, I know the score and what I’m getting myself into,” he adds. I know what I want to say, and I know what I should say, and each sentence is battling with the other for the right to be said.
“I know you’re fighting with what to do, but remember when you told me about this marriage thing, and I told you that for the next three years you should live the life you want to lead? Think about that, Ells. You have no one here to police you, to control you. And hell, I can try and help get you out of it if that’s what you want. I don’t care; all I want is to spend the next three years with you. If it can be longer than that, then I’ll be there, but if three years is all we get, then in my opinion, here’s to the next three years of us.” He puts a finger under my chin and gently makes me look into his determined eyes. “Tell me I’m wrong.”
I open my mouth to say something; anything. But the soft finger under my chin overwhelms every sense I have; all I can see is Matt. All I can smell is the scent of his aftershave and coffee, and all I can hear is the thump, thump, thump of my heart doing a marathon in my chest. I know exactly what I should say, but all I manage is:
“You’re right.”
“I know I am.” He winks at me, his finger letting go. My body slumps at the loss of contact. “So, what do you think?”
“About what?” I ask, shaking my head to get myself out of the daze his touch left me in.
He laughs. “About us, Ells.”
I arch an eyebrow at him; he knows the answer. We both know the answer. But instead of spelling it out, I move over and pull him closer to me. The minute our lips connect, everything around us melts until it’s just Matt and me. The intensity of his kiss makes me soar like a bird. It’s him who deepens the kiss by prying my mouth open with his tongue. I feel the slight smirk on his mouth as my arms snake around his neck to get myself closer to him – though if we were any closer, I’d be melting into him like butter on a hot potato. I feel his hands cupping my cheeks as he shifts on top of me. As his hands travel down to thread our fingers together, my body sings. My mind is being taken over by him piece by piece.
I know if we don’t stop soon, his sudden wandering hands will go further, and I will be taken over by him in more than just mind, but body, too. As much as I don’t mind that idea – in fact, I’d love it – it’s way too soon.
“Matty,” I whisper, pulling myself from diving too deep, too soon.
“Too soon?”
“I think so,” I manage.
The way his smile comes back instantly shows me just how proud of himself he is, how happy he is that we kissed again.
“I think I have my answer, but I’ll ask anyway. What do you think about us?”
I give myself one last chance to grab my inhibitions and morals back from the balloon they’ve taken off on, out of my mind, but as I do, my heart just blows them further away. They are now so far out of reach that I have no other path than the one I’ve let my heart make.
“I think… I think it’s the best idea you’ve had.” I smile and press a light kiss on his mouth just in case he didn’t get the memo the first time.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t quite hear that,” he slyly says.
“I said, you idiot, that I want to be your girlfriend.” I give him what he wants to hear, and he plants a brief kiss on the top of my head before engulfing me in a hug so meaningful it winds me. The deep pit in the back of my mind still knows this is the worst thing I could do because it’ll just end in hurt, but I know that for now, I have to live for me, and I’m safe for now. I have Matty, and that’s all I care about.