Collette Archer
I wake up in his arms, just like that time during his reunion. It felt the same, but I know it meant nothing to him, just like last time. I realise his hand is around my waist, under my T-shirt, his hand is around my bare waist and it feels nice.
Why do I feel like this? After everything he's done to me and everything he's said to me, I should be hating him but I just can't seem to, I know he's doing all of this for a reason but whatever the reason is, does it really give him an excuse to be this rude to me? But then he also saves me, comforts me and takes care of me. Ugh his stupid mixed signals, his words and actions are in completely opposite directions again, he should really stop being so fickle, at least if he hated me consistently, I could hate him too, but no, he just has to do really sweet things after saying really terrible things. Like that whole holding hands in the plane thing, who asked him to do that? And even yesterday night, I mean I was the one who initiated it, but he also hugged me back pretty damn diligently.
I feel him waking up, so I close my eyes immediately, pretending to still be asleep, I know he woke up but he just remains still, as if watching me and then I feel his breath on my face as if he's coming closer to kiss me, but then he pulls his head back and shakes his head like he's shaking off the thought. Then he takes his hands off my waist, pulls the blanket over me and tucks my hair behind my ear. Then he steps off the bed and walks away. See, he's doing nice things again, why'd he have to tuck my hair? Ugh I hate him and I hate the way he makes me feel. I think it'll be good for both of us if I kept my promise of not showing him my face today. I wait until, James and Aunt Lizzie leave and then come out of my room. I hug my parents good morning, and my dad hugs me really tight.
"Honey, I heard you fainted, are you alright?" He says"Ya dad, it really wasn't a big deal" I reply
"Don't ever hide things like that from us again" mom says
"I just didn't want to worry you guys more"
"Not telling us, will worry us more" dad says
"Fine, I'll tell you guys everything ok?" I say
"You better" they both say in unison
"Now, your father and I have to go run some errands for gamma's funeral tomorrow, will you be fine at home alone?" Mom asks
"Yes mom, I'm not a child" I reply
"Great, should I call James over, to look after you?" She asks
"NO! No, I'm good, why are you so obsessed with him?" I say
"Alright, calm down I won't call him
"My parents leave home, around 4pm but before leaving, my mom makes me my favourite burrito rolls for lunch, which I devour in 10 minutes. After a while, I hear the doorbell and it's James. Why is he here? Ugh. I decide not to open the door, he'll just assume I'm sleeping or something and leave then. It works, he leaves and I go up to gamma's room and lie down on her bed. Her smell is still there, it feels so warm.I hear the door open, it's only 5, mom said they'll be late, but they came pretty early. I just lie down there for a while more and someone swings the door of gamma's room open.
"Mom, you scared-" I stop when I see James
"Oh thank god, you're ok" he says and hugs me.
"Umm, what are you-, how did you-, get in?"
"I had to use the spare key, why didn't you open the door when I rang? Do you know how worried I was? I thought you fainted again." He says holding my face in his palms
"Why were you worried?" I take his hands off, "You hate me, why do you care?" I ask
"Well, I don't, I don't care at all I was just- um, worried because-, because if anything happened to you then Aunt Rachel and Uncle Max would have been scared and I like them" he says
"I'm fine, and I didn't open the door because I promised to not show you my face today, did you forget? This doesn't count, cuz you barged in and saw my face" I say
"Right. But now, Since it's broken already I might as well see your face for longer, did you eat?" He says
"You're so annoying" I say
"You're more annoying" he says, "aren't you bored, alone?"
"Little bit" I say when I'm actually completely bored, and really need some distractions from gamma right now.
"Me too, come on lets play UNO" he says
"Seriously? UNO? I always win at that, and you always lose" I say
"That's because I always let you win"
"That's what losers say"
"No seriously, I just really liked seeing you smi-, umm I mean , you know what nothing, umm never mind, lets just play." He says.
He was totally going to say I liked seeing you smile. WHAT? So he liked my smile when we were kids? And he used to let me win? So he didn't hate me then? I just assumed he'd always hated me cuz of all the bullying, but now that I think about it, it was really small things, and he always had my back when anyone tried to actually bully me. Ugh I'm thinking too much maybe I should just shut my brain off.
"Mm hmm, I'll bring the cards" I say.
We sit on my bed, where we were totally cuddling the whole night last night, and play cards. He just has two more cards left and I sneak a peek when he gets a call, he has a yellow skip and a yellow seven, and I just put down a yellow four, which means he's going to win, ugh, maybe he did let me win, when we were younger. He comes back from his call and I pretend to not have just sneaked a peek.
"It's your turn" I say
"Mm hmm" he looks at his cards and then at me and then he picks a card from the deck, "I don't have yellow" he says.
Oh my god he's letting me win again. Why would he do that? I never knew he used to do that, so all of my victories were fake? I mean not all, right? But why would he let me win? He's like the most competitive person I know, he never lets Thalia win at any game and even with his friends, he'd always beat them, but why is he letting me win? We play until I win, but this time I don't really celebrate my victory like I usually do, because I know he let me win, and I'm just thinking about why he would do that.
"Aren't you happy?" He asks
"Mm hmm" I smile.
He smiles at my smile and says, "one more round?"
We literally play 5 times and I win every single time. I don't think any of those times were real. But it's kinda sweet that he lets me win, and that he's been doing that since childhood. Ugh, my thoughts are going haywire again.
My phone rings, it's my mom, "Sweetheart, it's raining pretty bad here, and we are pretty far from home, your dad and I decided to stay here and come back in the morning, you'll be fine right, should I call James?"
"No mom, no need to call him, he's right here, and I'll be fine, don't worry, you guys be safe" I say "Alright bye"
"Bye bye"
"Was that Aunt Ray?" James asks
"Yep, they're coming only tomorrow morning"
"So you'll be alone tonight?"
"Mm hmm"
"Let's go to my place, my mom will kill me if I didn't bring you"
"Fine, sounds good, I could really use some of Aunt Liz right now" I say
"Aunt Lizzie!!" I yell and run towards her like I haven't seen her for ages even though I just saw her last night.
"Oh Letty, my baby!!" She yells back"You're on FaceTime with Thalia?" James asks picking up his iPad.
"Thalia! Look I'm replacing you with your mom, she is so much better than you, you know" I tease. We all talk to Thalia and then have dinner together.
I love Aunt Lizze's food, it is so good. We all chat after dinner and it is so wholesome, my family and Lia's have always been like this, we are just one big family, Lia, James and I have two moms and two dads, we have always been close, literally did everything together. So their house also feels like home. I was planning on crashing in Lia's room but it was filled with cardboard boxes so I had to bunk with James again. Ugh I would have just stayed at home, if I knew this would happen. His room is still just as I remember it, filled with posters and he has this dart board that I love and a tiny basketball hoop, I love his room it's really fun. "Now I don't have a pool noodle but I hope you can stick to your side" he says
"Ya like that pool noodle was of any help" I mumble.
"Huh?" He says"Nothing I just said, Yessir"He falls asleep really fast but I'm not sleepy at all so I just play darts for a while and then when I'm bored I shoot hoops and it literally doesn't go in, even once. When I'm bored with doing that too, I decide to lie down and count sheep, cuz well it's my last resort, but then I turn toward James and watch him sleep so peacefully and he looks so calm, I just keep watching him and then I can't seem to take my eyes off of his lips, I go in closer, my lips almost touching his and then he opens his eyes and I pull back immediately, but he grabs my waist, pulling me closer to him. "What were you going to do?" He asks, I freeze."Hmm? Uh- uh nothing, I- uh there was um something on your face" I stutter.
"Oh really" he says and smiles and then he turns me so that my back is facing his front. Then he slides his hand on my waist and pulls me closer to him, "I guess have to hold you in place so that you don't do anything stupid" he says I turn back so that I'm facing him and his hand is now around my back and because of the stupid crop top I'm wearing, his hand is touching my bare back.
"You really shouldn't be touching people you hate, like this" I say.
"You started it, by almost kissing me" he says
"I wasn't- I did not!" I say
"You did too and You know, if my touching you, bothers you so much, I think I'm going to keep doing it" he says and turns me back again and his hand is inside my crop top now, completely, he pulls me closer to him by pulling my waist and whispers to my ear, "You're enjoying this aren't you?"
"No, I'm not, not one bit" I say and try not to smile."Great, I'm happy as long as, you're not" he says.
But I am happy, really happy, I love being held by him, why? I don't know, he's a total red flag but then he's also green, it's like he's only red to me but that's because he thinks I'm red too, am I defending his actions? Oh my god, I have lost my mind, I'm just going to stop overthinking and just be a happy rabbit in his arms. Being with him, like this just made me forget about gamma and I felt comforted.
The next day, reality hit again, I woke up and he'd already left, I don't see him when I go down to eat breakfast either, I eat my breakfast and go home and get dressed for gamma's funeral. I really thought my eyes had dried out from all the crying but apparently not, I cried the whole day, and it all went by so fast. Gamma was gone, who am I supposed to call when I'm happy and when I'm sad now? She was the only one, who had the perfect replies for everything I said to her and asked her, she was always on my side and she comforted me when my heart was breaking, who is gonna support me now? I guess James has been pretty helpful through it all, I saw him at the funeral, but I was too occupied to talk to him. He's been distracting me from this nightmare and comforting me but with the experience I have with him, it's probably all gonna stop soon, he can only be nice to me for two days, that's the longest it can go and then he just does something really mean and cancels out all the niceness, it's like a pattern at this point. Maybe all this was just cuz of pity, but I think it's gonna be worse when he becomes hostile again this time, because I'm attached again, no matter how much I deny it, every time he does something nice I don't ever want him to leave me and want to cling on to him all the time but I can't. And this time, I got so much more attached because he was actually nice to me and comforted me so much, but I know he'll switch by tomorrow.
Whatever reason he has to hate me, cannot be good enough for him to hate me this much! He's just so unbelievably rude sometimes, for example when he was totally yelling at me the night I got to know about gamma, maybe it was his way of coping but he can't just use me as his personal scapegoat whenever he wants and then abandon me when he's done. Whatever he said to me that day was as mean as it gets and he even hurt me that night, my arms were red because of his nails digging in to my skin, but someone did put an ointment on it and Lia had no idea about that so I guess it was James. But that doesn't make what he did any better.
Enough about stupid James though, today only one person is gonna occupy my thoughts and that person is gamma, even though she's gone, she'll always be with me, in my heart , in my thoughts and guide me whenever I ask, she'll send me signs and never leave me alone cuz I'm sure she's an angel now, and she will always look after me. After everything was done, my mom and I visited gamma's grave once again. We said our finally goodbyes and shed some more tears, she'll be missed, very much, my mom didn't want to leave and I gave her a hug telling her, it will all be fine and that gamma will always be with her, I needed that hug too. I really wanted to be strong for my mom and she wanted to be strong for me but neither of us could and just consoled each other with our vulnerable side.
James and I had a flight the next day morning and we said our goodbyes and went to the airport. He held my hand the whole plane ride and I fell asleep on his shoulder. And then on our cab ride back, we talked after a long time of silence.
"You know I hate you right? I don't have to re-establish that by shouting at you? Right?" He says.
"What? Re-establish? Oh my god, is that what you did after the reunion?"
"Mm hmm, cuz you looked like you had forgotten"
"Unbelievable, please don't yell at me again, I know you hate me, I totally know that"
"Great" he says.
And that's the last thing I hear him say for like a month, I go back to my daily routine of avoiding him, cuz I don't want him to, 're-establish' his hatred. He's just so annoying but also the whole month, I notice all the nice things he does for everyone else. He really just hates me, only me, and I need to find out why. I'm nice, right? Why would he hate me?