Blinking a few times, I wait for my brain to catch up and get rid of this hallucination, but it doesn’t go away. Patrick is standing in front of me, somehow looking more handsome than when I saw him this morning. “Uh, when did you start delivering food? Does your job pay you that badly?”
He lets out a small chuckle and continues holding my large bag of Thai food. “You are ridiculous.”
“What are you doing here then?” I say curiously, but it comes out a bit defensive. The man is holding the fate of my dinner in his hands; I should be nicer to him.
He stares at me blankly, but it quickly turns confused. “You texted me to come over?”
“I did not.”
Okay, now I actually sound defensive.
Patrick pulls out his phone and shows me his text messages, and right in front of my eyes is a text conversation from my number asking Patrick to come over.
That is impossible.
I go to the kitchen and grab my phone off the counter. There's no way I could've sent those messages since my phone has been intentionally out of arms length since I started studying. I type my code in to open my lock screen, and the texts are staring right at me.
Ellie:Hey! If you’re not busy tonight, you should come over! I’ll probably be done studying by 7!!!
Patrick:Okay, cool! I figured you’d be studying all night, but I’ll swing by.
Patrick:On my way.
The realization flashes before my eyes.
Nick was hanging out in the kitchen earlier and asked if he could use my phone to look up a new recipe because his phone was charging in his room. He must’ve gone into my messages and texted Patrick.
What the actual fuck? Why would he do that? He wants to be right so bad that he is going out of his way to set up a hang out with Patrick from my phone. I think I might actually kill him. This is crossing a boundary. They are going to have to lock me up because I murdered my only friend.
Fuming turns into sympathy when I look back to see that Patrick is still standing in my doorway because I never actually invited him in. God, I’m such an asshole.
He came here to hang out with me, and all I’ve done is tell him that I didn’t invite him over and run away into my kitchen. Setting my head down on the counter, I yell out, “Patrick, can you please come inside?”
The least I can do is invite him in since he came all this way. My head is still on the cold granite countertop when I hear Patrick’s steps move closer.
He sits down at one of the stools that is across from me, but I refuse to lift my head up out of embarrassment and stupidity. He sounds more concerned than curious, and I hate this.“Ellie, I don’t want to pry, but can you tell me what’s going on?”
While I don’t want to lie to Patrick, I can’t tell him the complete truth. My brain attempts to think, trying to come up with something that sounds like a good enough excuse, but everything sounds stupid. Honestly, the truth sounds even more stupid, so I wing it.
“Nick texted you from my phone… I don’t exactly know why. He already had plans tonight, so if I had to assume, I would think he doesn’t want me to be alone during a school spiral.” I lift my head, gesturing to the living room. When he looks at the chaos and then back to me, a slight frown has formed on his face. “I’m sorry, Patrick. I didn’t know.”
He moves to stand up. “Oh, that’s fine. I’ll just go—”
"No, don't." Leaning across the counter, I grab his arm. “I mean, you don’t have to do leave. Fuck, I’m sorry."
"It's really not a big deal."
"But, you came all the way out here…” I trail off, feeling bad that I don't sound very convincing
He stares at me for a couple seconds, and I cannot figure out what is going through his head. He gently pulls himself out of my grip, looking me in the eyes. I can’t help but wonder what he sees right now. It is obvious that I am a complete wreck, but that’s not my fault—I wasn’t expecting to see anyone tonight.
His voice is soft and caring when he speaks up. “El, I don’t want to be here if I’m not wanted. This is a really weird situation, but I’m not upset or anything. It’s obvious that Nickjust really cares about you, and I get where he is coming from. I can see how stressed out you are right now, and I know that you need time to study alone. So, I’m going to go home, and you are not going to feel bad about something that is not your fault.”
I don’t know if it’s because I’m frustrated or tired, but my eyes start to water. Blinking to stop the tears from falling, my voice comes out a little shaky. “A-are you sure? I don’t want to be a jerk, but I really need to f-focus tonight.”
“Of course, El. No worries.” He places his hand on mine and gives me a small smile that is hard to believe with the rest of his expression not matching.
I watch him walk out my door, and I immediately regret asking him to leave. It’s embarrassing how desperately I wanted him to stay. I wanted him to hold me and kiss me and fuck me until I stopped being stressed out about everything.
