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This time though, it feels worse than it’s ever felt. This time was the hardest. This time, hemadeit the hardest.
I need my Kate fix.
When I see you, I only see colour.
You’re all shades of light, Katie.
You heal my fucking soul.
We are so fucking good together.
Show me you’re mine.
I’ve always been his. And he knows that. He knows that when he calls, I’ll always answer, that I’ll always show up.
I should never have gone. I should have never packed my bag. I know better by now. I know better, but he makes it so goddamn hard to care. In the moment, it’s always worth it, it’s worth that time I get with him, it’s worth those fleeting moments, those fantasies.
My James the artist. My James the drifter. My James the daring, adventurous, lovemaking god of a man.
But he’s not my James. He hasn’t been for a long time. And I know that.
“Katie…” he says through the phone, but his voice doesn’t sound like his. Maybe it’s all the alcohol he had to drink to get up the nerve to call me. At least there’s that, at least he felt bad enough that he needed a little liquid courage to once again break my fucking heart.
“I just want to manage expectations here, okay?” he adds when I don’t speak. “Things just… they felt heavy with us this time, you know? Maybe too heavy. I don’t want you to get the wrong idea of what this was. We’re friends, right? Katie?”
Tears fall down my face. This time, it’s not just the pain he’s causing making my chest feel tight. It’s anger. At him, at myself. How many fucking times have I done this with him? How many more times can I do it?
“James. I think…” I start, swallowing my emotion. “I think I have to be done with this, with us.”
“I know. Friends. We can start over as friends. Like we were before.”
It’s hard to remember a time when we were just friends. Much like my time with him, our friendship was a fleeing moment. Somewhere back in that art class, with his teasing and my snarky comments, we became what I think might be friends. But it didn’t take long for my newfriendto be spending time in my bedroom, for my newfriendto be kissing me in places no one had ever kissed me and making me feel things no one had ever made me feel before. We were never friends, but maybe that’s all he ever thought this was. Even though I know that can’t be true, even though I know there’s something broken inside him that will never let him admit how much he loves me. Something I can’t fix or figure out, no matter how hard I pull at his threads. A puzzle that’s missing pieces, that will never be whole.
“No. I can’t be that for you. We can’t be friends, James. You are fucking destroying me. Friends don’t do that. What we do is not friendship. We both know that. Why are you still playing this game with me?”
“No games. You know what this is, every time.”
“I do know. Every time you call me when you’re about to have a fucking breakdown and I’m always here to patch you up. To disarm the ticking time bomb in that fucking head of yours. Toheal your soul,” I add bitterly. “Don’t pretendyoudon’t know what this is.”
“And what’s that?” His voice comes out cold, but I ignore it, I stand my ground this time.
“It’s you searching for something to make youfeel.Anything. Because you don’t. You get off on cheap thrills and quick little adventures like your middle of the night vandalism, and then you can’t focus. You can’t get any feeling or emotion or passion into your art because you have none. And when you realize there’s nothing in your life to make you feel anything you call me. And every time you find it with me. You’re fucking desperate for it—for love, for the connection you never let anyone have with you. I give you that.”
There’s a pause, it’s heavy and angry and laced with whiskey and I know he’s probably been drinking since before the sun went down. “You’re wrong,” he says finally.
“I’m not. Tell me, what did you do before you called me? How many other girls did you fuck before you finally conceded to call the one person that can always pick you back up?”
“Kate—”
“How can you not see what we are? You love me, James.”
“I don’t,” he says, and this time his voice seems clearer, deeper, like he’s trying to take back control of this conversation. “I don’t, Kate. You know I don’t bother with that shit. I haven’t changed, I’m the same person I was the day we met.”
“You’re throwing this away.”
“I’m not.”
“You’re throwingmeaway.” And this time my voice comes out screaming. Because he doesn’t get it, he’s not listening, he’s not seeing what we are.
