Love Ridden

I just stand there, stuck, unable to move, like my feet were sitting in wet cement. I didn’t know what to do. She just walked away from me without a backwards glance and I have no clue what to do. I’m not even sure how long I’ve been standing here in shock before I hear Jenny calling my name. She rounds the corner, seeing me, eyeing me with a puzzled expression. She takes a place right in front of me and I don’t even think I acknowledge that she's blocked my view. My mind is still reeling and my body hasn’t quite caught up with the situation. She snaps her fingers in front of my face and says my name several times before I actually respond, shaking my head and glancing down at her.

She repeats herself since I clearly missed her words the first few times. “What happened? Why are acting like this? You look like you've seen a ghost.”

I look back to where I last saw Madelyn’s figure. “I saw her. She was here. I hugged her. My arms were actually around her. But she left me. Again. She left me again.” The words fall out of my mouth like little tiny bombs, each one exploding, making a new crater in my heart.

Jenny shook my shoulders. “Who? Madelyn? Are you telling me you saw Madelyn?”

I just nod, incapable of anything more. Then she hits me, out of nowhere, she hits me. I grab my arm in pain. “Ow! What was that for?”

"Niall! What the hell are you doing still standing here?!" She practically yells at me in the middle of the store. People are starting to look.

"But she left." I gesture towards the door, helplessly. "She said it was nice to see me and she left." I mumble, still rubbing the sore spot.

"Oh my god. Have you…" She huffs and shakes her head. "Have you never seen a movie in your life? When the girl runs away you are supposed to chase her, Idiot!" She mumbles this last bit and then puts both her hands on my shoulders and forces me to look at her. "Answer this for me. Do you want Madelyn? Do you love her?"

I don’t even have to think about it before I answer. It comes naturally. “Of course I love her! I can barely live without her! Look at me. I’m a mess.”

She smiles knowingly at me and points to the door. “Then go get her.”

Why have I been such an idiot?! That’s exactly what I have to do. I have to go get her. She can’t walk away from my life like this. I can’t let that happen. I smile at Jenny and take off at a run for my car parked outside. I slam it into drive and speed in the direction of Madelyn’s flat. The drive is short but it’s already been almost an hour since I saw her last. I race up the stairs and use my key to open the door. As I walk through her flat I start to worry. What if she doesn’t want me? What if she tells me to leave? I don’t know if I can handle that. That’s a rejection that would devastate me, but it’s too late now. I’ve got to find out before the not knowing kills me. I find her in the kitchen where she’s making herself a cup of tea. It’s what she always does when she’s upset. She looks up at me, sets her mug down and walks past me out of the room without even a word.

Anger comes out of nowhere. I can feel it start to bubble up inside me and I follow her. She stops, turning around and I’m only inches from her. My voice is quiet and low when I speak, but I am anything but calm. “What the hell was that? How can you just leave me like that? In the middle of a shop! I haven’t seen you in forever! Where have you been?” My voice is steadily growing louder as I continue. I place my hands on her shoulders and clutch at her. It’s almost like they know she might try and leave again. “Do have any idea what I’ve been going through? You left me! With no word! Just one moment you were there and the next moment you were gone!” I can feel myself starting to shake, my body becoming incapable of holding everything in that I’m feeling. Trying to ignore it, I press on. “I tried to call you. I tried to text you. You never once picked up. You never once answered me. What was I supposed to think? What was I supposed to do? I couldn’t think what I had done wrong! Why would my best friend suddenly decide she was done with me?!”

I’m about to lose it, just break down and cry. But Madelyn does something I don’t expect of her. She pulls away from me and collapses onto the floor. All traces of my anger are gone. All I can think about is her. I can’t bear to see this pain she’s in right now. I sink down to the floor in front of her. “You have to talk to me! I’ve driven everyone around me mad. I’m not even seeing that girl anymore. You know what she told me? She told me she couldn’t stand to hear me talk about you anymore! See! Everyone! I drove everyone crazy! Now talk to me! Tell me! What the hell happened between us?”

I have to know why she left me. I have to know if she will have me back. I have to know if she can even love me like I love her. I watch her face change, from sadness to worry and then she hesitates before I see that she's finally made up her mind about something. She opens her mouth and takes a deep breath before speaking.

She wants me to promise her something. I am beyond ready to give her anything she asks for and more. But can I do this? Not speak? Not interrupt? Not ask her anything? And I’m about to do all of the things she’s asked me not to when her words make me pause.

"If you stop me, I will lose my nerve. I won’t be able to tell you what I want you to know, the words that I need you to finally hear. Okay? Can you do that for me?"

She looks at me, searching my face for an answer. I see just how nervous she is about whatever it is she’s about to say, but she has to know that I would do anything for her. I look down at her hands, watch them moving back and forth across each knuckle, popping and cracking them over and over again. It’s her nervous habit. She does it whenever she doesn’t know what to do or say or whenever she feels uncomfortable. So I do the only thing I’ve ever done when she is nervous like this. I reach across the open space between us and take both of her hands in mine. I wrap my fingers around hers and I hold her tightly. I look back into her eyes and nod. I can be silent and still. For her.

Her voice is strong as she begins explaining herself. “When I first met you I knew that I had met someone who was so much like me. You are someone who laughs at the same things I do which is something I love. ”

Her words bring me back to those first weeks when we had met. We literally laughed all the time. She could have me doubled over while I had her in tears from nothing. We laughed at nothing and everything. That’s when I knew that she was different and she was special.

She’s continued talking and she’s saying all the things I’ve always felt, but what she’s saying now has me back at attention, focused completely on her.

"You made me so happy, but then something changed inside me. I started to think things about you that you are not supposed to think about your best friend, things that I never thought that I would admit you." She laughs her adorable little laugh and my heart feels like bursting because it’s been so long since I’ve heard it.

"And yet here I am. I’m ready to finally spill my guts to you. I’m ready for whatever happens after I say what I’m going to say because this last month without you has been terrible and I can’t imagine doing that forever."

I watch her take a deep breath and I know that this is it. What she is about to say is either going to make me incredibly happy or break me forever. All I can do is pray that it is the first.

"When I look at you my pulse quickens."

After her first sentence my heart starts to race. Could she really be about to say all that I’ve hoped and dreamed of hearing from her.

"I’ve secretly watched you so closely, watched your mouth form words, your lips wrap themselves around sounds. I’ve imagined those same lips on mine. On me." As the words leave her mouth, it takes everything I have, not to wrap her in my arms, pull her into my lap, and silence her with my kisses. But I promised I would listen, I wouldn’t interrupt, so, I sit still.

“I’ve dreamed of your hands on me, exploring my skin, discovering the things I like most.” It’s like she’s been inside my own head, watching my own thoughts, seeing my own fantasies.

"I’ve fantasized about touching you. I’ve awoken in the middle of the night with my own hands touching myself, the memory of your skin against me, but it’s only ever a dream." She pauses and she’s another deep breath and I am unsure of whether I should let her continue or stop her right here, but she seems determined to say these things and I want to know everything she’s been thinking. Can she really be about to tell me what would make the happiest man on earth?

"I know that it doesn’t make sense that I feel like this and that I haven’t talked to you. I know that I’ve been avoiding you, but I had to do something to save myself. I couldn’t watch you with another girl. Not again."

Her voice is starting to crack and I’m not sure I can stay quiet much longer.

"I couldn’t become someone you only came to when she wasn’t around. It hurt too much. It hurt being slowly forgotten, slowly phased out and pushed aside."

Tears were starting to form in her eyes and they were breaking my heart. This is the girl I’ve loved and she thought I was pushing her aside, but her next words really did pierce my heart right at its center.

"I couldn’t watch you fall slowly in love with someone else." She’s never known how I felt about her, never known that she is the last face I think of when I fall asleep, never known that she is the only girl I’ve ever wanted and that all those others were only because I didn’t think she felt the same.

She’d paused for only a second before she pushed on. “I couldn’t watch you love someone else when I am so desperately in love with you. I only want you. I want to be everything to you. I want to be your best friend and the woman who gets to love you. Forever.”

I am speechless. For the first time in my life I have no words. Nothing. I’m stunned.

She’s finally said it. She is in love with me. She wants me, only me, forever.

My heart feels like it’s exploded in my chest. I feel like this is the end of some cheesy romance and I want to pick her up and swing her around. I want to throw my head back and laugh with joy. I’ve never been so happy in my life. I pull my hands away from hers. They are itching to hold her, longing to pull her into my lap and keep her there forever. We have so much lost time to make up. My mind has gone off track in my excitement and happiness and when I look back at Madelyn, she is staring at the floor. I can see her chin starting to shake and I know she is about to cry. This is something I cannot allow.

I put my hand beneath her chin and raise her face slowly to mine. I cradle it with both my hands as a tear leaks from her eye and falls. She closes them as I swipe it away with my thumb.

My beautiful girl is sad. I can’t imagine what she is thinking but whatever it is, she's wrong. There’s only one way to show her just how wrong, she is right now.

Before any other tears can fall, I kiss her.
I kiss her and fill it with every ounce of love I have held inside.
I claim her as mine.
Mine.
Forever and always.
fin

Notes