Misunderstandings (Woodfalls Girls 2)

“Okay,” I said, shrugging out of my raincoat as he left the room.

“How goes it?” Melissa asked once the door had closed behind him.

I shrugged, flopping back on my bed. “I swear he’ll ruin me. Never in my whole life have I ever shouted at another person like that. He brings out the inner monster in me,” I said, feeling sick now that all the anger was gone.

“Not anger, passion,” Melissa piped in.

“What?”

“You feel passionately about him,” she said, proud of her diagnosis.

“I’m pretty sure what I felt was anger,” I said wryly.

“Anger and passion are basically the same thing. If you truly were angry, you would have walked away. Instead, you faced the problem. You embraced it passionately,” she said insightfully as she stood up and stretched. “Now, I need to take a shower before the person I feel passionately about shows up,” she said, flouncing off to the bathroom.

I contemplated her words. Was she right? Did I feel passionately about Justin? She had to be wrong. People felt passionately for each other months into a relationship, not after one month. I knew what I had felt in the courtyard when I spotted him with the other girl wrapped around him like some serpent or something. It was jealousy and hurt that waged a battle inside me as I tried to comprehend the scene. For a moment, every insecurity I’d ever felt surfaced. He made me feel that way, whether accidental or not. He made me face the reasons why I tried to avoid relationships.

I was still on my bed studying the ceiling and contemplating the doom of my sanity when Melissa exited the bathroom with a towel wrapped around her torso. “Are you okay?” she asked, taking in my expression.

“No. I’m a weak, nimble-minded female who’s letting some guy lead me around like I’m his bitch or something,” I grumbled. “Why did you have to introduce me to him? I was fine without some guy clouding the water.”

“Yeah, but think how boring that would be. Cloudy water is good for everyone. It’s the people who have the crystal-clear water who scare the crap out of me. So stop taking everything so seriously and enjoy your swim in this crazy murky water,” she said, grabbing a change of clothes and heading back to the bathroom.

I watched the door shut behind her and felt slightly better. That was the beauty or at times the horror of living with someone who was all rainbows and unicorns. Maybe she was right. Maybe murky wasn’t bad. So what if I had dived into water that was impossible to see through? Maybe just once I would let myself go.

Maybe I could put my faith and trust in one person.

19.

Present Day

2:53 PM

“I’m hungry,” Justin complained, checking his phone for the millionth time.

“We’ve covered that,” I said, shifting my position to help ease the numbness that had set in.

“I know, but I’m now thinking about food like it’s a lover or something. Like how juicy and delicious a cheeseburger loaded with bacon and all the fixings would be at the moment.”

My stomach rumbled loudly at his words. “Not nice,” I said, placing a hand on my stomach to quiet the gurgling.

“Or a large pepperoni pizza with extra cheese,” he continued, ignoring me.

“No, a tender steak cooked to perfection with a side salad and a loaded baked potato.” I added my two cents in.

He groaned at my words. “With a hot fudge brownie sundae,” he added, looking pained but eager at the same time.

“We’re gluttons for misery,” I pointed out as my stomach growled its displeasure.

“We have to do something to pass the time.”

“I have a deck of cards,” I offered up.

“What? Why are you just now mentioning this?” he asked, scooting across the floor until he was sitting less than a foot and a half from me.

My heart stuttered for a fraction of a moment before kicking into warp speed at his close proximity. The tantalizing smell of his cologne, which I had spent the last three hours trying to ignore, swirled around me like a blanket woven from countless memories. It was his scent. It didn’t matter that millions of men probably owned the same cologne. On him it smelled different. I knew this because back in my pain-filled road to recovery, I had made the forty-five-minute drive to the mall outside Woodfalls and purchased a bottle of it. Unable to wait until I got home, I had sprayed my jacket, wanting that small part of him. I was bitterly disappointed that it wasn’t the same. Sitting across from him on the elevator floor, I couldn’t help breathing in, trying to brand the smell to my memory so maybe this time it wouldn’t leave me.

“What do you want to play?” Justin asked, shuffling the cards like he was a blackjack dealer in Vegas.