Opposites Distract

I sighed and deleted the picture before preparing to take another one for about the thousandth time this afternoon. It was proving to be rather difficult to take a semi attractive picture of myself half naked. It made me feel so uncomfortable, and dirty, and it was just intensely degrading… I mean, I went to Notre Dame, where our RAs are nuns and priests! This felt so wrong, but… It had to be done, for Jack and Warren’s sake.

Once I took an acceptable picture, I called Alex. “Hello?”

“What?” he asked sharply.

“It’s ready…”

It took quite a while to get Alex on board with this plan of mine. “…Send it in fifteen minutes, Let me talk him into seeing you,” Alex sighed grudgingly.

“Thank you…”

“Fuck you,” Alex laughed bitterly. “Seriously, though, Taylor, please don’t go through with this. If you do this, you and Jack will never have a chance at a relationship ever again. Please? Jack is my boy, and I’ve never seen him into someone so much before. Don’t ruin this for him. For you.”

I swallowed hard and tiredly rubbed my temples. “I’m not ruining anything. We never had a chance at a real relationship, anyways…Bye, Alex.”

“Jack would strongly disagree with you…” He sighed for what seemed like an eternity before softly saying, “Bye, Taylor.”

We hung up. I got in the bathroom, changing out of the lingerie into a black bandeau and a pair of skinny jeans. “Warren, are you ready?” I asked when I got out, lingerie in hand. He nodded and got up from my kitchen table, slipping his shirt off. “Leave that on the floor here,” I muttered, pointing to the floor by the door to my room.

He nodded and did as I said, following me inside. I tossed the thong and bra onto the floor. The clothes made a trail leading to my bed. I sighed and slid under the covers. “Well, come here, then,” I laughed softly at Warren’s expression.

“Are you sure about this, Tay?” Warren asked dubiously. “I don’t want you to do something you’ll regret…”

I rolled my eyes. “Get the fuck in my bed, Warren.” I’d spent all day yesterday and all last night and all this morning thinking about this. In other words, I haven’t slept since yesterday, and I have come to the conclusion that, do it or do not, I would regret it either way. I just, I felt like I was leading Jack on, and I didn’t want to do that to him anymore. Despite his immaturity, he was a great guy, and we just weren’t going to work. Oh fucking well…

Warren reluctantly slid under the covers with me, keeping some space between us. “Oof,” I muttered, pulling the sheets up so it looked like we were naked underneath them. I was the one who came up with this plan. It was pretty convenient. Warren had talked to his RA about his problems and had decided to become a priest. A fucking priest. I know those are pretty bad words to combine, but still – Warren wanted to become a fucking priest! I guess I always knew deep down that Warren wasn’t the marriage type…still… I couldn’t get over it, or believe it, but he was really dead set on becoming a priest. Such fuckery! Well, I guess we need more priests in this world.

Suddenly, I got a call from Alex. “What?”

“He’s on his way,” Alex said in a low voice.

“Alright, then.”

“Bitch, he loves you!”

I just laughed bitterly, because I wanted to believe it, but also to hear it from Jack himself. “Alright, then.”

"I hope you're happy," Alex scoffed before hanging up on me.

If everything went according to plan, Jack would come and see us together, think the message was actually for Warren, think that I’d been cheating on him for quite a while, think I was such a fucking slut, and leave for Maryland with May, the both of them never wanting to see either of us ever again.

Sometime later, I heard my door swing open, so I quickly scooted over to Warren and he wrapped his arms around me so it looked like we were cuddling. “You smell like…like lemons,” Warren said, his nose buried in my hair.

“You smell like…sweat,” I laughed, turning away from him. Making my fucking bed right here. Yes, we had to pretend, but still, I didn’t like it when Warren did that. Jack always did that. He liked the way I smelled. “Damn, Warren.”

That was when I heard the tell tale slamming of my door being opened. “Wow, Taylor…My sister’s ex-fiancé? Really? You’re such a fucking whore,” Jack practically snarled. It hurt to hear him so angry at me. “Have a nice life, you both deserve each other!” And Jack stormed out of my apartment.

I have no idea how long I just laid there, but when Jack left and slammed the door afterwards, Warren got out of bed and grabbed his shirt. “Thanks, Taylor.” I didn’t reply. Warren sat down at the edge of my bed. “You alright?”

“Can you please do me a huge favor?” I whispered, pulling a pillow over my eyes.

“Sure…”

“I want you to take me somewhere. But, first, I need to…I need…” Warren wordlessly grabbed the box of tissues from my bathroom. I tried to limit the crying to an hour. I promised myself that was my limit, at least for today. After that, I had Warren take me to a body shop. I got surprisingly a lot done – nose piercing, an industrial piercing on my left ear, an extra helix piercing on my right, a tongue ring, and also a tattoo… of


“What does that mean?” Warren asked curiously, poking the small tattoo right behind my ear just to fuck with me.

I swatted his hand away, protectively covering up my new tattoo. I looked at it in the mirror before somewhat smiling to myself. I’d never gotten a tattoo before. I thought I should get Jack’s name as my first tattoo since he was my first…as corny as it sounds, love. And the first mistake I made that I actually regret. I wanted to be sure that I wouldn’t make another mistake like this again.

Not saying that Jack was a mistake – falling so hard so fast when he didn’t feel the same way was a mistake. I think. I guess. I know. No. I don’t know. I don’t know anything, but that I was certain that of one thing – all this pain was more tolerable than the pain of Jack leaving me.

Still, that little voice in the back of my head always reminded me of what Alex said.

“Bitch, he loves you!"

Hahaaa…not anymore.