Breaking Hearts Has Never Looked So Cool

Everything was perfect, everything was beautiful. I sat down to do my homework on Sunday with a smile on my face, I grinned blankly at my mother when she made me cook dinner because she was tired, and as the later evening approached, I lay on my bed, unable to even contemplate sleeping. I felt like Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady when she sang the song about dancing, or like I was on drugs.

A huge part of me wanted to call Annabelle and tell her that she had been right all along, and to share how high I felt that I had finally got the guy. I even reached for my phone a few times, but something made me hold back. I didn’t want to hear her screech ‘I told you so!’ down the phone, and then have her relate Gerard and I to her and Mikey in some way. There was something horribly smug about her sometimes, and it felt right to keep a happy little secret away from everyone else.

‘Besides,’ I thought to myself, ‘I don’t even know what Gerard and I are’

I devoted a few perplexing minutes to trying to work it out, and I eventually came to the conclusion that I didn’t care. Maybe we were indefinable.

The next day, he came unexpectedly to pick me up at 11am. My mum was still asleep, so I left her a note saying ‘Gone out with Frank – phone is on, see you later x’ and jumped into Gerard’s car without a second thought. We just drove around, apparently aimlessly, talking and listening to the radio. I didn’t care what I did with him – being around him was exquisite enough to make any situation enjoyable.

I was already worryingly immersed in him, but I was in too deep to contemplate turning back. He had me hook, line and sinker, 100%. I couldn’t work out if he knew how I felt about him, or if he returned it in any way, nor did I care. He wanted to be around me, he wanted to kiss me. That was enough.

“Yesterday was...amazing,” he said after a half hour or so of small talk. He pulled in to a secluded lay by near the side of the road.

“Yeah,” I agreed, letting my head fall back comfortably on to the headrest of the seat.

I wanted to say something like ‘I can’t believe you feel the same way about me!’ but it didn’t feel right, so I decided to stay silent.

It remained quiet for a few moments, and I considered asking him for a definition of what we were, but I dismissed the notion almost immediately. He didn’t need to call me his girlfriend for him to like me. I certainly didn’t need to call him my boyfriend to be hideously head-over-heels for him. I didn’t want to become another Mikey and Annabelle; so concerned with what they were that they sometimes forgot that they were supposed to care for each other. Well, that was more Annabelle anyway.

As far as I could understand it, the weekend party that I had missed out on had seen her get drunk again, and this time disappear off suspiciously with a strange guy. I pitied Mikey, but I also partly judged him for not breaking up with her. The niggling idea that happy people don’t cheat also remained at the back of my mind, and I wondered what was so wrong with Annabelle that she felt she had to find affection somewhere other than Mikey.

“You’re in another world again,” said Gerard eventually, apparently noticing the pensive expression on my face.

I snapped back into consciousness to see his face swimming before my eyes. Immediately everything else snapped back into perspective too. Mikey and Annabelle’s relationship was nothing to do with me; not my problem. As their friend, it wasn’t my responsibility to sort them out. Besides, all that mattered was the beautiful and amazing man sitting next to me, his heartbreakingly hazel eyes boring right into mine.

“Sorry,” I grinned apologetically, and I felt his pale, spidery hand reach out and caress my cheek.

“You don’t have to be sorry,” he said softly, “what were you thinking about?”

“Mikey and Annabelle,” I confessed sheepishly, and a dark cloud crossed over his face.

“I don’t like what she does to him,” he said, not really sounding that angry, but more sounding disappointed.

“Neither do I,” I agreed, “it’s not right,”

“And its not right for him to stay with her,” he added, and I shook my head. I wanted to say ‘I would never do that to you,’ but I couldn’ think of a way of getting the idea across without sounding stupid so I just tried to communicate it with my imploring eyes.

“I think they moved too fast,” he commented, “they called themselves boyfriend and girlfriend and branded themselves a serious relationship before they’d even been seeing each other a week,”

I smiled involuntarily; that was exactly what I had thought at the time.

“I know,” I agreed fervently, “and now they feel attached to this relationship they forged before they even knew if it would work or not,”

We contemplated this in complete silence for a short while. I found silences with Gerard pleasurable, rather than awkward. It gave me a chance to digest the ideas we came up with, and I could study his face and the way he casually tossed his hair out of his eyes.

“I don’t want that to happen with us,” he said carefully, as though he was worried he might upset me a little.

“Me neither,” I agreed, rather than using empty promises like ‘it won’t’ or ‘we’re different,’

“We don’t need to be defined by everyone else,” he stated more confidently, putting his hand on my leg gently. I felt as though a delightful warmth seeped into my body from where his hand lay.

“No,” I said, “we don’t even need to define ourselves,”

He was leaning close to me again, and everything was a haze; I was intoxicated by his scent, and then I was intoxicated by his kiss, again and again.

Everything about him exhilarated me and left me desperate for more.

After he dropped me back home, and swiftly disappeared down my street, I remained at the living room window, watching the last spot where I had seen his car.

I was scared of how much I felt for him, and yet I didn’t care if it crushed or overwhelmed me. Being close to him was worth it, every time.