On The Line

Music began to echo through the silent bedroom. I lifted my head, barely opening my eyes, only to find that the room was still pitch black. “Why does this keep happening to me?” I thought to myself and flopped my head back onto the pillow in defeat. Sunlight was starting to seep through the closed curtains, but not enough to even slightly brighten the room. I moved my arm out from its cocoon of warmth underneath the blankets and instantly regretted it. In reaction to the new found chill reaching my skin, my eyes squeezed tightly shut.

I reached out for the miniature lamp that sat on the nightstand next to the bed. I did not know my way around this room like I did my own, especially in the dark, so a little light was needed in order to find the phone that continued to ring. With poor timing on my part, I had just began to open my eyes after adjusting to the air in the room when I squeezed them firmly shut again because of the lamp illuminating the room.

That was when his arm tightened his hold around my waist and face buried into the back of my shoulder to hide from the light. It was scary how well our bodies fit together. We were both lying on our side and he had his arm around me, holding my back to his bare chest. I wrapped my fingers around his hand and tried to pry his arm off of me so I could get up and find the phone that was still ringing.

“Let it go, Rebecca,” Erik whispered in my ear and his lips brushed against it with every word. Then, he used his nose to brush my hair out of the way and began to place soft, gentle kisses on the back of my neck. He could sense the chills that ran up my spine and took it as a queue to hold my body closer to his.

The ringing stopped showing that the call had gone to voicemail. Once the room returned to silence, I could not stop my mind from flooding with the memories of the previous night. How was I supposed to turn down his offer when he asked me to stay the night with him? First, I always had a soft spot for those puppy eyes of his that made it basically impossible for me to say no. Second, he had brought up that word ‘love’. Hook, line, and sinker. He basically told me that his fiancé broke it off because she thought that he was in love with me. I do not think he noticed, but he never denied it. And that is why I ended up staying; just to see where things would go.

I let out an exaggerated huff, rolled onto my stomach, and drove my face into the pillow when I heard the ringtone erupt from the cell phone again. Erik began to draw lazy circles on my back like the ringing didn’t even bother him.

“Make it stop,” I mumbled into the pillow.

“Just ignore it, baby girl,” he replied – I did not know he heard me – and traced his fingers up my spine until they reached my neck so he could cup his hand gently on the back of my neck. I turned my head so I was facing him, his hand moved so it was now cupping my face and he was lightly rubbing my cheek with his thumb. Without another word, he brought his face closer and pressed his lips to mine.

It was distracting how nonchalant he was about it. This had not been our first kiss, there had been quite a bit of kissing the night before, but it still was not something casual for me. It started last night, we were about to start a new movie in our all night movie marathon. Erik was sprawled out on the couch and I was in the kitchen standing by the microwave, waiting for the bag of popcorn to be fully popped.

“What if she was right?” he called out so I could hear him even though I was in a different room. He continued before I got a chance to ask him to explain. “About me not being completely devoted to her.” This was the conversation I had been waiting for, but I was not about to let him know that. I cannot believe I was letting him do this to me. Never have I ever had serious thoughts about Erik as more than a friend. Sure, I thought about being with him on a handful of occasions, but I never thought much of them because I did not have actual feelings for him. But here I am, thinking about it nonstop since he brought up what his ex-fiancé really thought about me.

“I think she was just overreacting or reading too much into things or something,” I answered, trying to sound as emotionally detached as I could. The last thing I wanted him to think was that I would be all over him because he was single for the first time since I met him.

“Maybe I’ve had feelings for you this entire time; just been too blind to see it or too stubborn to admit it.” He was now standing directly behind me, speaking in nothing louder than a whisper. I was facing this microwave, with my hands resting on the counter, and my fingers began to nervously tap. He placed his hands next to my hands on the counter so his arms were on either sides of my body, closing me in. The microwave beeped, signaling that the popcorn was done, but I made no motion to take the bag out because I was too afraid to move. “Let me try something,” he stated and turned me around in his arms. There was a pause, like he wanted to dive right in and kiss me roughly but then decided against it. Instead, he placed his hand under my chin and tilted my face up so I was looking into his eyes, slightly smiled, and closed the space between our lips.

It all went down from there. There was kissing on the couch during the movie, kissing in the hallway, kissing all the way to the bedroom. That was as far as I let it go though. I just could not do it. Part of me liked what was happening because we were both realizing that he care about each other as more than friends, but a bigger part of me thought it wasn’t right. His relationship had just ended, so I was either the rebound or the theory of Erik loving me all along was true. Neither option was good. They made me feel like “the other woman”.

“Erik,” I murmured into his lips as we continued to kiss. The phone had begun to ring for the third time and I could not just let it go anymore.

“You can call them back later,” he replied and rotated my body so I was lying on my back. He then positioned himself on top of me, held up by his knees and elbows that were on either side of my body. I smirked at the way his hair hung around his face as he looked down at me.

“I don’t think it’s my phone,” I returned and reached up to run my fingers through his hair. “I think it’s yours.”

“Then I can call them back later,” he answered with a smirk appearing on his face as well. He then closed the gap between us and began to kiss me again. I let out a slight hum at the feel of his lips and his tongue ran over my lips, pleading for entrance, the same way it had many times the night before. Instead of accepting him, I pulled away.

“It could be Jason or one of the other guys,” I laughed out as I had to keep moving my face to avoid his lips that continued to try and connect with mind. The phone began to ring and I let out a sigh filled with annoyance and frustration, covering my face with my hands.

“Beck,” he sighed, running his fingers through my hair trying to calm me down.

“This is the fourth time now, can you just answer it? Someone is obviously trying to get a hold of you.”

Finally, Erik rolled off of me with a huff, made his way to the other side of the bed and stood up. He walked over to his dresser and picked up the phone, simply holding it in his hand and just stared. A look of shock mixed with panic formed on his face.

“Erik?” I questioned. Worry filled my mind to see him so instantly distressed.

“It’s her.”

*~*~*~*~*

Home sweet home.

After a long train ride back to Boston, all I wanted to do was curl up in my bed and go to sleep. I was planning on staying in Ottawa for a whole week, but I only ended up staying that one day. I had gone back to my parent’s house after waking up at Erik’s place. They understood when I explained this situation and told them I wanted to get back home as soon as possible. So I hopped on a train a couple of hours later. And now I’m home, far away from all the drama.

From what I gathered, not actually hearing her side of the conversation, Erik’s ex-fiancé had called to apologize for everything and tell him she regretted breaking up with him. An extremely cheesy grin appeared on his face when she told him that she did not want to call off their engagement. A part of my heart ripped. I had not seen him that happy since I arrived; it was like all his sorrow immediately became happiness at the sound of her voice. It was like he completely forgot about me, even though I still lying in his bed.

This was what I wanted though. Right? I hadn’t really wanted to be with Erik, I knew it was wrong from the very moment he kissed me. We were both just caught up in the moment and that phone call was there to bring us back to reality.

So why was I crying? Curled up in my bed at home, why was I so upset? I knew twelve hour fling Erik and I had was not going to become something real. Fate was going to bring him and his fiancé back together or he was going to find someone else that he did not have a history with. “Maybe I’ve had feelings for him this entire time; just been too blind to see it or too stubborn to admit it,” I thought to myself, quoting what Erik had said to me just the day before. I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to push out all my thoughts of him, and tried to fall asleep.

Music began to echo through my silent bedroom.

“You have got to be shitting me!” I exclaimed and furiously sat up in my bed. I glared over at my cell phone as it sat on my dressed, glowing and ringing. “You can’t just let me have one night to myself, can you?” I asked my cell phone as if it could actually hear me.

I pushed myself out from under the covers and stormed over to the glowing object and grabbed it with full intensions of throwing it against the wall. Instead, without looking for a name on the screen, I accepted the incoming call.

“What?” I huffed, trying to cover up my anger, but the person on the line had to be stupid not to know I was frustrated.

“Come to the door.”

“What? No.”

“Just come to the door.”

Without removing the phone from my ear, I walked out of my bedroom and made my way to the front door. I still did not know who I was going to be faced with because I had yet to actually look and see who I was on the phone with. I pulled open the front door to find Erik standing there. To say I was shocked would be an understatement; I released my hold on my cell phone and it went crashing to the floor.

“Beck, I made the wrong choice.”