Heart's in Baltimore

ALEX’S POV

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“Riley?” I could feel my brown irises widen in shock and confusion. What was she doing here? I hadn’t seen here in seven years…

“Yeah, it’s me…” her grey eyes flickered to the wooden porch. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be here. I don’t know what I’m doing,” she spoke quickly, turning on her heel to walk off the porch.

I don’t know why I did it, but before she could walk off the porch I grabbed her wrist and pulled her back to me; she was right. She shouldn’t be here. She left me without a single reason or even a goodbye. I should hate her. I made it out like I did, at least.

“Why are you here, Riley?” I interrogated the petite girl in front of me, not letting go of my grip on her bony wrist.

“I-I don’t know, Alex. I really don’t. I just… I saw one of All Time Low’s music videos on TV yesterday and I made a rash decision… You always told me that if I didn’t fix my mistakes and clean up my messes, I’d always be stuck in the past,” she swallowed heavily, visibly nervous. “I don’t want to be forever seventeen.”

I felt a harsh pang in my chest. She had heard the song… The song was filled with angst and a little bit of hatred. It wasn’t exactly the song I wanted her to hear. I had written lots of other songs about her; some were sweet. Of course, though, my luck, she heard one of the meanest ones.

“Riley, that song… it, uh, it was just something I pulled together when I was still angry, I swear,” I defended myself. Wait… why was I defending myself? It didn’t matter what the songs were about… I shouldn’t care about hurting her.

“It’s fine, Alex. Don’t defend yourself. I deserve it. I deserve a lot worse, really. But… I shouldn’t be here. I should go,” she stated, a sad smile present on her face.

“No, stay,” I blurted out before I could filter it. What the hell was this girl doing to me? I had Lisa; I shouldn’t be trying to make Riley stay. I need to let her go back home.

“Why?”

“I think after seven years I deserve a few answers, Riley.”

Sighing heavily, she nodded, walking back towards me. “What do you want to know?”

Gesturing her to follow me inside, we both sat on the black leather couch in my living room. “I just want to know where you went… why you left… why you didn’t at least say goodbye.”

“I went to Seattle, Washington. I left because I began second guessing myself. It was the worst thing I could do. Everyone was saying that you and I were going to get married. For a while, I thought that was what I wanted. As I began second guessing everything, I wasn’t so sure anymore. I was a coward and I ran. I ran halfway across the country and I have regretted it every single day for the last seven years, Alex.

Baltimore is my home and I just left it behind. I was selfish for doing what I did. I left you, Jack, Rian, Zack and Jared without any kind of reason or goodbye. Deep down, I know I could’ve handled saying goodbye to the guys. It was you I couldn’t have handled. I knew that if I even so much tried to say goodbye to you, I’d change my mind and I’d stay here. I wanted to get away. It was the only thing I knew how to do and you of all people know that, I’m sure. When things get bad, I run away from them. That was what I did.” She finished with what sounded like an exhausted sigh.

As she tried to force a small smile, I noticed her light grey eyes didn’t have the same happy spark as they used to. Her usually pin straight blonde hair was now settled into soft waves, a style I had rarely seen it in when she lived in Maryland. Her clothing styled seemed the same still, though.

“Riley, I just… I don’t know if this is, uh, if this is a good idea… you coming back here…” I tripped over my own words. I didn’t want her to leave, but God only knows what kind of shit storm would happen if she stayed.

“Trust me, Alex. I know it’s not,” the blonde girl confessed. “I knew it wasn’t the second I stepped onto the plane in Seattle. It’s something I have to do, though. I have to make things right.”

“I don’t really know if you can do that, Riley. You left me… without even telling me anything. All because you second guessed yourself?” I rose a bushy brow at the girl in front of me, feeling nothing but disbelief.

“Alex-,” before she could continue, I cut her off.

“No. Don’t ‘Alex…’ me. You left me with nothing. Absolutely fucking nothing, Riley! You don’t get to show up back at my doorstep seven years later and try to pretend it’s okay,” I tried to keep my voice from rising, but no luck.

“You act like I just left without one feeling of regret or guilt, Alex!” Riley yelled back at me. “I wanted so much to turn back around and not get on that plane. I couldn’t, though. You deserved better me and that’s what I wanted to give to you,” her eyes turned sad as they looked towards the ground.

“There wasn’t any better for me, Riley. You were what I wanted. I loved you, for fuck’s sake, Riley. I just thought you loved me, too.”

“I did, Alex, with everything inside of me. That’s what scared me the most.”

“God dammit, Riley, you can’t do this to me; not right now,” I ran a hand through my hair, distraught taking over me.

Glancing at her, I couldn’t but to see how full her lips looked. My mind wandered to how long it had been since I had last kissed her and how much I wanted to do it again.

But I had Lisa.

“I’m not doing anything to you, Alexander,” Riley stared at me, using my proper name, something she only did when she was serious and wanted to prove a point. “I came back to fix the shit I did seven years ago. I’m not telling you that we have to best friends or that we have to get back together. I just want to make sure that we’re not going our whole life hating each other.”

“H-how long are you in Baltimore?”

“I don’t know. I planned on staying until I fixed everything,” she shrugged carelessly, her serious demeanor disappearing.

Sighing heavily, I quickly looked away from her. “I know you said that we don’t have to go back to being friends and all that… but I really miss you.”

Smiling sadly, Riley nodded in agreement. “I really miss you, too.”

“So, tell me about your life in Seattle then!” I exclaimed, possibly a bit too excitedly, but I didn’t care at this point. I just wanted to know everything about Riley Nichols.

“It’s… it’s not really what I expected. I mean, it’s good. It’s fun. Things worked out the way I wanted them to… well, the way I wanted them to when I was 17. It’s okay, though,” she smiled softly, obviously not very excited about Seattle.

“Are you seeing anyone now?” I blurted out before I could stop myself. Dammit. She was going to think I was some creep.

Her eyes shifted slowly. “Yeah… his name’s Noah. We’ve been together for about a year and a half now. What about you? Are you seeing anyone?” she queried, seeming a bit uncomfortable.

“Oh, yeah, her name’s Lisa. We’ve been seeing each other for about three years… just on and off stuff. It’s complicated, I suppose,” I shrugged, scratching the back of my neck awkwardly.

It was true. What Lisa and I had was, indeed, complicated. Being on and off with someone for three years was a lot of work. It was tiring and stressful. It was like you were together, even if you weren’t. I didn’t like it as much as I played out that I did. When I met Lisa, I still wasn’t completely over Riley. I used Lisa as a sort of rebound, which sounds pathetic, I know. Using someone because you weren’t over a girl you broke up four years ago (at the time)? It’s creepy and pathetic.

“Do you love her?” Riley seemed to blurt out, but her grey eyes seemed to fill with regret as soon as she said it. “I’m… I’m sorry. That was really rude for me to ask… Shit, I’m sorry.”

Laughing at her sudden nervousness, I nodded my head. “Chill out, it’s fine, but, uh, I don’t really know. In a way, she was just kind of at the right place at the right time when I asked her out, you know? I think I love her. I just don’t know if I’m… in love with her.” Like I was with you, I thought to myself.

“Oh.”

“Do you love Noah?” I repeated her questioned, but directed it towards her. I won’t lie; it did hurt like hell when she said she was seeing someone. I don’t know why it did. It’s not like I could expect her to wait around for seven years, hoping I would find her or some bullshit like that.

“Um, yeah, I do, a lot,” she smiled weakly. “Much like yourself, though, I don’t know if I’m in love with him. I mean… we have a special ‘connection’, but I don’t know about spending the rest of my life with him and all that stuff…”

“I get it,” I nodded, noting her growing uncomfortable.

We talked for a few hours after that before she announced that she had to go “fix things” with the rest of her friends.

After she walked out the door and left in her car, I realized something.

In that moment, I realized that I didn’t care that she left me anymore. I wanted to hate her, I truly did. I wanted to scream and yell at her for going on with her life without me; yell at her for missing so many important things in my life. I couldn’t. I just simply couldn’t.

In that moment, I realized that her flaws… I loved them. The way she laughed too hard at things that weren’t that funny. The way her nose would crinkle when she went into deep thought about something. The way she could just make you feel better about whatever’s bothering you. The way she could own up to her mistakes and was willing to fix them, even if it took seven years.

More importantly, though, I realized that even after all these years, I, Alexander William Gaskarth, was still madly and hopelessly in love with Riley Taylor Nichols.