Status: You Left Me

Everything You Want

I Felt A Piece of My Heart Break

The wind was pretty rough—cold, brisk, and it messed up the braid I had worked so hard on. Practice makes perfect, right? And I didn’t have too long to practice, just ‘til next April.

I had to get it right. My wedding pictures depended on it.

We stepped away from the Starbucks and back onto the busy sidewalk. Honestly, it felt like I was in the traffic sometimes. People were rude, they never let you through, and quite frankly, I just wanted to stick my middle finger in the air and tell ‘em to fuck off.

Sean took my caramel apple frappe from my hands and took a sip, his eyebrows pulling together. “Hmm. That’s not half bad.”

I took it back from him and took a few gulps. No, caramel apple frappes were far from bad. They were heavenly.

Norman stood on the other side of Sean, both closest to the car traffic than me. Sean preferred it that way—says it was the only way to ensure I didn’t trip into the middle of the road and get run over or something.

Sadly, I could see it . . . .

“You wanna try some, Buffy Bear?”

Norman almost smiled, but he shook his head. “No, C. Thanks.”

“Hey,” I protested, and I started to pout. “She forgives you. Why so mopey?”

Norman’s eyes met mine, and he kinda smirked. Well, almost. “Still doesn’t mean I’ve made things right. Forgiveness is just step one.”

“And what’s step two?” I asked, trying to keep his mind off the fact that his plan hadn’t come together. The real thing to be happy about was the fact that he had a plan, that so far, it had worked.

He took a deep breath. “Earn her trust back. I can’t expect anything to happen if she can’t trust me to never be so stupid again.”

Sean smirked at him. “See? You’re learning. Trust is a wonderful thing.”

To my delight, he wrapped one arm around my shoulders and kissed the top of my head. It always, even after all this time, seemed to bring out this huge smile. Sean did that to me.

It didn’t matter how long we were together, how often he kissed me. For the rest of our lives together, his adorable romantic moments would forever make my heart swoon. Make me smile like nothing else.

Forever with Sean . . . I could live with that. As a matter of fact, I didn’t really think I could live any other way.

We were headed back to Sean’s place when I saw something that caught my eye. I stopped dead in my tracks and snatched the magazine off the stand, barely even giving Sean time to take my frappe from me.

Literally, there was a chick on the front cover wearing the most perfect wedding dress! I had to turn away from Sean so he didn’t see it, on the slight chance I was actually able to find it somewhere, and I spazzed a little.

“I need this,” I told him as I began flipping through the pages, finding even more gorgeous dresses inside that made me realize how much fun I was actually gonna have with this.
Endless shopping trips with Kenz? Sounds like a fun week to me.

Speaking of Kenz, however . . . holy fuck. I flipped back to an article with the headline “Liven Up Your Honeymoon” and there she was. Straddling this random guy, feathers everywhere . . . both laughing.

I tried not to squeak, but I already had. Sean looked concerned whereas Norman just rolled his eyes at me. Shot me this little smirk, too.

“Crazy little thing.”

I closed the magazine and looked to the man at the newsstand. “Can I possibly have every copy of this magazine you have? I, erm, need it for my bridesmaids?”

Sean took the magazine from me before I could stop him, and his eyes were wide. “Fucking hell . . . McKenzi?!”

Norman took it from Sean, who was in a state of shock that left him unable to stop him. Sean’s eyes were wide, his face a little pale, and Norman looked even worse.

“Buffy Bear,” I whispered, and I stepped towards him. “It’s okay.”

But it wasn’t okay. The poor guy looked absolutely devastated. His fingers knotted in his hair, and those blue eyes filled with tears that he fought back . . . but it didn’t matter. They still wanted to come out. Seeing the love of his life in a raunchy photoshoot with random guys must’ve been harder for him than I could even understand.

I wiggled my way over to Norman and squeezed him too tightly. “It’ll be okay. I promise. Remember? I love you, bestest buddy. And you know what? We’re gonna be, like, family before you know it! You can’t get rid of me then. You just can’t.”

He still looked like he was on the verge of tears, but he shot me a half-hearted smirk anyways. “There are these things called guns and body bags . . . not that hard, Little Bit.”

I let out a huff and looked up at Sean. “Baby, would you let him kill me?”

“Of course not, love, but you may have to come up with a cover story for me pretty soon,” he muttered. “Cause I’m about to fucking kill my cousin.”

I frowned. “Now wait just a second. You can’t kill my maid of honor. You just . . . you just can’t do that. That’d be, like, me killing Norman. I mean, I just . . . I can’t.”

“Like you could kill me anyways,” Norman snorted.

I rolled my eyes. “I could easily kill you. You know why? You could never, ever, ever kill me.”

“And sadly, you’re correct,” he told me, but it was useless for him to say. I already knew that.
I tried distracting Norman on the way home, which involved passing by three more newsstands where we bought all the magazines with Kenz in them to the point Sean just had a huge box full that he was lugging around New York.

But . . . Norman couldn’t stop looking at them, couldn’t stop breaking his own heart. With each picture, another piece of his heart broke off every time he looked at it, but he didn’t stop. It was like he felt he deserved the pain.

Sean was more than relieved to put the box in the coat closet right inside of his apartment, but Norman held onto his copy. Sean started to say something about how it was weird, but then he saw his expression.

He wasn’t trying to get off or anything. For fuck’s sake, this was Norman. He was doing to himself what he believed he deserved.

“She forgave you!” I reminded him, but he didn’t look at me.

Sean knew this very well. I didn’t like it when people wouldn’t look at me, so I huffed a little. Crossed my arms over my chest and waited on him to look.

But he didn’t. So, of course, I crossed the room, took his face in my hands as tightly as I could without crushing him, and forced him to look away from the magazine for the first time since he saw it and look at me.

“She forgave you, Normy,” I whispered. “Instead of wasting this chance, use it to your advantage. Step two. Trust. She needs you, more than she even realizes, so you’ve gotta cheer up and show her that she needs you. Let her see that you’re always gonna be there for her, that you’re not gonna let her get away again. That’s what she needs from you—security.”

And speak of the fucking devil, right? About the time I let Norm’s face go, in waltzed McKenzi Ariel Kamden. Of course she had no idea we had seen, no idea why Sean and Norman looked at her the way they did.

Sean looked anything but happy. Norman . . . well, that was the thing. He wouldn’t look at her.

“What’s up?” she asked, and her eyes darted over to me for some form of explanation.

Sean didn’t say anything, only pointed to the magazine in Norman’s hands while Norm nervously hid it behind him. He kept his own eyes averted from Kenz’s, and if the reason wasn’t so heartbreaking, I probably would’ve found it cute how bashful he seemed to be.

But he wasn’t bashful. The man was heartbroken.

“What are you guys looking at?” she snorted.

I rolled my eyes at Sean, whose blue eyes had narrowed to slits at this point. “Your sketchy and sexy as hell Breaking Dawn reenactment.”

Kenzi’s eyebrows rose. “Uh, what?”

Sean yanked the magazine out of Norman’s hands and held it out so Kenz could see exactly what he meant. “What in the hell do you think you’re doing?!”

“Erm, reenacting the Breaking Dawn honeymoon scene?”

I knew I shouldn’t have, but I smirked at Sean and Norman, neither of which were pleased with her answer. “Told you, bitches. Y’all were worried about nothin’ at all.”

Sean snorted. “Because reenacting anything in Twilight isn’t something to worry about?”

“That’s beside the point,” I said, and I waved my hand in his direction. “You just stay outta this. I have important questions. Did he have a boner the whole time?!”

Kenz snorted. “Oh fuck, he did. It was massive.”

I could see Norman’s fists clench, see the way his jaw went rigid, so I knew this would work out for the best. With a smirk, I kept this conversation going. “Oooooo-la-la!”

“Yeah, we went for drinks afterwards.”

I knew that wasn’t true because she had gone with Sean after this photoshoot, but Norman didn’t know that, and he seemed to be paling a little.

“I think I’m gonna be sick.”

Man, I loved how well things were falling together. First, Kenz and Norman casually ran into each other at the restaurant. Then, they started fixing things. She forgave him. And now? Fuck, Norman looked sick at the thought of her being with someone else. Sick. That meant he was on the verge of snapping, on the verge of admitting to her that she was all he ever needed in life.

Or maybe he already had, and it was vice versa. Either way, things were falling right into place, and while Norman looked sick and Kenz looked annoyed under the glares of Sean, I wore this huge and proud smile.

Yes, Cleo. You’re winning.
♠ ♠ ♠
Every shred of credit for this chapter goes to my lovely bestie,Phenax . She did wonderful with it, and I've really been looking forward to having her guest-write a chapter in her characters viewpoint, Cleo. And here it is, ay? It's phenominal.

Anywho, theres only maybe 6-8 more chapters left! Oh man!
Comment with your likes, dislikes, thoughts, hopes, requests... All that! It's always inspirational.
xx brin