Saving Grace

There’s always that moment before you try something new where you ask yourself if it’s a good decision. Like when I started smoking, there was a moment before I lit up that first cigarette where I asked myself if I should really do it. If I should really light it up, and I asked myself why I was doing it. Was it because everyone else was doing it? Was it because I thought it would make me cool? There were a lot of questions involved before I lit the cigarette. Just like there were a lot of things I asked myself about Zayn. Like if pursuing a relationship with him was a good idea, if allowing myself to believe that he loved me even for a second was the right choice, and really they were both really bad choices. And that happens sometimes. Sometimes we just make the wrong decisions, but they seem so right at the time. They feel so good, and we wonder how something that feels so good could possibly be so wrong.

But they are wrong. And when we realize how wrong they are we start to wonder why we ever made the choice to begin with, then we start to regret our decisions and don’t think we’re really fit to be making life choices for ourselves. But the thing is we have to. We have to keep living and making choices, we can’t just stop because we make a few bad ones, even when they hurt so much you can’t stop crying and start to hate yourself for every making them.

People will tell you not to regret your decisions, good or bad. They’ll tell you that at one point the bad decisions you made were just what you wanted so why regret it. Why spend valuable time regretting something that might’ve once made you happy? But I did regret my decision. I regretting ever letting myself get close to Zayn. I regretted letting him touch me, I regretted believing him when he told me he loved me, I regretted trusting him, I just regretted it all. And I knew that if I could’ve ever gone back in time and just not meet him I would’ve. Because if I wouldn’t have met Zayn then he wouldn’t have ever been able to suck me in, he would never be able to poison my life. And then I wouldn’t have needed Liam to save me. Or maybe Liam wouldn’t have felt like he needed to save me. Either way if I never would’ve met Zayn then maybe Liam and I could’ve had a normal relationship from the moment we knew how we felt. But Zayn ruined that like he ruins everything.

Let me explain.

It was a Thursday after classes were over for Christmas break, and I’d had a really long and awful week. What I wanted was to go home for Christmas break. I wanted to forget all about university and the people here. I wanted to go home and ignore that Zayn was being a douche, I just wanted to leave.

Zayn and I had been seeing one another for nearly five months at this point. The story of how we met really isn’t that interesting. I could lie I guess and say that it was magical, but really it wasn’t. We met at a party, he gave me a cigarette and we talked. He got my number and we talked a bit before we became official. Lately though he’d been acting like a douche and we’d been fighting, a lot. I was so sick of it and it made all the other pointless drama even more annoying.

Babe come on, you’re not really still mad at me are you?

He was really pissing me off. Of course, I was still mad at him. I didn’t see how he could expect me to not be mad when he’d pretty much gotten mad because I was talking to someone else. First of all I wasn’t one to step out on the person I was seeing, I’d never really seen the appeal to it. And second he should know by now that I just got on better with guys than girls, I didn’t like the drama girls around here tried to start up and I liked that guys could just be chill. They could just sit around and not be bothered by the petty things girls worried about. Plus I thought it was stupid that girls would still start up drama. We were in university for crying out loud they should move on from the petty things they thought were important during secondary school. But Zayn got mad because I was talking to one of my friends, he was mad because my friend was friendly and gave me a hug. One I was positive that Ben was gay, he’d told me he was gay, and we just got along because he was so much like me that we clicked instantly. But Zayn was going to be a douche and tell me that he couldn’t be gay. He tried to tell me that Ben was into me and it just led to a huge fight and I stormed out. And now I wanted to go home and forget about all of this.

Yes I’m still fucking mad at you. You were being a dick and you’re still being a dick and I just don’t want to be around you right now.

I couldn’t be around him right now. I couldn’t be near him. I couldn’t stand around my boyfriend and act like I was okay when he was mad because I had guy friends, when he was telling me that my friend couldn’t be gay just because he'd hugged me, I just couldn’t do it. I needed space. I needed to go home and have a little bit of time away from Zayn to clear my head.

Come off it will ya.

Then he was ringing me like that was such a smart idea.

“Zayn I just want to be left alone for like five minutes, is that too much to ask for?”

“Considering I think you’re overreacting yes. I got jealous, it happens. I can’t help it. I just don’t like it when there’s some other guy touching my girlfriend. Just come home and I’ll help you finish packing for your trip, or you’ll end up being late and only have yourself to blame for that one.”

This was his way of apologizing, and it was total shit. I would’ve liked for him to tell me he’s sorry for how he acted or at least promise it wouldn’t happen again, but, of course, this was Zayn and he didn’t say sorry. It really kind of made me more pissed that he thought I was overreacting. It was stupid. He was stupid. And of course he was probably laying around in my flat waiting for me to get home so we could finish packing my things and shag. Because well Zayn always tended to be in the mood when we were mad at one another, that would never fail. Today though I wouldn’t let him shag me, he’d just have to wait until I got home for that one.

“I’ll be there in a few.”

I only agreed to go home and give up this time because he was right, I did still need to pack for my trip and I’d be really mad if I didn’t get to go because I missed my train into the city. My parents had decided that we were going to go visit some ski resort over in the states for Christmas. They’d already gotten everything we needed all I had to do was make sure I was on the train into London by six when it left. Otherwise we’d miss our flight and everything would be fucked up. It was already nearly four and would take like half and hour to get to the train station so I knew Zayn was right. I needed to finish packing and then head out. And thanks to him I barely made it to the station on time.

I could’ve killed him, I was so mad that he’d already pissed me off with his insane jealous boyfriend act, and nearly made me miss my train. But I didn’t have time to argue with him so I just pecked his lips and told him I’d see him when I got back then got onto the train. Things weren’t good with us really, I was still mad at him and he was still annoyed with me. I’d thought the breather would be good for us. I could have a while away from him to just ignore that he was a jealous douche sometimes and he could be alone and I don’t know think about things. Sadly it wouldn’t work like that though.

“Aspen?”

I heard my voice the second I was stepping onto the train to London and quickly turned my head in the direction of the voice smiling when I saw Liam.

“Liam. Why’re you going to London?” I asked him once I’d walked over to him and took the seat across from him.

Liam and I didn’t really talk that often, I knew he and Zayn ran in the same circle of friends and that they shared a flat with the others, but I spent most of my time with Zayn since we were dating and usually only mingled with his friends when we were at parties or I happened to be hanging around his flat. Which some nights I’d stay at their flat because I was too tired to go home to my own. So Liam and I knew one another. And we got along pretty well, really I got along with most of Zayn’s friends. But I got along well the most with Liam.

He was sweet and would talk to me when I didn’t feel like getting drunk with the rest of them. Plus we had a couple of classes together so if we ran out of things to talk about we could always talk about classes. But I wouldn’t have said we were best friends or anything.

“Oh well my parents decided they wanted to go to some ski resort in the states for Christmas with some other couple, like a couples retreat thing but didn’t want to leave me here alone and so apparently I’m tagging along.” He told me, and I couldn’t hold my laughter in.

“My parents kill me.” I muttered through my laughter pushing my fingers through my hair, “I think we’re about to spend our Christmas break together. Because my parents have been planning this trip to a ski resort in the states for like the last four months. Figures they’d bump into some other couple to bring along though. It just seems like your parents are the other couple.” I told him wondering how something like this could happen. I mean I didn’t have anything against spending the break with Liam.

At least I knew him and he wasn’t some weird 12 year old who wouldn’t be helpful at keeping me company or something like that. No, I knew Liam. And really I didn’t mind spending time with him while our parents ran around like a bunch of children, but it was just weird how this had worked out. And of course I’d end up thinking it would just be me and my parents and we could bond over things and talk or something like when I was younger, but of course it wouldn’t be like that.

“Well that’s rather unexpected.” He chuckled and I just nodded my head.

“It sure is.”

The train eventually left and Liam and I stayed in our seats talking the whole ride into the city to meet our parents. And it was really nice just having someone to talk to. He was so much easier to talk to than Zayn was. I could tell he was actually listening and not just pretending too. And I just felt really comfortable around him. Plus I knew Zayn couldn’t possibly get jealous of this since everyone knew Liam wouldn’t try anything with me. I had a boyfriend and well I didn’t really know his relationship status, but either way he wasn’t the kind of guy who’d convince you to cheat on your boyfriend with him. He was too nice for something like that. So I didn’t for a second feel bad or like this could cause issues, if it did though it wasn’t like either of us has known before hand that we’d pretty much be going on vacation together so there wasn’t anything really wrong with this. Just two friends going to the states with their parents. That’s all this was.

And I didn’t think I’d want it to be anything else, because I was with Zayn, and while he wasn’t always the best boyfriend I was still really attached to him.