Couldn't Stop Caring

“Babe, come to bed,” Josh mumbled from the other side of my bedroom and I looked up from my notes and turned back to him. My room was dark except for the desk light I had on pointed on my books and notepad and Josh was bundled in my duvet.

“I can’t,” I said. Reading words that seemed to suddenly blur into nothing. Advanced chemical analysis was my worst class.

“You still have 3 days before your exam,” Josh sighed, sitting up in bed. He was bare chested and I turned back to my note to remove the temptation.

“3 days is not a lot,” I said. “I don’t know anything. Plus I have my organic chemistry exam the following morning so it’s not like I can revise for that after my chemical analysis exam.”

“Sam, it’s 3 a.m.,” Josh said, flicking on the main bedroom light. I blinked at the harsh light and turned to face my boyfriend. We’d been together for almost 2 years but I knew my frustration with my exams was getting on his nerves.

“I’m not coming to bed,” I said. “I’ve still got 2 chapters to get through if I want to keep on top of my schedule.” Josh sighed heavily and fell back onto the pillows. “You can always go back to yours,” I said impatiently. “I need to revise whether you’re here or not.”

“I know you need to revise, Sam, but you need to sleep, too,” he said. “Your brain needs sleep to process everything you’ve read and absorbed.” I turned and glared at him.

“There’s nothing to process right now and there won't be if you don’t let me get on with this,” I said and Josh pursed his lips.

“You know what, I think I will go back to mine,” he said, getting out of bed and pulling on his shirt.

“Fine,” I said, not looking up from my books. Not even after I heard my bedroom door open and close. He didn’t live in the same block as me; his dorm was way across campus. For a moment I considered calling him and telling him not to go. Not at that time of night. But if he was going to keep distracting me then I didn’t want him here.

Josh and I had met when we were in school when we were 17. He’d joined my school and we’d immediately become friends. Best friends. We didn’t cross that line until over 2 years later. We’d gone to the same university and one night, when we were both drunk, Josh blurted out his feelings for me. He’d told me he loved me. I’d sobered up pretty quickly with the declaration and realised how nervous he was. So I rushed to reassure him that I felt the exact same way. We’d been together ever since. And now we were in our final year of university. Only a few weeks away from finishing all our exams. Neither of us really had any solid plans for after we finished but we had talked about moving to London together to find a job.

I sighed when I realised that even with Josh not in the room, he managed to distract me. I looked at my phone and saw it was 3.30 and accepted that I wouldn’t be getting any more work done tonight. I turned my desk light off and crawled onto my bed, finding the warm spot from where Josh had been lying. Suddenly I wished I hadn’t told him to leave. A lump formed in my lower stomach but I ignored it. We’d be fine.

--

My alarm went off a 7 a.m. a few hours later, and my heart pounded when I realised how much work I still had to do. I took a quick shower – the shared bathroom was empty due to the time – and then went back to my room and got dressed in sweat pants and a baggy t-shirt, ready to get on with revision again.

A couple hours later, my stomach was starting to rumble so I quickly nipped into the kitchen to make a bowl of oatmeal, and then went back to my room to eat as I worked. My phone vibrated on my desk and I sighed when I saw it was a text from Josh. I put my phone on silent, flipped it over, and got back to reading about the forensic analysis of chemicals.

When the sun started setting, I flicked my light on and stretched in my chair. I looked away from my notes and finally picked up my phone. I had two texts from Josh, both asking how revision was going. I set my phone back down without replying. I didn’t really have much more to say other than it was going slowly, I wasn’t learning enough and I’d never been so stressed in my life. I turned back to my notes and sighed heavily, resting my elbows on my desk and burying my face in my hands.

From the corner of my eye I saw my phone light up with Josh’s picture flashing and I knew I couldn’t ignore a phone call. “Hey,” I said as I answered the phone.

“Hey,” he said. There was an awkward silence which stretched on for too long. “Have you had dinner?” Josh asked eventually.

“Uh, no, not yet,” I said.

“Do you wanna go to Prima’s for dinner?” he asked, naming the restaurant where we’d gone for our first official date. “You need a break, Sam.”

“I can’t take a break, Josh,” I said bluntly. “Revising and learning may come easy to you but I actually have to work hard to get the grades I want. You don’t understand. This is so much harder than comparative literature. You can read a book and watch a film and you’re halfway there. I actually have to learn stuff. I can't just go swanning around with you whenever you want some attention. This is important to me.”

“I get that, Sam,” he said and I could hear the barely restrained anger in his voice. “I’m not asking you to drop all your work, just take an hour off. It won't do any harm.”

“Yes it will! What if the stuff I sacrifice to spend time with you is what comes up in the exam?” I asked.

“You still have 2 more days and you’ve been revising for weeks! You know it all, you’re just freaking yourself out,” Josh said and I scoffed.

“No I don’t,” I said. “Kat texted me yesterday asking me a question that I couldn’t answer. That means I don’t know enough!”

“Kat’s super clever and she didn’t know it either,” Josh pointed out. “Just because you don’t know an answer to something that probably won't even be on the exam doesn’t mean you need to stress yourself out like this.”

“You know what, I’ll just talk to you when my exams are over, okay?” I said and Josh was silent for a second.

“What?” he asked and I sighed.

“I can't…deal with this right now,” I said. “I’m stressed enough as it is, I don’t need an argument with you making it worse. Maybe we should just…pause us for the next couple weeks.”

“Are you…are you serious?” he whispered and for a moment I wanted to take back what I’d said.

“Yes,” I said calmly. “Just…you focus on your work and I’ll focus on mine. We can sort things out between us after exams.”

“Fine,” Josh said, his anger perfectly clear now. “I’ll go find someone else to come to Prima’s with me.” And with that, he ended the call. I knew that was an empty threat, but it still hurt that he would take someone else to our place.

I shook my head in an attempt to push the conversation away. I’d deal with it after my exams. I pushed it all to the back of my mind and locked it there. I took out my coloured pens and started writing notes which I’d blu-tack to the walls so I’d see them when I was lying in bed and could read through the before going to sleep.

--

I couldn’t sleep that night. And it wasn’t because I was scared about my exam which was in, to be precise, 32 hours. My conversation with Josh had broken free of its cage at the back of my mind and was replaying over and over again. God I was a horrible boyfriend. Maybe Josh doesn’t need to come first all the time but he needed to know that he was at least second. And I’d made him sound like nothing but a nuisance. I wanted to talk to him. I didn’t want to go without talking to him for another week. Sure I still had my organic chemistry exam in 2 days’ time and then I had my chemical kinetics exam 3 days after that. But I didn’t want to go that long without talking to or seeing Josh. I’d probably go crazy without him.

I huddled down in bed and pulled my duvet up over my head, hoping that I hadn’t messed things up too much with Josh.

--

When I woke up the following morning, I skipped the shower, had my oatmeal and then got to work again. And I pushed Josh to the back of my mind. 24 hours. My heart raced whenever I looked at the clock as the hours counted down. I officially hated chemical analysis. I’d enjoyed it when we’d had the lectures. It was essentially maths applied to real-life chemical situations. But it had been destroyed by the constant reading and rereading I’d had to do to revise. I hated organic chemistry too. And chemical kinetics. Three years of studying and I come out of it with a hatred for my subject. How perfect was that.

I checked my phone that evening and my heart skipped when I saw I had a text from Josh.

I know you don’t want to hear from me, but good luck tomorrow, Sam, I know you can do it xx

Tears pricked in my eyes. I wanted to phone him but I knew my brain couldn’t handle any more stress just yet.

I crawled into bed and glanced at my clock. 10 hours. I took a deep breath and skimmed over the notes that I’d stuck to my wall before turning my light off and attempting to go to sleep.

--

I finished the exam with time to spare. Kat had already finished and left the exam room 10 minutes ago. She just got chemistry, it all made sense to her. I looked at the clock at the front of the room. I still had 15 minutes until I had to stop. But I’d done everything. Answered every question, pretty sure I’d done them all right, or at least as good as I can. I flicked through my paper, double checking the questions and my answers and then raised my hand with 7 minutes still left on the clock. One of the ladies that was supervising the students came over to me with a smile and silently took my paper and dismissed me. I silently left the exam room and took a deep breath once I was in the fresh air. That had gone okay.

I set off across campus feeling significantly lighter. I still had organic chemistry and kinetic chemistry to do, but chemical analysis had definitely been the hardest topic, so I felt slightly more positive towards them. It was only just 11 o’clock so it wasn’t too busy except for students like me who had just finished an exam.

I knocked gently when I reached Josh’s bedroom in his block. There was no answer and I bit my lip anxiously. I knocked again and then tried the handle. The door opened and inside the room was dark so I guessed Josh was still asleep. I closed the door behind me as quietly as I could, set my backpack on the floor, slipped out of my clothes and then joined him in bed. He was lying on his front and I rested my head on his back between his shoulders. “You know,” he said softly and so clearly that I knew he’d been awake for a while. “I kind of get why so many couple’s don’t survive university.” My heart pounded and I closed my eyes as my emotions finally caught up with me.

“I’m sorry. I don’t want to be on a pause,” I whispered, tears trickling from my eyes to land on his warm skin. “I’m so sorry, Josh. I just…I don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t thinking. Not about you. And I should have. I’m so sorry. I didn’t meant anything I said. I know you work really hard to get the grades you get. I can’t go a week without talking to you. I’m so, so sorry.”

Josh shifted and I lifted off of him so he could turn over. He lay on his back and looked at me for a minute and smiled weakly. He opened his arms to me and I practically dived into his body, curling up against him and burying my face in his neck.

“Get some sleep, baby, we can talk later,” Josh said and I shook my head.

“No, I don’t want you to think that I just…that fixing things between us isn’t my priority right now, because it is,” I said, tightening my arms around him.

“I know that,” Josh whispered, “you wouldn’t be here otherwise.”

“I just…I love you so much,” I whispered. “None of it matters if I don’t have you to share it with.”

“I love you, too,” Josh said, pressing a kiss to my temple. “You couldn’t push me away even if you tried.”

“I’ll never try again, I promise,” I said, lifting my head to meet his gaze.

“And I promise not to push you when you’re crazy stressed,” he said and I smiled.

“Maybe I need you to,” I whispered. “I kinda like that you’re there making sure I’m eating or whatever.”

“Okay, well I promise to try not to cross the line again,” he said, brushing my hair behind my ear. “Instead of suggesting a date, I’ll just bring dinner to you and we can eat and revise at the same time.”

“That sounds perfect,” I whispered, leaning down and pressing a tender kiss to his lips. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” Josh smiled. “Now get some sleep, you look knackered.”

“Okay, but not for too long,” I said. “I need to do some last minute revision for tomorrow.” Josh just smiled and wrapped his arms around me tight. A few hours break wouldn’t kill me.