Cleave

I could barely concentrate on my job after I saw Micah. Even though I didn't get to talk to him or even see him for that long, he was the only thing I could think about. I messed up several orders, which resulted in me being yelled at by Darrell once my shift ended, but even then I wasn't concentrating.

Even when Darrell called me useless and pathetic and threatened to make me lose my job, I almost didn't hear him. My mind was just repeating Micah's name over and over again.

When Darrell finally stopped to take a breath, I simply apologised and promised to do better next time, just so that he would shut up. I don't know if that was the response he was looking for or if he even accepted my apology, but I just wanted to get out of there and go home.

Once I was dismissed, I almost ran out to the truck and then sped home. I really needed to talk to Drew about Micah being back. He would know what to do and if I should even try to get in contact with him. I would have tried to speak to his dad when he came to order but one of my coworkers got in first. Plus I don't think his dad wanted to talk to me. He deliberately didn't look my way, that's for sure, because I tried to catch his eye more than once. I had a feeling it was probably because his bitch of a wife was there as well, because Micah's dad was always nice to me the few times that I spoke to him…

Unless Micah told him not to talk to me…
Maybe Micah decided that he just didn't want to be with me anymore that day he went away and just didn't have the balls to tell me. Maybe his mother was telling the truth and Micah became some born-again Christian while he was gone. I didn't think I would be able to handle that. Seeing him again but not being able to talk to him was one thing, but if he came out and told me that we couldn't even be friends because the church said that what happened between us was wrong and disgusting and he can't have any association with gays, I think that would kill me.

I'm not sure how I made it home in one piece. I think I got beeped at a few times because I wasn't concentrating on the road, but I did make it home without killing anyone. I practically ran into the house, calling Drew’s name as I did so.

“What? What's wrong?” he asked, slightly panicked.
“H-he's back,” I said as evenly as I could, despite my heart beating a million miles an hour. I was met with silence as Drew stared at me. “He's back,” I repeated once the silence had gone on long enough.
“Are you serious?” Drew finally replied. I nodded, pulling in a deep breath and then letting it out slowly.
“He came into work.”
“Shit,” was the genius response my best friend gave me. “What are you going to do?”
I knew what he was asking. The full question was: “What are you going to do about the fact you're dating Max.”

Drew had always known that I wasn't nearly as invested in my relationship with Max as I was with Micah and I had disclosed to him once when I was drunk that I would go back to Micah in a heartbeat if he came back home.

I still loved Micah. It was as simple as that. Even when I started to like Max more romantically, it was never in the same way. I never loved him. I never allowed that, and I know it wasn't fair to him that I was still so hung up on my ex, but he accepted that about me and we had a fairly happy relationship, for the most part.

Now, it was even less fair on Max. Micah was back, and my feelings for him had obviously not diminished and I didn’t know what I was supposed to do about it all. Do I stay with Max, knowing that I could round a corner and bump into the person I loved more than I could ever love him? Do I end the relationship, even though I haven't even spoken to Micah in over a year, and hope that things go back to the way they were? What if Micah did change? What if I end a good relationship over nothing? Micah already broke my heart once by moving away, who's to say he won't do it again? All those questions were completely doing my head in.

“God, fuck…” I muttered, punching myself lightly in the forehead, not hard enough for it to hurt, but enough to give me a sensation of trying to knock something into my brain.
“Angel?” Drew questioned. I looked at him desperately. I needed him to tell me what to do.
“I don't know what to do,” I whispered. “I love him, but…”
“But he left you and now you have Max.”
“Right.”
“Did you talk to him at all?”
I shook my head. “His parents were there and they dragged him away so I couldn't.”
“Well, I think in that case, you need to find a way to talk to him. You need to know what happened and how he feels about you. And then, you can make a decision,” Drew said.
“Okay,” I agreed. “But what about Max?”
“You can be honest with him and tell him you saw Micah, or you can keep quiet about it until you talk to Micah and figure out what you want to do,” he told me.

I nodded slowly, running that information through my mind. If I told Max about Micah straight away, he could get pissed off and try to make me stay away from Micah. He's always been pretty territorial. At the start of our relationship he wasn't even happy about me spending time with Drew, even though I told him that we've been best friends (and nothing more) for years. He eventually got over that once he accepted that Drew is, in fact, straight when we walked in on him fucking some chick on the kitchen counter and I wasn't just saying that he wasn't into dudes so I could sleep with him behind Max’s back.

Plus, Max knows all about my history with Micah. He knows how hurt I was. He knows why I ended up in the hospital the day I met him. He knows how tortured I felt trying to decide whether I should date him. Max may be territorial, but he's also protective. If he thinks I'm going to get hurt again, he's not going to let me go back to Micah easily, whether it's my decision or not. He probably wouldn't even want me to talk to him.

I didn't want to be kept away from Micah altogether, and I was afraid that Max would try to do that to me. I needed closure, I needed to talk to Micah. Max or no Max, I needed that.

“I'm going to wait to talk to Micah first,” I told Drew with finality. He nodded, not questioning my decision, almost like he knew that was the one I was going to make. “I just don't know how I'm going to do that.”
“Is he coming back to school?” Drew asked.

I realised I had no idea. Would he be coming back to Hillcrest or would they send him back to his old school? That would be pretty stupid if he really was into guys, since it was an all-boys school. I'm sure there would be at least a few gay guys there, although I may be stereotyping.
I only shrugged in response to Drew’s question.

“Well, you'll probably find out tomorrow,” he said. He clapped a hand on my shoulder with a sympathetic look on his face, before he walked out of the room, leaving me to my thoughts.
“Tomorrow,” I whispered, and hoped to God that I would see Micah then.