Love Me, Hate Me Either Way We'll Go Crazy

“I actually ended up becoming a part of an accelerated bachelors program. So that I could finish my degree early. I was squirming by my second year to get out into the world.” I smiled as I swept hair from my face. “I did not take any time off of school. Focused hard. Here I am graduating college in two months.”
“Sounds boring, Lex.” Joe chuckled before he perked up. “I have to quickly show you something,” he pulled me out of the chair and through a door almost giving me whiplash. He shut the door to a hallway and draped arm around my shoulder. “So marketing, that’s got to be a boring cube job, right?” His voice was urgent as he lead me through halls.
“Actually, I was hired to work at Victoria Secret, I’m technically just a paid intern for the moment. It was probably a favor my mom called in, but I don’t think I care. It’s an interesting job. I of course spend a lot of free time after work taking classes online.”
“That’s nice. Here we are.” He pulled me into a room. I immediately recognized it as their music room, but it seemed unused and lonely since each of them had different lives now.
“What did you need to show me, Joe? I’ve been in this room several times looks the same.” He led me over to a book case pointing to something up on a high shelf.
“That.” In one fallow swoop he was out of the room as I tried to determine what he meant.
“You’ve got to be kidding.” I stepped over trying to pull open the door. Evidently it was locked. “Come on, Joe. We are too old for this.” I sighed and waited for him to get bored of the situation. Responding would just further the humor he finds in this childish game. I sat on the piano bench and flattened out my dress on my lap. My mind wandered to all the good times and bad that happened right here at this piano. It’s been a long time since then. Felt like a lifetime really.

“Kevin, said mom wanted me to take some things of mine she found. He said the boxes were in here.” My head pulled up to attention. Joseph what did you get me into.
“Oh yeah, right in there. I just left. Reminiscing and all.” Joe spoke. The door opened for a brief moment letting in bright light before slamming shut quickly. The lights turned up as I stood. He noticed me right away. His first instinct was to take a few steps back until he was against the door. I did not approach him. He tried the door and failed.
“Damn it.” He muttered before locking eyes with me. “Did you have something to do with this?” His words were seething with a sort of venom that stung me deep opening up old wounds.
“I’m in the same boat as you are.” I shrugged trying not to show emotion, but it slipped out of my mouth regardless. “I stopped trying to see you two years ago.” I did not like that even now it hurt deep inside.
“Don’t act like you are the one that got hurt in this situation, Alexis.” He shoved his fisted hands into his pockets.
“Really? I don’t get to act hurt. You are the one that ignored me for years after I… We had a lot to talk about.”
“You are the one who walked out the door and told me you couldn’t do this.”
“I couldn’t marry you at the time. I loved you, that didn’t change for a long time after I left. And I left not to leave you, but to get to my mother, Nick. So I had to deal with losing a sibling and almost a mother at the same time as loosing you! I needed you to be there for me. I needed you to tell me it would be fine. I still loved you. I wanted to anyway. I left, but you, you abandoned me.” I was crying. Damn it, Alexis. I turned away from him so he couldn’t see.
“There were times I needed you.”
“You didn’t tell me! I asked so many times. Anytime I got the briefest notion I tried to get in, but you slammed doors in my face so many times. At some point I just stopped knocking on the door. I moved on cause all you were doing was hurting me! I couldn’t try to fix it any longer! It just hurt too damn bad.” I brushed the tears off of my face before turning to face him. “I let you get as close to me as you ever could and then you pushed me out. You ignored me for years, for what? Because at nineteen I wasn’t ready to marry you after dating for four months. You plopped a $40,000 right in front of me without thinking seriously about how scared that would make me feel. Had you waited a year or so maybe I would have changed my answer, but you decided if you couldn’t have me right then I wasn’t good enough.” I stepped around him to the door. “Joe, let me out.” I asked feeling raw like muscle was scrapped from bone. “Please.” I waited for any response. “Fuck it.” I turned around looking around the room for anything to knock down the door. Nothing. I noticed a gift basket placed on a side table. Nice humor, Joe. Ha ha. I pulled off the clear wrapping examining the items as I pulled a small card from an envelope. “Stop being idiots. Thanks Joe.” I removed one of the bottles of wine and opened it taking a long drink fully intending to drink the whole bottle. He took the second bottle. We didn’t look at each other for the longest time. It had to have been an hour or two because I was almost finished with the bottle.
“I’m sorry I’ve been a piece of shit friend, Lex. I didn’t enjoy the past three years.”
“From the outside it sure looked like it.” I muttered thinking of all the girls and the parties.
“Maybe, but I kept thinking about you the whole time. I was jealous as hell. Every time I heard that you had brought home a boyfriend for Christmas, or you posted a picture of whomever on twitter or Instagram. I always saw and I thought about how he gets to be with you. Touch you. How I touched you.”
“And you don’t think I didn’t think about that every time I saw your face anywhere with another supermodel. Who I inevitably end up face to face with at work. It was like they all gave me this look because I was your normal girlfriend. Not special like them. Because Nick is only into people I could never live up to now.”
“Really? No one can ever live up to you.” He confessed drinking from his bottle while leaning back against the piano. I thought about how all this time I still thought that about him. My heart was beating fast. I took in several deep breaths calming myself down. “I’m sorry that what happened, happened.”
“Which part?” I placed my empty bottle on the side table. I defiantly felt unbalanced with a stomach full of wine.
“That I asked you when I promised not to. That I took advantage of you. That I never called back. Or tried to see you again.”
“You didn’t take advantage of me, Nick. I initiated it. I thought we would have more time. I should have kept my head about the situation.” My body felt warm like a fire was being stoked within me. I wrapped my arms around myself. Calm down. I heard the door click and open.
“Anyone dead?” Joe spoke from the doorway. Both, Nick and I stood quickly and headed to the door.
“Drunk maybe. But, dead no.” I spoke taking hold of the door in case he got any ideas. “Have you been out there the whole time?”
“Maybe.” He chuckled mischievously before patting each of us on the shoulder. “I didn’t realize there was long past congratulations in order.” My cheeks burned red brightly as I looked down at my feet.
“Of course you heard that part.” I stepped through the door as he held up each of his hands for high fives. I shook my head. “Neither of us won in that situation, Joe. Stop it.” My feet fell heavy as I traveled down the hall and away from that room.