Until You Met Me

By the time Gerard could form any kind of response to what Molly had said, he knew that she was long gone. He had registered her slipping out of the front door, and the sound of her car’s engine as she had driven away, but he hadn’t been able to coax his feet into moving to follow after her, still floored by the words that had fallen out of her mouth. There had been a lot to digest. For a long moment, he had been completely fixated on the announcement that she was crazy about him, but slowly his thoughts had moved to what she had said after that, and that was what had finally spurred him into moving.

She thought that he didn’t feel the same way. She thought that his admission about the dinner he had attended in place of Dani was designed to stop them heading out on another date, and he couldn’t let her keep thinking it, not when the truth was the complete opposite. He hadn’t wanted whatever was starting to happen between them to start based on a lie. Before he had told her the truth, Molly had been talking about her parents, and how long they had been in one another’s lives, and it had caused him to realise that he couldn’t continue to lie to her.

He didn’t know what they could be, and he knew that admitting the truth came with the obvious risk of Molly pulling away from him, but he had realised he couldn’t start anything between them with a lie, and so he had told her the truth, hoping that once the dust settled, they would be able to talk about what they wanted. He hadn’t thought for one second that Molly could read it as him not wanting her, and he hated that he had missed it. He hated that he had hurt her.

Moving too quickly, he fumbled getting his feet into his shoes again before he retrieved his keys and barrelled out of the front door, determined not to leave things as they were. Everything was going to change, it couldn’t be stopped now that Molly’s admission was out in the open, but he couldn’t let it happen without putting all of his cards onto the table too.

~#~
Switching her phone off, Molly dropped it onto her mattress before she padded into her bathroom, already shrugging out of the dress that she had been wearing. She didn’t want to look at it. Between the texts that she would inevitably receive from Ava, asking about how dinner with Dani had gone, and the prospect of Gerard trying to get in touch with her, she knew there was a very real risk of her doing something stupid to her phone, and so she had opted to switch it off, postponing dealing with the reality of what had happened until she had had a chance to process it.

Tossing her dress into the laundry basket, she pulled on a set of pyjamas and moved to wash her face before she heard the knocking at her front door, something which caused her to exhale a quiet sigh. Grabbing a towel, she dried her face, but she didn’t move towards the door, not until she heard Gerard’s voice call out her name softly. “I know you’re here” he said gently “Your car is outside. Can you open the door, please?” he added.

Molly still didn’t move, the dull ache in her chest wouldn’t let her. She didn’t know that she could face him so soon after what she had said, not when there was a strong chance that the only reason he had followed her was to let her down gently.

“I don’t want to make this worse by using my spare key” Gerard said after a few moments of quiet “Please, Molly. Open the door” he added.

Molly hesitated for a moment longer before she started to move. Slowly, and second guessing each step she took, she reached the front door and pulled it open. “What do you want?” she muttered.

Gerard slipped past her, causing Molly to roll her eyes before she closed the door and turned to look at him. “Gerard...”

“You didn’t give me a chance to say anything” Gerard interrupted.

Molly shook her head as she stepped around him, padding back towards her bedroom. “You didn’t need to say anything” she called over her shoulder.

Gerard followed after her, gently gripping her elbow to stop her from walking further away from him. “Can you just listen to me for a second?” he asked “You dropped something huge on me, and then just walked away. How is that fair?” he pressed.

Molly didn’t turn back to look at him, but she did stop walking, something which caused Gerard to exhale a muted sigh of relief. Gently pulling his hand off of her elbow, he watched her for a moment, half expecting her to move away, before he ducked his head. “Did you mean it?” he asked quietly.

Molly squeezed her eyes closed. “Would you rather I didn’t?” she countered.

“I asked you first” Gerard said “Molly, what you said...Was that real?” he asked.

Molly pressed a hand to her eyes, trying, and failing, to keep them from stinging before she reluctantly nodded her head. “Yeah” she breathed “It was. It was an incredibly stupid thing to just blurt out like I did, but it...it’s real” she added.

Gerard didn’t know what to say. He had spent the entire journey from his home to hers rehearsing it. He had thought of so many things that he wanted to tell her, that he wanted her to know, but now that he was in front of her, her words ringing in his ears again, they’d slipped his mind, and despite his best efforts, he couldn’t conjure them again.

After a few uncomfortable beats of silence, Molly shook her head, letting out a sad laugh. “I guess that answers my question” she quipped “I’m sorry I fucked everything up. You know where the door is. Please, don’t call. I won’t answer” she added before she moved to start heading towards her bedroom again.

Gerard almost tripped over his feet, but he was able to get a hand onto the door before she had fully closed it in his face. “I can’t think” he spluttered.

Molly finally turned to look up at him, her blue eyes full of tears. “I am not doing the thinking for you, Gerard” she said “Whatever it is you need to say, it’s got to come from you this time” she added.

“I didn’t mean that” Gerard said “I just meant...I had so much I wanted to say. I spent the whole trip here thinking about it, but then you said it again, and it’s all fallen out of my head” he added.

“Then go” Molly sighed “And think about it again, or don’t. Just, don’t stand there and say nothing” she added.

Gerard ducked his head, taking a beat to think, before he blew out a quiet sigh. “You were wrong” he said “About why I told you the truth about that dinner we had. I didn’t do that to push you away. I did it because I couldn’t let whatever was happening between us start with a lie. That...if there was going to be...if we were going to start, that wasn’t the right way to do it. That’s not how I would want you and me to start our story” he added, grimacing slightly at how awkwardly the words had come out.

Molly stared up at him. “What does that mean?” she asked.

Gerard offered her a helpless smile. “It means I am a really big idiot” he answered “I should have done so many things differently. The night we had dinner, the night I told you the truth about it, tonight, they’ve all be disastrous, and I am so sorry for that” he added.

For a long time, Molly just stared up at him before she shook her head, lowering her stare to the floor. “Do you want there to be a start to our story?” she asked quietly, too afraid of the answer to ask the question with more certainty.

There was no hesitation about Gerard when he nodded his head, his lips quirking upwards into a relieved smile. “God, yes” he breathed.