Someone I Used to Know - By Blakney Francis Page 0,101

living room. He’d turned an armchair so he could recline while he watched the door, apparently predicting my actions all along. I wondered how long he’d been sitting there, just waiting on me to disappoint him.

“It’s for the best.” If I was that tired of repeating the mantra, I couldn’t imagine how bored they were of hearing me say it.

He raised a hand, halting me from continuing.

I expected anger or irritation. I’d anticipated rage and tears. All I got from Cam was a look of exhaustion that sagged through his whole body. The defeat on his face scared me a thousand times more than any of those other emotions ever could have.

It had finally happened.

He’d given up on me. My actions and words had been begging him to do it for years, but nothing could have prepared me for the moment he truly let me go. I felt naked, like a part of me had been ripped away, leaving me exposed. It was terrifying.

He sighed. “Red Shoes, you don’t always get to decide what’s best.”

It was unfair to use that nickname. Tears burned my tear ducts, but I refused to let them fall. Couldn’t he see that it was hard for me too? Why did he have to make it harder?

I shuddered, blinking back my weakness until I’d regained my composure.

“Look,” he began uncomfortably, “about Declan. All those things I said about the two of you, they weren’t coming from your friend. When I said them, they were coming from your ex-boyfriend, and I’m sorry…I think I was wrong about him. He came by last night. I’ve never seen someone –.”

“Don’t.” It was my turn to cut him off. My back hit the door as I retreated like a skittish cat, ready to dart at any moment. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

He didn’t fight me on it. Maybe I’d grown too reliant on Declan’s stubborn tongue, always happy to put me in my place. Cam just relented.

His expression changed from forceful to longing as he gave me a regretful look up and down. It felt a whole lot like he was trying to memorize everything about me, even the smallest, most insignificant details. He was staring at me like it was the last time he’d ever see me.

“No rubber ducky shorts this time.” I could tell he tried to say it lightly, like a casual observation made by a friend, but there was a thickness in his voice that didn’t belong.

“It’s not a rubber ducky sort of day,” I replied solemnly. My bottom lip wobbled dangerously, and I had no defense to throw up when he came at me, wrapping his familiar body around mine.

I almost broke right then and there. It would’ve been easy to fall apart in Cam’s arms.

I could’ve forgotten all the silly mess of the past. I could’ve accepted the comfort he offered. I could’ve stayed with him forever, letting him take care of me, like he’d been trying to do all along. It would’ve been so easy to give in…

But the wrong things were always the easiest, and I’d been finding the strength to do otherwise for far too long to wave my white flag.

“You can’t keep doing this, Adley.” The comfort of his warm breath on my forehead was wholly misleading, a false promise of reassuring words that I wouldn’t let him speak.

He was wrong.

I was fatally flawed, doomed by the stubbornness of my convictions to make the same decisions over and over again.

I hadn’t moved, not an inch, my face still pressed into his soft t-shirt that sported the name of some indie band I’d never heard of, but he sensed the change. He dropped his arms and stepped away, resorting back to his demeanor of calm defeat.

I could see the part I’d played in every weary line of his face. There was a four year age difference between us, but he hadn’t looked a day over eighteen when we met. There had been youth in his smile and innocence in his joy. And then he’d met me.

A lifetime of sorrows hadn’t aged him like I had.

There wasn’t a thing I could do to erase the harm I’d done, the pain I’d inflicted by the cruelty of my love.

All I could do for him was leave.

When I stepped backwards out of his arms, my expression was strong, betraying none of the desperate weakness that clawed at my insides.

“Fine,” was all he said, resigned to my will. He reached behind him, dislodging