“Why didn’t he tell me,” I murmur, “He had me believing that he was courting you, trying to win you…”
“He was scared, especially after what happened to me. He was extra, extra scared at messing anything up with you. He told me you were this hopeless romantic, who had these fictional guys and kpop boys as your standards and was scared of never living up to them.”
She laughs as she says that, but her words wash over me in violent waves, tearing apart everything that I had thought. I was wrong. I was so, so wrong.
“I - I-”
I’m stuttering my words, unable to process how I’m feeling. What I’m feeling. These last two weeks, I’ve been the wrong one all along.
“I thought I was preventing you both from being happy,” I confess, “That’s why I distanced myself from him. I-”
Christine reaches forward, clasping her fingers around mine.
“I know, Jas. Marlon told me. He’s been in such a torment these last two weeks. He’s been asking me what to do to win you back, and I told him to try to talk it out with you. I’m literally his last resort.”
“I’m sorry you had to be pulled into this,” I say.
She shakes her head, smiling.
“I’m not being pulled into anything. I care for Marlon alot, he’s a good friend. And I want him to be happy. I can see that he makes you happy too.”
Letting go of my hand, she leans down and takes a bite from her croissant. Crumbs fall from her lips when she says, “And besides, I always thought something would happen between the both of you, when we broke up. Your family was right all along, and I never disagreed.”
She winks at me then, and I decide right there that I want to stay friends with Christine. That, if and when this whole thing settles, I hope I can keep on chatting with her. I lean back, allowing myself to laugh, even with the weight of the dawning revelation on my chest.
Thirty Four
It’s sprinkling when I get home,which is frustrating. I didn’t bring an umbrella, so I had to walk the entire way from the bus stop home. Thankfully, the rain only got heavier once I was safely inside.
I shower immediately, not wanting to cope with an impending cold. All the while, Christine’s words wash over me just as the water does.
Marlon was into me all this time.
We’d both been into each other unknowingly, while thinking the other was into someone else.
God, talk about absolute wrong timing and miscommunication.
What a fatal coincidence, since miscommunication is what annoys me most in the romance books I read.
I need to see Marlon, to tell him that it was him all along. To apologise to him.
I need us both to have our cheesy little romantic reunion, to have our moment where everything that’s been hiding is revealed. God, how do I even make up for how I’d been acting the last two weeks?
How can I possibly mend the damage I caused? Even if Marlon liked me before, would he even like me now, knowing that this is how I deal with my issues? By ignoring them, hoping it’ll go away all on its own?
Once I’ve settled into drier clothes, I glance outside the kitchen window. The rain is pouring now, the season’s rain making its debut heavily.
Ugh, great.
I was planning to hopefully walk over later, when the rain had receded to talk to Marlon in person, but now, even the rain was trying to sabotage me.
I contemplate calling Marlon, but decide that this is something that needs to be done in person.
As the hours peel away, the rain doesn’t seem to die down. The heaviness dwindles, but it’s still too heavy to walk under. By the time all of my family is home, it’s still pouring.
“We’re finally getting the autumn rain, huh?” Dad proclaims. Ria heats up a meat pie for herself.
“I’m so glad. Rain makes it easier for me to study.”
