“Why?” I squeeze her hips through her leggings. “Why did you leave like that? What the fuck happened?”
“Nothing.” Giselle’s fingertips come to rest on mine, pausing there for a heartbeat before she physically peels my hands from her body and steps back, putting space between us. Space that I hate. “It was nothing, Hudson.”
“It wasn’t nothing,” I argue. “You were upset at something. Just tell me what it was.”
“It doesn’t matter. Seriously, Hudson, I’m fine. It was nothing, okay?”
The frustration building inside of me raises its ugly head; I don’t believe Giselle for a second.
“You’re making this more complicated than it has to be, Gee.” I clench my jaw, feeling it tick. “Just tell me what I said that upset you.”
But whatever it is, the walls Giselle has built around herself hold firm. Her chest rises unsteadily, arms coming to cross over her body.
“If you’ve come to just try and pick me apart, Hudson, then you can leave.”
Her words are soft, but no less hard – still packing a punch to my gut.
I’m so angry with her, with the entire situation. If she’d just tell me what it is that I said, what it is that upset her, then we could just move past it, but there’s no amount of proddingtonight that is going to get Giselle to break apart and spill her guts to me.
Not that I’m willing to do so either and I don’t care if I sound hypocritical.
Shaking my head, I let the words roll off my tongue. “I don’t want to pick you apart, Giselle, that’s not why I came here.”
“Then why did you?”
Her question hangs above us; suspended in the air.
“Because…” I lick my lips. “Because I was worried something had happened to you. Because I needed to see with my own eyes that you were okay. Because somewhere along the way, from the first day we laid eyes on each other, to the playful insults we trade back and forth, I’ve come to care for you, Giselle.”
“I’ve come to care for you too,” she all but whispers. “But…”
My stomach flips unpleasantly. “But what?”
“Hudson, you don’tdate,you—”
“How do you know I don’t date?”
I don’t, or should I say I haven’t in a couple of years. Not to date in hopes of getting into a relationship at least. The last few dates I’ve been on have simply been a common courtesy call before I sleep with the girl – a dinner here, drinks there, maybe even a trip to the cinema if I’m feeling particularly comfortable.
But date to get into a relationship?
Why would I need to do that when I can have everything a relationship has – the girl, the sex, the… whatever else a relationship contains – but without the label? Without the pressure and the worry that loving somebody comes with.
I know how to love, of course I do. I’m grateful I’ve been showered with it since I was born, and I love my family to death.
But growing feelings for someone outside of that, someone who isn’t my family… wanting that person, needing them, falling in love with them… that sounds terrifying.
Especially when I know how all too soon that person can be ripped away from you.
When my mum developed breast cancer and began the difficult fight for her life, I saw, even as a small boy, how much it effected my dad. He had to watch the woman he loved, the woman he’d promised to cherish and uphold and look after in sickness and health, deteriorate rapidly in front of his very eyes. In front of all of our eyes.
He had to be away from her for months while she stayed in hospital, hooked up to loudly beeping machines and IV drips, all while trying to keep our life at home as normal as possible.
It wasn’t just Mum who aged as she battled, but my dad too. The stress and worry and sheer pain at the idea of being ripped apart from one another so cruelly, had taken its toll on both of them.
I think it was then, at ten-years old, that I first realised how resilient a human being can be, how much they can withstand and take without being knocked down.
But also, how much loving somebody can be the very thing that makes a human easy to break.
