“Come inside. You’ll get sick like me if you stay out here in the cold. Come on I have tea for you.” She hands me one of the mugs and takes my hand before linking her fingers with mine, bringing me up to our apartment. We reach the top of the stairs and for whatever godforsaken reason, I cry. It starts off slow before the next thing I know we’re standing in our kitchen and I’m sobbing, the tears dripping off my chin onto my sweater.
“Aw Wills, come here.” Alina says as she takes the mug from me and puts both mine and hers on the kitchen counter. She pulls me into a hug and I can’t help but cry harder into her shoulder as I wrap my arms around her waist, holding onto her like the lifeline she is to me.
“Let it out babe. I’ve got you.” So I do. I spend the next hour snuggled up to her telling her about our dinner and what happened on the doorstep while crying harder in between every few words that I manage to get out.
She knows this is more to do with how I feel about myself and the aftermath of Fred rather than crying over Dragna. It’s not the man I’m crying over, it’s the situation I stupidly found myself in after swearing I wouldn’t and I hate myself for it.
I built walls around my heart that I swore I would never let anyone break, I reinforced them with steel but then Dragna somehow found a crack and just slipped in. Each attentive look he gave me tonight, each follow up question to a story I told at dinner, all of it slowly allowing me to feel like maybe I could lower that wall. Now though, I’ve been proven once again that I’m not the girl that gets the work put in for her, I’m not the girl who gets chosen.
After a while, Alina and I fell into a comfortable silence watching a movie once I had cried myself out.
“I’m calling things off with Lev.” She announces quietly as she strokes my hair.
“Alina no. Don’t do that just because of what happened with me.” I tell her as I sit up and look at her feeling guilty.
“You think I could be with him or around him when his stupid fucking cousin has done this to you? I don’t care how good the man fucks, it’s not worth you being upset if he ever came round. Plus, I’d want to punch his stupid face just so when Dragna see’s him, he’d know the punch was intended for him.” She laughs while weakly punching the sofa cushion beside her and I can’t help but smile at how stupid she is and how much I love her.
“I love you Willow and I would never, ever put a man before you. Even though Lev hasn’t done anything wrong, he is guilty by association in my eyes and I wouldn’t keep him around to remind you of Dragna either.” She says while kissing the side of my head.
“I know you wouldn’t, but it’s not right to take it out on him. The boy brought you soup then came back over to keep you company tonight while you’re sick. He’s obviously obsessed with you. Him being around isn’t going to hurt me. He’s actually growing on me.” I say while side-eyeing her.
“I knew it! You do think he’s funny!”
During one of our many conversations about Lev, I told Alina he was like a pest you couldn’t get rid of because I just like riling her up. The truth is that I think Lev is great for her. I haven’t seen her smile so much in the past few years over a guy as she has for last week over Lev.
“He’s tolerable.” I say gently smiling back at her and she hits me with the sofa cushion in the face as I break out into laughter.
“I’m kidding! He’s pretty great Ali, I think you should keep him. His comedic value might even bring some relief for my sadlittle heart during these trying times.” I say while putting on an overdramatic pout, pulling myself together.
I’m cried out, drained and my best friend has helped bring me out of my pity party so it feels good to joke with her about Lev.
“If you say so girl, but if he comes round and makes you upset, you tell me and he’ll be out the door faster than he can make me come.”
“Alina!!” I groan, covering my face with both my hands and shudder while she laughs beside me. My best friend ladies and gentlemen.
—————————————————————
I wake up feeling stiff and sore and quickly realise Alina and I fell asleep on the sofa together tangled in her duvet. We don’t do this often but between her being sick and me having an emotional breakdown it’s no wonder we both passed out after last nights events.
I reach over her to pick up my phone and check the time and sigh when I see the battery died during the night. Thankfully today is our usual day off from the bookstore so we didn’t miss any phone alarms going off.
I stretch and give Alina a little shove.
“Wake up, we slept on the sofa and you’re starting to squash me.” I say as she groans and only further wraps herself around me.
“Nooo, just five more minutes mom please.” She jokes as she starts to move off me.
“Come on, give me your phone and I’ll put it on charge with mine.” I say as I climb over her to get up. She throws her phone over to me as I make my way to the kitchen.
“Do you want coffee or tea?” I ask her as she groans some more and stretches out into the free space surrounding her now that I’ve got up.
“Ohh tea please, I still feel like shit.” She looks at me while blowing her nose and I feel guilty I left her here last night to go for dinner. Okay, nope, not going there, not doing that. I won’t think about last night ever again.
I plug our phones into their chargers and start to make us both cups of tea while trying to force my mind to think of anything other than Dragna.
“You don’t think there will be any texts or missed calls from him do you? Maybe he regretted walking away when he got to the club.” Alina asks me from across the living room bringing my mind right back to what I didn’t want to remember.
“No, I don’t think he’ll even have a second thought about me after last night.” I reply honestly, because how could he walk away like that and then still think about me?
