บท 33: Talking
- - The Next Morning, Emily's Apartment - -
"Ugh..." Chloe held a hand up to her forehead and opened her eyes. She slowly lifted the blanket off of her and sat up. She blinked a few times so that she could see clearly.
"What the hell?" She mumbled. She immediately recognized the room, the apartment, and the woman crouched over in the corner, putting a neatly folded blanket into a small basket.
"Shit!" She gasped and sat up completely straight when she registered what she thought must have happened. The last thing she remembered was texting Emily back at the office building. She assumed that after getting drunk she confronted Emily about not keeping her phone number, and somehow ended up in Emily's living room.
"Good morning." Emily blushed, remembering what she had told her last night. The words were still echoing in her head; "Love you." Her drowsy voice, the casual tone, the violent beating of her heart when she heard them.
"How much do you remember about yesterday?" She walked over to the kitchen counter and poured Chloe a cup of coffee.
"Here." She said softly when she walked back over to the couch and handed the mug to Chloe, then sat down.
"Um...I texted you happy birthday, then I went to the bar..." She shrugged her shoulders, holding the mug with both hands in the middle of her lap, "Then nothing after that."
"That was you? Huh." She smiled as she spoke quietly, not wanting to upset Chloe's head.
"Yep...Do you mind telling me how I got here?" She turned towards Emily.
"I have no idea how you got to the building, but I found you on the bench outside, you said you were waiting for me, so I helped you inside. You were a mess." She looked down and fiddled with her shirt. "I brought you here and laid you down on the couch to sleep the rest of the day." She smiled quickly at Chloe then walked out to the kitchen to get herself a cup of coffee.
Chloe looked down at her coffee cup, and out of the corner of her eye she saw tights curled up on the floor. She scrunched up her eyebrows and tilted her head to the side, then looked at her legs and realized that they were hers. Her eyes widened and she reached down to the ground to grab them. In doing so, she completely forgot about her coffee, spilling it on her stomach.
"Ah! Shit!" She hissed.
Emily quickly turned around to see what was wrong, then set her mug down, grabbed paper towels, and ran over to Chloe.
"Are you okay?" She whispered as she wiped the steaming liquid off of her abdomen.
"Yeah."
Emily continued patting the coffee out of Chloe's shirt.
"Ah..." Chloe sucked air through her teeth and winced in pain.
"Sorry." Emily lifted the paper towel, then placed it back on the cloth more gently than before.
"Better?"
"Much, thanks." She sniffled and turned her head away from Emily.
Emily threw away the paper towel, then returned to the couch with her coffee in hand.
"Emily?" Chloe asked after a few minutes of silence.
"Mmhmm."
"Did anything happen yesterday?" She stared at her half empty coffee mug, anxiously waiting for an answer.
Emily's cheeks flushed. She remembered what almost happened on that couch last night. Then the words came back to her head. "Love you."
"Um..." She chuckled weakly. "Almost."
"Oh, god...I'm so, so sorry." Chloe blushed and looked over at Emily, whose cheeks were much redder than her own.
"What did happen?" She asked, her curiosity growing.
"We um...kissed."
"There's more to it than that. I can tell. What else?" She repositioned her body to face Emily.
Emily's heart was beating out of her chest.
"You...You told me that you love me." She turned her face away to hide her red cheeks.
"Oh." Chloe was shaking slightly, her cheeks became an even deeper shade of red than before.
"Did you mean it?"
"Huh?" She composed herself and looked towards Emily.
Emily moved her head back around so that she was facing Chloe, but avoided her eyes.
"Did you mean it? Or was it just some drunken comment."
"I-"
"Because I think that..." Emily cut Chloe off, "I think I could love you too. If you let me." She still avoided Chloe's gaze.
"What?" She scoffed. "Seriously?"
"Did you mean it?" Emily persisted, this time giving Chloe a chance to respond.
"I don't fucking know, I was drunk!"
"Well then, do you love me?" Emily met Chloe's eyes. They were glossy, almost tearful.
"That is none of your damn business." she chuckled and stood up, setting her glass on the coffee table, walking towards the door.
"Chloe, wait!" Emily hurried out of her seat and beat Chloe to the door.
Chloe tilted her head to the side and tried to smile as the tears piled up in her eyes.
"You hurt me, Emily." She wiped the tears off of her cheeks as they all began pouring out at once.
"So fucking bad. And now you, what, 'could love me'? What the hell does that even mean?!" She spread her arms and started weeping. "And of course I fucking love you!"
Emily gasped and smiled weakly.
"But you 'don't have your shit together'. Remember?" She scoffed and tried to walk past Emily to the door.
Emily blocked her by wrapping her arm around the front of Chloe's waist, causing her to wince at the pressure on her tender skin.
"Sorry." Emily moved her arm away from the burned skin. "I did though. Get my shit together. That's what I spent practically all of last year doing."
Chloe scoffed, keeping her eyes on the door.
"Don helped me. I came out to my grandma, to him, and now to you."
Chloe just shook her head as tears continued to drip down her face faster than she could wipe them away.
"I left the office, and the first thing I was going to do was call you and ask you to meet up." Her voice hitched as she saw the continuous flow of tears running flowing down Chloe's cheeks.
"Chloe, I'm sorry, I jus - I wasn't ready.
If it makes you feel any better, I wasn't with anyone last year but you."
"And why would that make me feel any better? I'm not mad that you got yourself figured out, I'm actually happy for you." She lifted her head to see Emily's face. "I'm just pissed that you think that I'll automatically welcome you back.
Yeah, I also waited for you. But guess what? I did more drinking last year than I ever thought I would in my LIFE."
Emily pursed her lips as tears started clouding her vision.
"I understood that you didn't want me as a girlfriend, but not wanting me at all? Do you know how shitty that made me feel?!
No. Because you've never felt unwanted. Well I have. And it fucking sucks! I expected as much from my parents, from coworkers, bosses, but not you. I thought you were different."
She took a few shaky deep breaths.
"I'm obviously broken, but you haven't gone through half of the shit that I did. You have no idea how I feel, and absolutely no right to know my feelings anyway."
"Goodbye, Emily."
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