Frankly Told: Are you really?
“Stop bloody fighting it!” he shouted in half-sober frustration.
The two had been at it for close to thirty minutes and a crowd had since started to form around them. Theirs was the only noise, outside the booming music oozing out of the house, drawing people in. Starting from the kitchen, the two had dragged each other out onto the lawn of the stand-alone mansionette.
Alcohol coursed through their veins like supplements to emotions that were at an all-time high. The cold of the night meant nothing to their bodies and even if it tried to whisper in their ears, they were focused on each other in their squabble. One was just barely able to tell if there were two of his friend or if the alcohol had taken his head. The other red with anger.
“I don’t know why you are fighting me,” he said in a commanding tone. “You literally asked me to do this.”
“I don’t care what I asked you to do,” his opponent slurred through.
“You will in the morning when you wake up and remember you were about to walk back on months and months of healing,” he responded with venom behind his words.
“I love her, okay?” was the response and he could only shake his head.
“I know,” he started. “But you have to move on.”
“Shut up!”
He shook his head, palmed his face and his shoulders dropped as he watched his friend stumble around before him. The temptation to just let him be lapped at the back of his mind but he shook it off. He had made a promise, a man’s honour, to prevent any mistakes and that night was not the night to backtrack.
In his mind, he began to question, why did he have to drink so much? Maybe I shouldn’t have told him she was coming. This was meant to be a night for the boys, one that was long overdue. Why did he have to go and start messing things up so damn early?
The tittering crowd began to clear, noticing that it was nothing worth writing home about. Back in, they slowly receded until there were only smokers and a few sparsely spread cliques and couples. He walked up to his friend and threw his arm around his shoulder and ushered him to a patch of grass a little ways from the house.
“Sit…” he pushed him down. “Down.”
He cussed as he lowered himself beside his burden. He wondered what he would have rather been doing on such a night instead of attending this party. He looked over at his friend who was staring off into the distance with his mouth slightly open. He pursed his lips and crossed his legs to share the trance.
“I’m sorry,” his friend started after sitting in silence for a while.
“All good mate,” he responded, without looking over at him.
“No it’s not,” he complained. “I keep going round and round in this circle and I am ruining this night we said we would use to go back to our old days of just having fun, just us two. For what? Simping?”
“Come on, man,” he tried to console him.
“Nah,” his friend insisted. “I should not be in this position. After all these months. After checking myself into therapy. After working on myself, joining the gym, picking up books, getting back to an emotional baseline that is healthy.”
“It’s just… her. I don’t know what it is but I can’t help myself,” he resigned. “When I think of her my heart starts swelling in my chest and it gets hard to breathe. My body starts shivering like I'm going through withdrawals and I have butterflies in my stomach.”
“When I think of seeing her, I can’t help but smile,” he rumbled on. “The thought just makes me warm inside. It’s like a hug. It’s fuzzy and cringe but I like it. I want to hate her but that only lasted like a week before I was back to missing her in her absence.”
“Damn,” he scoffed. “That’s kinda poetic.”
“Shut up,” he shot back to the tease. “It’s just how it feels man. I wish I could somehow take that part of my heart and tear it off and burn it. Like why am I as a man feeling like this? Ati helpless because of a shawry. Yuck!”
They both laughed.
“Thanks though,” his friend sighed. “I would have definitely regretted it and I would have gone like three steps back. You are a real one.”
He put out his fist and it was bumped in sheepish agreement.
“I’m sure,” he affirmed. “In a couple more months, I’ll get over her. I need to.”
“Sure.” he doubted. “Are you really?”
“No but do I have a choice?” he scoffed. “I mean if i saw her right now, I would probably freeze up again and this alcohol is not helping me because who know what I might do. This is why I don’t like drinking. Where are my inhibitions ?”
There was silence again and a cool breeze snuck itself upon the two causing them to shiver a little. Yet, they remained glued to the spot as the alcohol settled in their system. He rubbed his forearms as goosebumps spread themselves over his skin. He sighed
“Maybe we should…” he started but was interrupted. His body was half off the ground, balanced on his heels and one arm, there he froze with surprise.
“Um… Hey,” her voice cut through the night like a warm knife through butter.
