Breakup Lines {Part 04}

BREAKUP LINES

04.

 

Breakup Lines - 04 - @Owggee

 

She had dark, piercing eyes and a haunting smile, and my friend Temisan would sometimes become poetic when he saw her. He said her smile made melancholy seem almost exquisite. I was the captain of her friendzone. It was 2.27am on a Tuesday morning and she came to talk. She brought the smell of White London cigarettes and red wine in a half empty Four Cousins bottle. She stood there at the door like a lost conviction, smiling her haunting smile, daring me to judge her. I didn’t.

“I hate fine boys,” she said softly, then she began to cry. I didn’t know what to do with all that brokenness, so I put my arm around her shoulder and told her it will be alright.
“Don’t touch me,” she sniffed, as she removed my arm, “you’re a fine boy too, aren’t you?” There was no bitterness in her voice.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
She sniffed again, “We met for the first time in High School,” she said quietly. She had stopped sobbing, and a faint, little Bini lilt made music of her words. “I loved him and he loved me and the world knew. I was not ashamed.”

She didn’t speak for a while and I could tell there were memories running wild in her head. The moon shone through an open window, gathering her an audience of shadows.

“We dated for eight years, and then, one day, he told me he had something important to say to me. I thought he was going to propose so I wore my best perfume.” She chuckled softly at the thought. “He was acting all weird and all, you know, looking very uneasy, so I asked him what was wrong.” There was another long pause, then she started to sob again. My arm stayed down.

She wiped her eyes with the back of her left hand and continued, “He had come to tell me he was gay. Can you believe that, Ashiwel? Eight years and three abortions, and all of me given, and just like that…he was gay. Just like that.”

We sat there in silence for a long time, fingers clasped around our knees, our backs against the navy-colored sofa, both of us, not wanting to ruin the moment with superficial words. There was a lot to say but the silence said it better and we understood. She stood up to leave after a while and I walked her to the door.
“Ashiwel,” she said.
“Yes Rachel?”
“You’re still my best friend, right?”
I nodded, “Yes Rachel. I still am.”

I stood there and watched her drive away into the night. She left her bottle of wine behind.

 

——-

Hello! Thank you for dropping by. Breakup Lines Part IV is part of an experimental fiction thing I started, where I take a random tweet from one of the people I follow and create a fictional breakup story out of it. If you’d like to contribute to the series, please email me {email@ashiwel.com}, or tweet at me, {@iamashiwel}. Many thanks to the @Owggee  for letting me (ab)use her tweet this way.

Go here to read Breakup Lines Part 01 or Breakup Lines Part 02 or Breakup Lines 03.

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