Bouquets of Chocolate (manxman)

Five

The colour of my sweats hasn't changed in the last 20 minutes I've been staring at them. My forehead is resting on my forearms, which are, in turn, resting on my pulled up knees. I'm sitting on my sofa, as small as I could possibly make myself, for the minuscule amount of comfort it gives me, and I'm acutely aware of the ticking of the clock hung over the turned off TV in front of me. It's so cliche. 11.56pm. And all I can do is wait, listening to the hands on the clock tick tick tick closer to midnight, to the end of the day. He hasn't come to see me yet. And even if he does show up now, there isn't enough time for us to make the chocolate today without it going to tomorrow. There are only 4 minutes - sorry, 3 minutes now - left, after all.

I'm not even really sure whether I want to cry. I know we haven't been getting along as well these past few days, if not weeks. Something is changing and it hurts. I want my best friend back, and I want him in the way we've always been - closer than other people think is normal and more honest than we are with anyone else in our lives. Now I do want to cry.

But my struggles of holding back my tears are interrupted by the doorbell, ringing at exactly 11:58pm. For a second, I sit there, eyes wide open and brain not quite catching up to the fact that he's here - there is absolutely no way this is anyone else.

It feels like forever, but it's really only a few seconds before I get up, stumbling my way to the front door and pulling it open so suddenly, Jordie jumps a little bit.

He smiles at me crookedly, a little sparkle in his eyes. "Hi."

"Hi?" I echo as a question. Immediately he flinches and I can see the regret in his eyes. He knows he messed up. I see him swallow before he holds out his hands, cradling a little fancy looking box. For a moment, I genuinely think he's bought chocolate and am seriously considering hitting him over the head for it. But then I remember that Jordie is an acclaimed pastry chef and has probably made his own chocolates. And knowing the dork he can be sometimes, probably also his own little fancy box.

"You made them yourself?" I ask, carefully trying to keep my voice even and not let my disappointment shine through.

"Of course!" he says proudly. He clearly misunderstood me completely.

"Without me?"

"Oh."

"Yeah, oh."

There's silence between us, neither of us knowing what to say, so I just sigh and step to the side, gesturing him to come in. Hesitantly he pulls his arms back towards his body, stands up straighter and looks at me for a second, clearly trying to figure me out. I try not to meet his eyes as I gesture him to come in again. He quickly does, toeing his shoes off and then just standing there. He's still watching me, like he's waiting for me to react, explode more like, but I don't bother reacting to him. Instead I close the door and just walk off towards my living room.

I want to sit down, but I'm too restless. Somehow, this feels different. After spending so much time away from each other, beating myself up over something I didn't even know I'd done, and then him suddenly showing up all smiley, there's a bad feeling sitting in my chest. It feels oppressive and thick and it makes it hard to breathe. A part of me wonders whether he's gonna tell me he needs space, or that he's moving out, or maybe he found a proper partner that doesn't like him being so close to someone who's just a friend. I try to calm myself down by reminding myself that no matter what, regardless of what changed between us, Jordie would never do that to me out of the blue, but it's hard to believe it after the last few weeks. And that hurts.

"Can you stop pacing please?"

Jordie evidently followed me into the living room, clearly watched me walk the small space that is left between all the furniture, somehow completely oblivious to his presence even though he's all I'm even thinking about right now.