𝙇.
SOMETHING BORROWED

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NEW YORK

I COULD ALREADY picture what was going to be written on my gravestone:

Here lies Elizabeth Montgomery, a dumb bitch.

My gravestone would be in some shitty plot in a cemetery back in Connecticut. 

My funeral would be painfully long and awkward, a lot of Addison trying not to emote and my mother being unable to do anything but stare, due to the amount of botox in her cheeks. Maybe my plot would have flowers, maybe some pictures and maybe even a teardrop or two.

Maybe if they didn't like that option for my eulogy, they'd opt for a specific text message that Mark Sloan sent me.

It was short and snappy and occurred thirty minutes after I'd told him that I loved him for the first time. It had a certain ring to it and it seemed to have the Mark Sloan stamp of approval.

Out of everything, this was how he decided to end it. He typed out those words and thought, yes, this is how it's going to end. It was a nice message, very brief and curt and impersonal with it's own empty apology at the beginning:

I'm sorry, I think we should see other people.

I spent a lot of time pulling it apart, dissecting it as if I was back in an English classroom in high school. I spent a lot of time reading it over and over until it was burned into the back of my eyelids, ready to pop up on a short moments notice to get my blood pumping. 

It'd taken him half an hour to tap out that text message, half an hour to press send and make frown and squint as if I'd misread the tiny words on my screen.

What the fuck did that mean?

It meant: I don't want you to love me.

It meant: I'm bored now, go find someone else to get emotionally attached to.

Or at least, that's what I concluded. It was the argument of my essay that I'd compiled with the last of my sober brain cells. It was enough to make me falter completely and think 'what the fuck did that mean?' and hope that I was very, very wrong. 

I'd always been shit at English in high school and often, I overanalysed things until they were broken little syllables that didn't make sense to me anymore.

Was I wrong? I really wanted to be wrong. I was in the process of convincing myself that I was wrong, I was nearly at the breaking point, convincing myself that this was just a miscommunication—but then Mark wouldn't take any of my calls and I couldn't bring myself to leave him a voicemail and I just had to stare at the message over and over.

I'm sorry, I think we should see other people.

I don't think he meant it to be overanalysed. I don't think he intended it to be anything other than what it was. It took me a while to respond. 

It took me one hour more than it had taken him to send his. I tapped out various replies, some with expletives, some that were simply so over-the-top that I'd had to physically remove myself from my cell phone and remind myself who I was.

The response I came up with ticked all of the desirable boxes:

Okay.

It was to the point and impersonal, just as Mark's had. It was saying exactly what I needed it to say without letting him slip in between the lines.

Okay. I understand. The realisation made me wipe away a few tears and exhaled heavily through my nose-- but I didn't think too much into it.

Okay. I understand. Just forget I said anything.

I was accumulating quite a pile in my stack of failed relationships. I'd only ever said I love you to three men in my life. The words carried a lot of weight for me. It was kind of humiliating-- oh fuck no, of course, it was mortifying-- for Mark to just look at me, pause and then send me a text message as if to say 'I don't want that'. 

But I chose to be cool. I chose to be impersonal and brief and to the point:

Okay.

And then I mourned the relationship.

I'd actually enjoyed Mark's company. He'd been exciting and fresh and had made me feel wanted. But with the text message at the back of my throat like rising vomit, alongside the look of panic in Mark's eyes as he processed what I'd said, I dug the grave myself and wore black at the wake. 

It was held in Addie and Derek's brownstone and I was the only guest. It was a private affair. With Addie sat beside me and the world's biggest glass of Shiraz in my hand, I'd told her the second most cursed three-letter-sentence to fall out of my lips in the span of twenty-four hours:

"You were right."

Addie had loved that.

She'd loved getting to unsheathe her favourite weapon ("I told you so") and refill my glass until I was practically blindsided. She'd had sparkles in her eyes and an empathetic smile on her face that wasn't big enough to hide the look of relief in her eyes. 

She'd loved it so much that she hadn't even been angry with Mark about it. Addie had loved the fact that Mark had done exactly what she'd expected: detonated under high amounts of pressure and sent me flying face-first into the floor with a giant hole in my heart.

I hadn't, though. I hadn't loved that.

I was very stubborn, I didn't admit that people were right often. Maybe that was most of the reason why Addison seemed to revel in it. But then there was also the whole love part... I'd been very upset about it. 

There was something so painstaking about finally telling someone you loved them and for them to panic about it and then just end things then and there— but in retrospect, I had it coming. After all, Mark's reputation had been a parade of red flags that I'd waltzed happily through without any second thoughts.

When I told Amy she'd told me that I'd had it coming. 

Mark had never been the commitment type. She'd asked me with a strained look in her face over a bottle of wine: "What happened?" And I'd sighed, already well past tipsy and drooping in my chair. A hand had been glued to my forehead, a downturn to my bottom lip.

"Well," I said, appearing far too distanced from the true emotion turmoil that the whole situation had caused me. "I told him I loved him, he freaked out, left and didn't answer any of my calls and then... he texted me."

"Text" Her eyebrows had risen at that and she'd shook her head, scoffing. "He fucking broke up with you over text?"

"Yeah," I said, then laughed because it really did sound shit. "He did."

I'm sorry, I think we should see other people.

What he forgot to mention, in that message, was that he was going to leave for six months.

He'd had a medical facility in Massachusetts booked for nearly a year. He'd been given the green light for taking time off for the project, three days before we broke up. Mark had two weeks between that message and leaving to take his research project to trials. I had to hear about it from Derek who thought that I'd known about this the whole time. 

It had caught me off-guard. I'd never been made aware of it.

What he also forgot to mention, was that 'other people' meant every woman Mark could charm into his bed in those two weeks. He seemed to make up for the time he'd lost. Mark made it his mission, his prerogative to avoid the fact that he'd dropped me on my ass for a fortnight of hookups.

Imagine it. Breaking up a relationship because you get spooked by three little words and then proceeding to sleep with every single staff member in a hospital... couldn't be me. 

But it was so painfully Mark Sloan that when it started happening I didn't have the energy to even be hurt about it.

I wafted around the hospital with the willingness to just leave the topic alone.I was very, very happy to be ignorant to everything, but Faith seemed to take the opportunity to become a commentator. Even Isaac and Liam humoured her. 

Every morning, as I sat down and laced my sneakers, I had to listen to them trying to figure out who had fallen victim to Mark Sloan's charms. They'd hedge their bets and debate Meanwhile, I had the world's tiniest mental breakdown at how quickly my love life had gone to shit.

Protip: if you're going to get dumped, don't get dumped by a man whore.

This woman, this on-call room... This woman... this bar... 

Faith seemed to find the topic electric. She rattled on and on about how he'd done a complete reversal and embraced his reputation. Secretly, I thought Mark was putting on a show-- he knew exactly what they expected from him and he'd always been a performer.

"It was that nurse in the ICU, I bet," Faith paced thin lines up and down the centre of the locker room as she mused over the night's pickings. She was half-dressed and seemed to take this topic very, very seriously. "I mean, who else?"

"My money's going on Georgia from accounting," Isaac said from the other side of the wall of lockers, in the middle of brushing his teeth. The exasperated breath I let out was masked by the sound of Liam spraying deodorant. "She's been trying to get with me for a few weeks and yet yesterday I got absolutely nothing-"

They were all throwing in money into Faith's bag like they were taking part of some sort of underground betting ring. I stared at it, watching as the crumple bills seemed to soak up my veiled frustration. I shook my head when Faith asked (for the fifth or sixth time that week) if I wanted to take part. 

My excuse was always the same: "Oh, I've never been into bet sort of stuff", which was a blatant lie. The college student in me had taken every excuse to make money, and I'd actually gotten pretty good at it. Faith didn't really push that answer so I appreciated it. She breezed away and started talking at lengths about what she was going to do with the money she's going to win...

"So much for feminism," I mumbled under my breath.

There was a whole different level of idiotic watching the people you work with talk about your ex's sex life so enthusiastically. I'd asked Faith (with a very restrained sense of desperation) why she was so invested and she'd just shrugged. 

I'd begun to think that she was far more entranced by Mark than I'd ever been. She would bring him up as if he was a celebrity, talk about his life as if he had a Wikipedia page or magazine articles written about him. It was taking all of my acting abilities to pretend as if I wasn't bothered whenever she'd bring up his latest hookup or what nurse he'd been seen flirting with at the coffee cart. 

It had me wondering why I'd even bothered to go into surgery if I had such a promising future on Broadway.

But I'd said Okay. I hadn't yelled at him or screamed.

I'd said Okay. He was perfectly free to do whatever he wanted to do. If sleeping around was what he wanted to do, I'd just leave him to it.

I didn't have the energy to exude anything other than Okay.

It wasn't as if I had time to be angry or hurt. Work got harsh, really harsh. I started stacking more and more shifts, working more and more until I barely even went to my own apartment to sleep. I was brushing my teeth in the restroom and doubling up on deodorant so I could avoid having to use the staff showers. 

I was too busy to even think about sleeping. I was too busy, through those two weeks, that I didn't even falter when I saw Mark in the hallways. I just turned onto the next case or the next assist or whatever else was needed from me.

At night, when I did get a chance to lie down, I'd find it funny. Everyone at work wanted so much from me. Addie wanted so much from me so I could inch out of her shadow. Mark was the only one who didn't want anything from me at all.

The only perk that I had from Mark's sex crusade is that he'd decided to steer clear of me completely, which was doing me just fine. 

According to Isaac, our premier Plastic Surgery correspondent, Mark's research project was going swimmingly. He hadn't appeared on the OR board in weeks and was only seen in very brief interludes in the ER, picking up whatever trauma the other doctors couldn't cover. He was busy too and I hadn't spoken to him since he'd called things off. Whatever contact we had was minuscule glances that were impassive and orderly. 

I was counting my blessings that I hadn't ended up in an OR with him.

"Y'know, if you were smart Montgomery, you'd put money down countering all of our bets," I raised my head, looking over at Liam as he sent me a wicked smile. In my head, I pointedly replied: 'if you were smart, Carmichael, you'd shut the fuck up.' "You'd probably make enough to cover your coffee addiction for a week—"

"If she was really smart," Isaac got to his feet and let out a laugh. "She'd put a fifty on herself and chase Sloan into an on-call room."

My stomach curdled, "Yeah," I shook my head. I sounded disgusted. I felt disgusted. "Not happening."

It'd completely got lost on me how they were able to talk about this sort of stuff so trivially. I wasn't a prude by any means, but betting on peoples lives like this— holy shit. 

I grimaced at the realisation that this was definitely the sort of immature betting game that I would've set up during college. The only problem I had with this dumb situation was Mark. Of course.

The only person who raised an eyebrow was Liam.

"Are you in a relationship?" He said it as if that was the only thing that would keep anyone from throwing themselves at Mark. I scoffed, but then I realised that he was going to need an answer, and that I was actually going to give him an actual answer.

I sighed, throwing my bag into my locker and slamming it with a bit too much enthusiasm.

"Even worse," I scratched the gap between my eyes. It was a bid to stop myself from kicking something. It worked. "I got dumped."

"Shit," Faith yelped as she realised what I just said. Her head popped up from her locker and she looked at me, wide eyed. "I didn't even realise you were dating? Now I feel bad for trying to set you up with that nurse— why didn't you say anything?"

Faith had spent a good two weeks trying to get me to give Ralph, the nurse Mark had paid off, a second chance. She'd hounded me about it. She'd been persistent. 

Apparently he was a great guy and he was happy to take me out to dinner for sometime— although, apparently, he couldn't say this all to me in person. Faith had been his personal cheerleader and yet, I'm sure if I asked her now, she probably didn't even remember his name.

"I just..." I shrugged. Oh how I regretted bringing up my relationship. "I don't know. I like my privacy, I guess."

It was weird, the relationship I had with my colleagues. Despite spending all this time together, I knew barely anything about any of them. We'd never had an instinctual bonding moment where we'd all toast marshmallows and sing Kumbaya. I only knew small things like how Liam was a legacy and a fourth-generation surgeon, how Faith went on a liquid diet every fortnight and how Isaac's MP3 Player had a playlist exclusively dedicated to Madonna songs. 

I knew nothing about their love lives, I knew nothing about their family, I knew nothing about their world outside of this hospital—

I swore under my breath when I realised that, from the look on Faith's face, she was going to be asking me a lot of questions about this new revelation today. Just my luck too— we were on the same service.

I was about to leave for said service when a second year resident popped into the room, handing Isaac a letter. It looked important, so, naturally, we all stared at him as he opened it. It was a heavy-looking envelope, very formal. 

Beside me, Liam frowned, wondering why Isaac was getting special mail from the surgical department.

"Holy crap!" Isaac's exclamation made Liam's frown deepen. We all exchanged a look as Isaac read the contents of the envelope. I'd never seen him so... happy? I almost couldn't recognise the emotion on his face. "I made it onto Sloan's surgical research team—"

"His what?" Faith asked, brow furrowing. She was as confused as the rest of us; although Liam appeared almost (just a tiny bit) constipated.

"He's putting together a team for his Plastics research project," I raised an eyebrow as Isaac beamed, eyes shining and teeth gleaming. A research team? I didn't realise that surgical interns were allowed onto that sort of thing. "He suggested I apply for it—"

"An intern on a research project?" Liam was still frowning. I couldn't tell whether he was jealous or just bewildered. I was more inclined to vote for jealous. "Is that even allowed?"

"I guess it is," Isaac said, still staring down at the paper in his hand in disbelief. "I mean— Sloan said that I had promise-"

"Promise?" Faith said, scrunching up her nose. She was sat on the bench, looking as if she seriously doubted that Isaac had a talented bone in his body. "Are you sure you're not going to put fifty on yourself? Sounds like you've slept your way onto a research project to me."

The new addition to Mark's superhero team just scoffed and rolled his eyes, "You looking for pointers, Brooks?"

He ducked out of the way of a sock projectile as Faith glared in his direction.

I was sat in between all of them, a little bit too stuck on the fact that Mark had assigned an intern to his project. Putting interns on research projects was unheard of. Usually, these sort of line ups were filled with fellows and high ranking residents, maybe an attending who was looking to step back from surgery— interns? Never. 

I twisted my head to the side, watching Isaac as he shoved the letter into his locker.

"So, what are you going to do?" 

Liam crossed his arms over his chest and leant against the wall. It was very clear that he wasn't happy. A placement on a research project was a big deal. I knew enough about the prep work that Mark had been doing for it to know that if this did go well it would be a big deal.

"I don't know," Isaac said. "I mean... it's a lot to think about— I'd have to defer the internship for six months and move to Boston—"

"Boston?" I barely even registered that I'd spoken; a very incredulous voice escaped my mouth, one that caused everyone to look at me. 

Did he just say move to Boston?

"Yeah," He said. Luckily, no one seemed fazed by my sudden outburst. "Sloan can't do the research here because of the lack of resources but he managed to find some research clinic out in Massachusetts that we could rent."

The thought of it was absurd: Mark Sloan outside of New York city. 

The man practically categorised living in Manhattan as one of his personality traits. I'm sure quite a few of our patients would've classed him as a sight-seeing landmark, second to maybe Times Square or the Statue of Liberty. My brain struggled to comprehend it.

"I can't believe you didn't tell me that you were in a relationship," We were waiting at the elevator and Faith punctuated her statement with a swipe at the upwards arrow. I just wrapped my hands around my torso and shrugged. Was she really that surprised? I didn't even know if she was in relationship. We weren't exactly close friends.

"Well, I'm not now," I said stiffly, really wishing that this wasn't the hot topic of conversation. From the expression on Faith's face I knew that it wasn't going to die away soon. 

I would just have to grin and bear it and hope that she didn't join the dots to a certain other hot topic in the hospital.

"How long were you..." Faith asked, eyebrows drawing tight across her brow.

I glanced over at her but kept my eyes trained on the floor counter above the door as the elevator climbed up the hospital very slowly. "Next month would've been a year."

"I'm sorry to hear that," She was chewing her lip and acting as if it was one of the worst things she'd ever heard in her life. "Do I know him?"

"I don't—"

It was at that moment that the elevator arrived to the floor and the doors parted. My eyes jumped to watch the space reveal itself and in doing so, I made eye contact with a very familiar pair of blue eyes— oh great. 

My words got caught at the back of my throat and I seemed to go into auto-pilot. The elevator was empty other than the enormous elephant in the room. Out of all of the times to see Mark, during this conversation was not the one I would've chosen.

It seemed as though he was busy too. There was a patient beside him and we interrupted some very shameless flirting. He had his charming smile on and the woman was looking very, very flattered. I raised an eyebrow but just decided to not give it much thought.

"Good morning Doctor Sloan," Faith chirped happily. She had a smile that stretched from ear-to-ear. He didn't respond.

He didn't seem surprised to see me, just looked over from the woman beside him. There was a slight tension in his face that appeared, one that no one else but me noticed. Faith didn't give him a second glance, just continued talking with her hands and took her place in front. Reluctantly, I followed, all too aware of the way that Mark was staring at the back of my head. As the doors closed behind us, I began to wish that I hadn't even turned up to work today.

"No," I said breathily, finally answering her question and massaging the back of my neck. "You wouldn't know him."

Like I said, I really regretted bringing up my personal life.

Faith frowned, "I don't even have time to think about dating these days."

Neither did I. I was juggling two different jobs and a thousand different shifts and I was very slowly going insane under the weight of it. 

Every morning I was getting up and taking Adderall with my coffee just to make sure I was fully awake. Somehow, I got the feeling that Faith wasn't as busy as I was— of course, she was working through her internship, but she surely didn't have to race across the city the moment her shift finished to start doing non-surgical work at Manhattan Gen.

"Hmm," I answered vaguely, feeling the burn of Mark's eyes on my shoulders.

"I mean that's pretty serious, right?" Faith asked, completely unaware of how awkward this whole situation was. 

I shot her a look out of the corner of my eye and just pretended, in my head, that I was on some very hot beach in the middle of the Caribbean. God, I needed a vacation. 

"A year is a long time."

"It is," I agreed, nodding choppily. I started to scratch at my arm, nervously willing the elevator to go quicker. "It's a very long time."

"What did he do as a job?"

These questions were slowly making me lose my mind. It was weird talking about Mark so vaguely when he was stood in such a close proximity. 

His aftershave was swamping me, almost suffocating me. Faith seemed to just gaze at me, waiting for me to pluck an answer out of thin air, one that would satisfy her while also throw Mark off the scent of whatever train wreck conversation we were having.

"Uh," My throat was dry. "Dog trainer"

There was a brief moment in which I could tell I'd fucked it up. Dumb dumb dumb. Why could didn't I just say cashier or even a psychiatrist or something?

"Really?" Faith looked interested, "My Mom has this chihuahua that's a pain in the ass. He keeps peeing on the floor and eating her pillows. I'd totally ask for his phone number if you weren't broken up."

I wasn't really paying attention to her. I was far more focused on the fact that I'd burned my bridges and made it very obvious that we were talking about the man behind us. I grimaced at the wall. I heard a very breathy chuckle at the back of the elevator. 

I buried my teeth into my bottom lip and held onto my sanity for dear life.

"Do I dare ask why you called it quits?"

Mark's chuckle had provoked a very odd response in me. My jaw clenched and I dug the heel of my sneaker into the floor. Surprisingly, I wasn't as bothered by Faith's invasive question as I thought I would've been. 

My head was full of 'Fuck you, Fuck you, Fuck you, Fuck you Mark Sloan'. I could hear him stall slightly, his eyes grilling into the back of my head as I just shrugged, attempting to play it cool. God, I was a better actress than I'd given myself credit for.

"Oh," I said, as if I didn't think about it much. "Just a stupid reason really...." It was stupid. I felt stupid. The whole situation mortified me. I was still reeling from the embarrassment. "Commitment mostly."

Another light, almost inaudible chuckle. 

I didn't dare to look backwards. Beside me, Faith looked as though she agreed with me. She was nodding feverishly, ponytail bouncing and mouth in a thin line. I wondered whether she'd had some messy breakups of her own. Faith, to me, screamed functioning adult, not the sort of person who'd stick around a guy who was incapable of loving her back. But surprisingly, she appeared extremely empathetic.

"I know the type," She muttered with a stormy look in her eye. Then she flashed me a smile that caught me off guard. "Well, you're better off without him. There's probably a thousand guys that would line up to date you. You could do so much better."

Again, I was pleasantly surprised by her support.

"Thanks," I grinned. 

You hear that Sloan? I could do so much better.

"I had this ex who broke up with me so he could sleep around," Faith sniffed loudly, shaking her head at the thought of it. I just pursed my lips and nodded knowingly. "It's honestly so immature— I will never understand how some men just think that they can lead us on like that... It's awful."

"Wow," I mused. "It's like you read my mind."

This time, Mark didn't chuckle.

"I broke up with my boyfriend a month and a half ago," She continued, appearing very impassioned. "It's been hard being single again but... I've learnt a lot about myself, y'know? Like, I actually really like having a comforter to myself and I really don't actually like watching World Series— it's actually kind of boring. Oh, and I really do like Italian food. My ex was gluten intolerant so for like, a straight week after we broke up I ordered lasagne for dinner from a takeout place."

I smiled at her. Her energy was very, very chaotic. I hadn't noticed it before, but Faith Brooks was quite the hurricane if you squinted and got close enough. It was clear that she was very outspoken about her breakup and it was doing wonders on the atmosphere in the room. I wasn't looking at Mark but I could tell he wasn't looking at me anymore— there was a lack of tension in my shoulders now. I felt as if I could breathe.

"But we're hot, right?" It was my turn to laugh. She had a fire under her ass and I was doing all I could to fan it, helping her bounce on the balls of her feet as the elevator neared our floor. "We're hot and we deserve better."

"We do," I agreed with her. "We deserve better."

"One of my exes broke up with my through a flower delivery," She exhaled sharply, shaking her head. "I mean like... what the hell?"

I chuckled, "He broke up with me through text message."

"Text?" Faith's eyebrows shot high up her forehead, faster than a rocket skittering into space. She looked away from me, muttering under her breath as if it was the most stupid thing she'd ever heard. "Text.. Holy shit."

"Yep," I nodded.

"Holy shit," She repeated. "That's the most asshole thing I've ever heard."

The last ten seconds of our elevator journey was a whirl of Faith listing off men that she'd love to matchmake me with. Was it wrong to say that I enjoyed every single moment of joy in her eyes? I wasn't looking for a date anytime soon (I was currently very happy having my comforter all to myself) but I still pretended to muse over some of the options. 

I heard Mark shuffle at bit in the back and I really hoped that it was out of discomfort.

I'd never been so thankful to leave an elevator in my life. As we left for our floor to go through to Paediatric Surgery for the week, I sneaked a very sneaky glance over my shoulder— I caught Mark's eye just before the doors closed. His eyebrows were raised, head cocked to the side and his mouth was in a thin line. 

I just gave him a very bright, borderline bitchy smile— one that had the light fading very slightly from his eyes and his face dropping.

I hadn't been able to meet his gaze in a hot minute, hadn't been able to hold it like that or allow me to communicate in anyway. However, Faith's oblivious ramblings had reignited a force in me, one that drowned out the embarrassment that still lingered from my unrequited declaration of love. This was different now.

I deserve better.

Sometimes I'd have to interact with him. Sometimes I'd be on Newman's service and I'd be sent down into his research office and asked to chime off numbers from a patient's chart. I'd do everything with grace and decorum, forever wondering whether Mark cared that his text message was hidden behind my every blink and pause. 

I'd gotten good at rolling out the tension from my shoulder and just acting indifferent.

"Good morning Doctor Sloan," I'd say. 

I'd throw out some stats, fix my eyes on the numbers and pretend as though everything was perfectly fine. I'd also throw in a stellar smile for good measure and bounce on the balls of my feet as if the weight of his eyes didn't make me want to crack into little pieces.

He would just nod thank me for the information and then watch me leave. My exits would be fast and very quiet, like a band-aid that I was trying to rip off. There was only once that he tried to speak to me; the day before he was set to leave for Massachusetts.

"Beth..."

I hadn't turned around to look at him. I'd been teetering on the threshold of his research office. I'd just stopped completely, hand gripping the chart as it threatened to slip between my fingers. Empty rooms felt emptier when he said my name like that— I swallowed and turned to face him, eyebrows lifted in an expectant, professional way that didn't correspond to the way he cleared his throat.

"Take care."

There was a strain in his eyes. 

His voice didn't sound like his own. He inclined his head, processing his own words just like I'd fought to process mine. My mouth parted and I let out a breath that I hadn't even realised that I was holding— I was filled with a disappointment that I hadn't even realised had been brewing either. 

My jaw clenched and I nodded.

"Okay."

The next day, Mark left. He left for six months, leaving me to wonder what the hell that even meant.

How nice it must be to be able to just take off and leave people behind like that.

Sometimes, I thought about it for a little too long. We'd had a long evening, our date night had gone south as we watched a guy get shot and die on the sidewalk and we'd been unable to save his life. It was a bittersweet moment, tense silence as we drove back to my apartment— it'd been outside of the car, waiting for him to get his jacket and a bag of liquor from the backseat.

I'd said it so offhandedly, so matter-of-factly: "I love you."

Shit.

And then: You have one new message.

***

So, here's the shitty thing about being an adult that you don't realise until it's too late: everyone you grow up with become adults too.

There's this little realisation that you have when you receive the first wedding invitation from a high school friend that you haven't heard from in five years— shit, they're adults. Those people you remember from your childhood, they're all now functioning members of society. They have jobs, cars and houses and send little invitations to you with ribbons on them. 

They have weddings and they decide to phone you half way through Dirty Dancing and ask if you want to attend.

That one mousy girl from your boarding school, the one who used to share your dorm and plait your hair— she's an adult. Suddenly, she's not the shy, introverted girl who dreamed about her first kiss and pined after Austen novels. 

Suddenly, she's living over back in Connecticut, working as a paralegal and engaged to a German businessman called Klaus.

What the fuck.

In all honesty, I'd almost forgotten that Laurie Bolton had existed. I hadn't thought about her in years. But now there she was, a nostalgic voice on the end of the phone, warmly asking me how I'd been all this time. I'd had no clue how the fuck she'd gotten my number— but then she'd recounted the whole story; she'd originally sent the invite to my childhood home address and then she'd phoned after it when I hadn't RSVP'd. 

After an apparent six months of radio silence, my mother had sent her to me with steely impassiveness. That lead to now, Laurie was springing her wedding onto me last minute: she was going to walk down the aisle in a month and she really wanted me to be there for it.

"You'll come, right?"

My first thought was (and I cannot stress this enough): What the fuck.

I couldn't comprehend why she, a girl that I hadn't spoken to in years, was so desperate to get me to come to her wedding. Of course, we'd practically lived together for the whole of our time at the school, but we'd never stayed in touch. 

One moment, I'm having a breather from medical school work and sitting down to watch a movie, the next I'm getting pulled into a wedding that I had absolutely no desire to attend. Laurie must've been able to sense my hesitation as she then continued to burst into a rehearsed speech;

"We're getting all the girls back together from the dorm," She said it all in this passionate way that made me want to grind my teeth. "I've had an RSVP from Vivianne and Elyse and Mary— it's going to be an amazing reunion and I couldn't imagine it without you—"

Funnily enough, the idea of a reunion didn't attract me as much as she seemed to think it would. I didn't look back on school with much fondness and with every name Laurie reeled off I felt my stomach sink lower and lower. 

With my molars locked and my jaw throbbing, I gritted out the most pathetic 'I wouldn't miss it' that I could muster.

Laurie, meanwhile, didn't seem to catch onto my reluctance— the phone line exploded into squeals and information and excitement and it took everything within me not to break a tooth. She started talking about how excited she was and it caught me off guard; Laurie had always been so quiet and I'd never even gotten the impression that she was friends with people like that. 

People like Vivianne and Elyse and Mary... well, they were all exactly how you'd expect boarding school girls to be.

"I'm so excited," She said for the fifth time in three minutes. "It's going to be so nice to see everyone again. Of course, I go for brunch with Elyse every week but it's nothing without the others- Did you hear that Vivi got engaged to a Cargill? Elyse has three kids now, isn't that crazy? And Mary got married last year to the CFO of—"

I just stared circles in the wall in front of me. Over the years I'd progressively gotten more and more numb to this sort of conversation. I was able to tune out seamlessly and ponder over whether I needed to change the light bulb in the wall sconce. 

A tiny part of my brain was allowed to tune in and out of the sound of her voice. Laurie sounded the same but different at the same time— it was as if I was talking to an alien who'd inhabited the person I remembered.

Maybe that was what happened to people who stayed in my hometown, maybe they washed into the same sort of stale socialite, a reproduction of their parents. She spoke about her weekly brunches with the same enthusiasm that Addison did, she spoke about her fiancé and his charity work as if the two of us didn't know that people from our town usually only did charity work so we'd have something to brag about in our Christmas cards. 

By the time she'd stopped talking about her wedding, Mary's nuptials and last week's farmers market, I was realising how much of a mistake saying yes to the whole thing had been a big mistake.

"I have you down for a plus one," Laurie's breezy statement caused me to falter, "I can't believe you didn't invite any of us to your wedding!"

Oh fuck. 

As if this situation didn't need to get shittier; how better to follow Laurie's extensive breakdown of everything I'd missed than to tell her that my engagement had fallen through. Not only that, I had practically nothing to show for the past five years of my life other than a college diploma, half a medical school degree and the foundations of alcoholism. 

There was a long pause between Laurie's words and my answer. An awkward one, one that made Laurie visibly hesitate. I scrunched up my nose and leant against the wall, trying to figure out how I was going to word it: Oh, yeah no Calum fucked off to Canada...Oh yeah, don't worry I'm really fucking lonely, just one.

"Ah," I said finally, once my brain had stirred enough bull for me to comprehend into a coherent sentence. "Well, that's not really—"

"Oh my god," Laurie said immediately. This time, she noted the strain in my voice. She seemed to blanch over her mistake. "I'm so sorry—"

"It's okay," I said, because it was. I wasn't that hung up over it anymore. 

I'd put a lot of distance between myself that broken engagement; in all honesty, I'd started to be fine with it. Even so, there was something about pushing my ego aside and dragging my heel across carpet that really made me want to projectile vomit across my apartment. 

"It didn't work out," She couldn't see my shrug.

"I'm sorry to hear that."

I didn't like her tone. It was the same tone that Addison had had when everything had come to an end. It stank of pity and resignation. It wasn't particularly nice to hear. It made my skin crawl and my bones ache and my head throb. 

I wanted to hang up and turn myself inside out. It was the sound of my hometown, of an upper-class white woman who was so devastated to hear that you'd been dumped on your ass. It didn't sound like the Laurie I knew at all, it sounded like my Mother's disappointed exhale, the realisation that Beth wasn't a cookie-cutter housewife like the rest of them.

Sometimes, it felt as though my hometown was an alternate universe where the suffragette movement had never happened and women were still given medals for shitting out kids. 

Sometimes, it seemed as though everyone forgot that I was still only in my twenties and that I was still not entirely convinced that I had this adulting thing nailed down.

I turned my eyes towards the window, staring at New York.

"Nah, it's okay," I repeated, itching the side of my nose.

"Should I put you down as solo, then?" Her voice was tentative, soft, as if she was talking to a wounded animal.

I thought a little too much about her question. My pause wasn't long but, as it spanned out, I fell into a whirlpool of thoughts. My first thought, once again, involved the word FUCK, and my second, again, also involved the word FUCK. 

I was thinking about how awful it would be to turn up into a room full of people exactly like this new Laurie, Vivianne, Mary and Elyse. I was thinking about how my Mom had probably told every person in the whole of Connecticut how her daughter had gotten engaged to this dashing Canadian lawyer and how I was panning out to be the perfect socialite in the big city. 

I was thinking about how I'd turn up to that wedding alone and get subjected to that look that matched that tone. I'd be a social pariah. I'd be as ostracised as an 18th-century spinster— they'd all take one look at me, tut under their breaths and my Mom wouldn't be able to show her face in her local Whole Foods out of shame.

Yeah, this wasn't a great idea.

What, also, wasn't a great idea, was what I said next: "Oh no, I'll have a plus one."

I said it so suddenly, a product of my mental spiral. I said it so suddenly and so confidently, with such conviction that I realised that maybe I should've gone for a career in acting rather than medicine. However, Laurie seemed hesitant. 

She wasn't as sold on my confidence as I was. Her response was a very slow and unsure sound, one that slipped deep under my skin. Again, it wasn't the sort of tone that I was used from her.

"Really?"

"Yeah," I said, motivated to keep talking by her reaction. She sounded doubtful. Fuck you. I pressed my lips together and, in a last-minute panic that was not at all well thought out, donned my most nonchalant tone. "Oh, did you not hear about my boyfriend?"

Boyfriend? Boyfriend. Wow. That's the best you can come up with? This boyfriend was so elusive not even I had heard about him.

The moment I spoke, I knew that I'd gotten myself into deep shit.

"I didn't," Laurie sounded caught off-guard.

 I wondered how up-to-date people were kept back home. I barely spoke to my parents but I was sure that Addison must've gossiped to her old friends— did she tell everyone about my love life, at my pathetic attempt at fitting the Stepford Wife mould? 

Jeez... She didn't have to sound so surprised.

"That's a shame," I said airily, despite the pounding blood in my ears. I stared holes into a VHS tape that I'd left out on the dining table. The screen was frozen on Patrick Swayze's face, his eyes boring into mine as I tried to speak with a numb tongue. My body was slowly going into flight or fight mode. I held the phone with a sweaty palm. "Yeah, he's really successful and we're really happy so—"

"Do you want me to put his name down?"

Her question caused me to almost choke, "Hmm?"

"For the seating plan," Laurie said slowly. Oh crap. "I can take Calum off and put him in there instead... I know you didn't RSVP but I planned around you because I knew you'd..."

I zoned out completely.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

I closed my eyes. Even Patrick Swayze was looking at me in disappointment. I massaged my forehead and tried my best not to slide down the wall in anguish. I couldn't quite describe what was going through my body, was it panic? 

Was it delusion? Was it sheer fear of being caught out on a blatant lie? Whatever it was, it sure as hell wasn't creativity— I bared my teeth, held the receiver as far away from me as possible and silently screamed into the empty room. 

When I opened my eyes, I met the eyes of Patrick Swayze and wondered what the hell I'd need to do to get myself out of this one—

Fuck.

I shoved the phone to my ear so abruptly that Laurie was cut off by the sound of the receiver slapping my face.

"Patrick," I said, pinching the bridge of my nose and repressing a yell. I truly was my own worst enemy. "His name is Patrick."

Dear lord.

I avoided Patrick Swayze's eyes— I'm so sorry. 

My second blatant lie was a dishonour on Johnny Castle's name. Laurie, however, wasn't as rustled by it as I was. She noted down the fake name as if I hadn't just dug myself into a very deep hole. Her nonchalant comment on how she just can't wait to meet him did nothing to brick up the hole that was eating at my chest. 

As she told me that she'd email me a replacement invite with all the information I was swamped by the realisation that my improvisation had done far more harm than good.

Beth, sweetie, I said to myself as the phone call ended. I stared at the dead phone for a prolonged time, wondering whether Laurie had been able to hear my internal screaming. Why can't you just shut the fuck up?

Patrick. A boyfriend. A wedding plus one. 

All in the name of my pride and ego. All in the name of my Mom who was far too fragile to go to ALDI instead of Whole Foods (she'd never survive). 

I could imagine the gossip tomorrow; Oh Beth's got a new boyfriend— yeah, some guy named Patrick, he's really successful and they're really happy— 

I was glad that my Mom didn't care enough to phone me up and interrogate me about it. She'd hear about it, undoubtedly. Addison would too. Everyone heard about everything. Before I knew it, I'd be a topic of conversation throughout our small town and by then it would be more than clear that I'd—

"—messed up."

Two days later and Addison was staring at me as I paced thin lines across her apartment floor. I was talking with my hands, wildly waving them around as if I was about to take flight. 

She was sat down, ankles crossed and a glass of wine in her hand. In the other, she held a medical journal. 

She had reading glasses on her nose and a look of bewilderment on her face as she finally paid attention to my intrepid monologue.

"Who's Patrick?" Was all Addie said, raising an eyebrow. 

It was clear that she really wasn't following; in all honesty, I didn't blame her. I, also, was struggling to follow the bullshit that I'd thrown myself into. I let out a very dramatic sigh and whipped my body around like a child who was on the verge of a tantrum.

"I have no fucking idea," I said, "But I need to find one—"

Are you hearing yourself? You sound like a psychopath.

Admittedly, pretending that I had a boyfriend was one of the worst ideas I'd ever had. Similarly, maybe coming to Addie for a resolution to my dumb problem hadn't been the best idea. However, it seemed that, during that week, I was incapable of having any ideas that weren't fucking awful. 

My brain seemed to be hell-bent on making me go through the most inconvenient and mind-numbingly stressful experiences possible— and now Addison was blinking at me, tilting her head to the side and visibly wondering whether I should be committed to a mental asylum.

"Take Derek," she said, as if taking her husband as my date to a wedding full of mutual friends was a brilliant idea. 

Come to think of it, half of Addison's guest list was probably the same as Laurie's. Derek was not the Patrick I needed. I vocalised this to her with a very pitchy and not at all composed voice. My sister just sighed. 

"Say that your boyfriend is off on a last-minute business trip and that Derek is a stand in—"

"That's awful," I said, because it was. 

There was something awful about taking your brother-in-law to a wedding as your plus one. Addie just averted her eyes back to the medical journal and shrugged.

"You don't have a better idea," She pointed out.

As much as I wanted to argue, Addison was right. 

I didn't have a better idea. I didn't have anyone on hand that I could drag into a wedding and play ball with my delusional ideas. So I agreed; I organised train tickets for me and Derek to go back to Connecticut for a day and attend Laurie's wedding. 

I bought a dress, forfeited my very rare out-of-clinic holiday hours and counted down the hours until I'd be sat in a room full of people who were far more functioning than I was.

It was very tempting to fake my death, I had to say. It was also very tempting to wear white, just to distract people from the fact that I'd been caught out on a lie. These people weren't dumb, they weren't born yesterday— they'd take one look at Derek and sniff out the bs that I'd fed so quickly to Laurie down the phone. 

I was doomed either way. Eventually, I did decide against white and instead settled on black (Laurie said that it wasn't as controversial as people seemed to think so I settled on it with the hope to just blend into a dark corner). It was a nice dress, asymmetrical and smart. It made me look as though I was attending a funeral.

Funnily enough, I figured that it would end up being a funeral. Specifically, my funeral, one for my reputation.

I woke up on the day of Laurie's wedding not at all feeling optimistic. I curled my hair, burning my fingers in the process, and did my makeup, managing to stab myself in the eye with a mascara wand. 

I broke one of my heels in the process of packing my overnight bad and had half of my closet fall on top of me while I searched for a replacement pair of shoes. It was needless to say that the day was not going well, even before I'd stepped out of my apartment. 

Few things, however, did go right. I remembered to pack the train tickets, the taxi turned up on time and I even remembered to spritz myself with perfume before I left.

It wasn't until I shoved my bag into the back of the cab and opened the door, that I realised that those things that did go right really didn't matter. Things were about to get so much worse.

Derek wasn't sat in the taxi like he'd said he would be.

At that moment, I felt my cell phone buzz with a message. I bit down on my tongue, hard, trying to stop myself from swearing. 

The taxi driver frowned over at me as I hung onto the open car door, convinced that the metal framework was the only thing that was keeping me upright. I exhaled sharply, shook my head and tried to avoid the eyes of the person who had come in Derek's place.

"Don't say it..." I begged, my voice very strained from the effort of keeping myself together. 

The familiar thud of an oncoming stress headache (a sensation I'd become very used to over the past few days) was my only companion as I closed my eyes, hoping that once I opened them, Derek would magically appear. 

"I swear if you say what I think you're going to say—"

"He had an emergency surgery."

Mark didn't seem to panic like I did. 

On the contrary, he was just like he always was: Calm, cool and collected, sat in the back of the taxi cab in a suit jacket as if it was just any other day. There was only the slightest bit of tension in his face, his jaw seemed to clench a little as I let out a very shaky and exhausted breath. 

My head dropped to the floor and I stared at my sneakers, cursing myself for thinking, for the tiniest amount of time, that things were going to work out. 

My hand flew to my purse, grabbing my cell phone and reading the last-minute text Derek had sent.

I'm sorry.

"Yeah," I murmured, stuffing my cell phone back into my purse. "I figured."

There was a very weird moment in which Mark seemed to think that I was going to just slam the car door on him and go back into my apartment. 

Maybe I should have done that; maybe I should have just phoned up Laurie and told her that I'd had some really bad takeout and that I was projectile vomiting everywhere, or even that I'd had a tragic trip down the stairs and broken every bone in my body. 

But I didn't, unfortunately, I just asked Mark to move over and, very numbly, sat down and secured my seat belt.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck--

Six months. It'd been six months since he'd broken up with me over text message and then disappeared off into a research lab-- but Mark acted as if nothing had happened. He acted as if we'd never even dated in the first place. 

When I saw him, I saw the man I'd seen at a college mixer all those years ago.

"I heard you needed a date," Mark began smoothly. 

Immediately, my face contorted, back rigid and head turned towards the passenger window. The taxi pulled away from the curb and I watched in anguish as my apartment disappeared behind a labyrinth of New York buildings.

"Sure," I repeated, my voice quiet and strained. 

I looked at him out of the corner of my eye. He was looking at me, lips pressed in a line as I tried my best to not make any eye contact with him. The thought of being here any longer than I needed to made me want to vomit. 

I leant forwards, addressing the driver. "Can you make a U-turn, please? Head uptown—"

"No," Mark was quick to interrupt, throwing out a hand and catching my upper arm. I flinched and he let go as quickly as he had reached out. "Beth, I want to help—"

The taxi driver seemed to sense the tension in the car and, instead of following my instructions, just opted to pull over to the side of the road. His eyes drifted up into the mirror, warily looking between the two of us, very clearly completely bewildered. 

I fell back into my seat, tugged at the belt and proceeded to glare holes into Mark's stupid face. He was looking at me, his mouth downturned as if he hadn't expected me to be very against this whole situation.

"I don't need your help," I said because I didn't.

Sure, it was going to suck turning up to the wedding alone and pulling the 'oh he had a last-minute business trip' but it was going to be a lot better than having to attend with my ex-boyfriend. 

At least with Derek it was going to be easy to navigate smooth-talk waters. I shook my head and massaged my forehead and reminded myself that I was wearing mascara— I couldn't afford to get angry.

"I'm not going to just—"

"Get out the of car, Mark," I didn't want to hear it. I really didn't want to hear anything he had to say for himself. He must've been able to tell from the way I just balked completely. "Get out of the stupid car."

He stared at me, caught off-guard. 

How the hell could be caught off-guard? He had the audacity to break up with me and then fuck off for six months to some research clinic and then turn up in a taxi as if nothing had happened. 

No, you can't just do that. You can't just— I exhaled sharply through my nose.

"Get out."

"You don't have any alternatives," Mark pointed out. He clearly didn't think that I was just going to wing this whole dumb situation and do it on my own. I gritted my teeth. "I just want to help... Beth I know I've been away for a while but—"

"Look, son, if you're going to harass the lady I think it's best you get out," I stared down at my shoes as the cab driver piped up, giving Mark a warning look. The plastic surgeon just sighed, rubbing his forehead. "What's it gonna be? Am I going to Grand Central or—?"

"I don't need you, okay?" I said again. I was going to figure this out on my own. I didn't need Mark and I sure as hell didn't need his help. "I've survived the past six months and I'll survive the next eight hours— just go home."

"I know," He said quietly. His blue eyes bore into mine, my chest tightening as he chew on the inside of his cheek. I could tell that he was thinking long and hard, trying to figure out how to convince me otherwise. "I know you don't need me but... I want to."

Our eyes met. 

I could see thoughts ticking over in his brain. 

He was determined, clearly, to go to a wedding with his ex-girlfriend. Maybe he was seeing it as an opportunity to broaden his horizons? Maybe he'd jumped at the chance of flirting with a bunch of women at a wedding reception? Had he seen embarrassing me in the progress as a plus? 

I was asking all of these silent questions and Mark appeared so intense, impassive yet his eyes spoke millions of words.

"This is already so humiliating," I said softly, unable to raise my voice higher than the mumble that escaped my lips. "I'm so tired and I'm... going to have to go through all of this shit from people that know they're better than me and I...." I trailed off, shaking my head. "You're just going to make everything so much worse."

Mark didn't speak.

I searched his face, looking for a single semblance of emotion or feeling, something that I could grasp onto, but he appeared solemn and cold to the touch. I chewed on the inside of my cheek.

"It's just..." I let out a breath and laughed, sinking back into my seat. "Fuck you, you know?"

"Let me make it up to you."

I wasn't sure what those words entailed, nor what they truly meant— I was just completely struck by his tone. Out of the near year that we'd dated I'd never heard him sound so... 

I found myself just staring at him, trying to figure out what the hell was happening. Make it up to me? What the hell was he thinking? What was he expecting this to be, some sort of bonding experience? 

He was the one who walked away, not me.

"I know you don't need my help," He said yet again, "When Derek asked me to step in, I didn't hesitate. I want to help, I'm here to help-- take my help." He wet his bottom lip and exhaled in a very unlike Mark way. "Please."

My answer was so easy. 

I didn't hesitate, I didn't overthink. It was on the tip of my tongue, ready to just appear with barely any energy exerted. I tilted my head to the side, held my breath and just laughed again.

"Fuck you."

I'd always been shit at communicating things, but those two words perfectly encapsulated everything that I'd been too drained to put in that text message six months ago. It summarised all of my feelings, and, as if I was speaking in morse code, perfectly conveyed my message.

A very slow smile cracked on his lips. 

It wasn't an amused one, it wasn't malicious, it was almost human, a flicker of hilarity in the face of despair. It made me roll my eyes and realise that maybe what I needed was this evening to get even worse than it was already going to be— I pinched the bridge of my nose.

I'm going to regret this.

"Grand Central," I said, not believing the words as I said them. Mark's eyes were stuck on the side of my face, watching as I gave the driver the signal to start again. As the engine purred to life, I couldn't help but think that this was all going to be a big mistake.

"Thank you," Mark said. It felt weird for him to thank me. It didn't feel right. I just let out a very dry laugh, scooting away from him so my shoulder was pressed against the window. The more distance between us, the better.

"Believe me," I said with a wary smile that felt oddly unhinged. My cheeks burned with the knowledge that by the end fo the day, my facial muscles would be exhausted. "You won't be thanking me in a few hours."

***

Do you know what I didn't envision myself doing?

ANSWER: Going to a wedding with my ex-boyfriend.

I spent the whole train journey to Bridgeport penning a very lengthy text to my brother-in-law telling him exactly how I was furious with him. It was a nice paragraph, one that had to be split over two separate messages. I was sure that he wouldn't read it anytime soon but it was extremely helpful in clearing my mind. 

I finally sent it when we arrived in Connecticut, my home state, and the train pulled into our destination. When the message trundled off into the world, I allowed myself to relax, I even played with the idea of feeling happy— my nonchalance made Mark raise his eyebrows as he grabbed his bag from the overhead storage.

"You okay?" He asked, noticing how I seemed to loosen up. His eyes flickered between me and the sight of Connecticut outside the window.

"Never been better."

We didn't have any elaborate conversations. We just kind of manoeuvred beside each other with the mutual reluctance to communicate. We hauled ourselves off of the train and into a town car that would take us to the wedding venue. 

Mark seemed to just exist, never saying anything, never even asking me how I'd been, what I'd done for the past half year. In return, I pretended to have very little regard for his life, biting back the comments that I wanted to chip in. It was so tempting to ask whether he had his eye on the bride.

I'd booked a room in the hotel where Laurie was getting married, just for one. I'd figured that I'd at least make some sort of vacation out of it, seeing as I'd had to use some of my rare vacation days. I was going to spend a whole day in bed watching trashy reality television and ordering room service. I hadn't had any time like that in a long time. 

Meanwhile, Derek had planned to return to the city as soon as the wedding finished. I vocalised all of this to Mark as we arrived at the hotel and I went to check in— he just shrugged and said that he'd figure something out. 

I gave him a very long look; there was no way he was staying in my room tonight.

"I should probably ask whose going to be at this wedding, right?" Mark said quietly as I handed over my credit card and signed papers. I didn't look up at him, just checked in with a little bit too much violence. "Will I know people?"

"Well," I drawled lightly, smiling at the concierge as I finished. "Seeing your track record I would not be surprised if you were more than familiar with every socialite in the TriState Area..." 

I paused, catching the way Mark's face cracked. I shrugged.

"Yeah," He said, slightly breathless. 

He was looking around the hotel reception as if trying to see any faces he recognised. I couldn't tell whether he was rethinking this whole thing or whether he just really needed the restroom.

"To answer your question," I said, breathing out a lung full of contempt, "You probably won't know anyone. They're all going to be girls from my boarding school and that was all the way out in Pennsylvania so..."

"Pennsylvania?" He echoed, eyebrows raising. I just mhmm'd lightly and shoved my room key into my purse. "Your parents sent you to Pennsylvania? How old were you?"

"I don't know," I shrugged, sighing. The more I thought about my childhood, the more I felt like throwing something. I pushed all of this to the back of my mind long enough for me to find an answer to his question. "Eight maybe? Or maybe younger? I can't remember."

Mark mumbled something under his breath, but I was completely distracted by the hotel lobby. There was a sign in the back of the reception welcoming us to the wedding of Laurie Marie Bolton and Klaus-Michael Klatten. 

It looked fancy— in fact, this whole hotel was fancy. There was a lot of marble, a lot of flashy fixtures and expensive-looking carpet. Every person in the lobby was dressed finely and I felt horridly out of place. 

It'd caused my toes to curl when I'd put forwards my reservation, it was far from cheap.

"This is a nice hotel," Mark said, looking up at the chandelier overhead. I couldn't bring myself to respond. I just winced at the thought of the fact that a nice hotel meant a lot of nice rich people who were all too nice to be genuine. Come to think of it, some of the people around here looked vaguely familiar. "I have to say I was expecting something a little less—"

"I was wondering when you were going to turn up." I almost jumped at the sound of a voice behind me. "I didn't raise you to be late to events, Elizabeth."

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck--

I turned towards the voice and smiled so wide that I was surprised my cheeks didn't split. "Mom, I didn't realise you'd be here."

Bizzy Forbes looked at me as if she was about to eat me alive— which in all honesty, I did not doubt it. 

My pressed smile was met with her dark, calculating eyes and a grin that flashed a set of pearly whites. I almost felt the need to turn to Mark and warn him to not be deceived; those teeth were sharp enough to tear out a jugular. My face flushed with the effort of trying not to scream--- I had no idea that my mother was going to be here. 

If I'd known, I would have thrown myself under the train at Grand Central instead of boarding it.

"Of course I'm here," My Mother said, sniffing slightly as if she couldn't understand why I was so surprised. She would've frowned if it wasn't for the botox. I watched as her mouth wobbled and her eyes blistered into my skin. "It's the biggest social event of the year— I wouldn't miss it for the world. I attend all of the social events I can."

Huh, I thought to myself, Funny you never come to Addison's mixers.

It took everything within me to not gawk and turn to dust. The moment her eyes latched onto me I felt as though I was a kid again, crying down the phone because they didn't like being so far away from home. 

I swallowed a sour taste that tasted suspiciously like vomit and inhaled a long breath-- one that inflated me enough to make my shoulders rise and my chin raise. It made me feel a tiny bit less small.

"I thought you weren't going to show," She said it a way that made me think she would have preferred I hadn't turned up. It was the one thing that I could actually agree with her on. Her eyes flickered up and down my outfit, "Laurie was very upset that you didn't RSVP."

A pause. An exasperated breath, one that caused chills to run down my arms. 

The thing with my mother was that she never seemed to age, she seemed frozen in time, same haircut, same hard-pressed, dark eyes. She had her hands on her hips and a suitcase behind her and a stormy look in her eye, one that told me that she was disappointed in me even though I'd only said 7 words to her.

"Oh, I didn't find out about the invitation until last-minute," I said airily. She was mad at me for something that was entirely her fault, nice. "And the train was running late--"

"You should've gotten a town car," She said indifferently, waving a hand around as if I'd been stupid to get a train. 

She didn't catch my blatant lie at all. I just continued to smile nonchalantly, opting for a mute nod. I found that it was best not to argue. 

"I'm sure Addison would have organised you one if you'd just thought to ask—"

Mark shot me a glance out of the corner of my eye; he was stood there, holding our bags and stuck in some sort of middle ground that was somewhere between no-mans-land and purgatory. I couldn't tear my attention away from the woman in front of me— this was the sort of shit they spoke about in Western movies. 

You couldn't turn away from this standoff otherwise you definitely would not survive the evening.

"Ah," My Mother was the first one to look away. She turned her head towards Mark and I could literally hear my stomach drop out of my ass. I looked over at him, my lips going numb. "You must be Patrick."

I'd completely forgotten to plan anything. There had been no communication about what was going to happen at all. Mark knew nothing. He was completely unaware about how badly I'd screwed this whole thing up. 

I'd also been completely correct: news of my extremely successful boyfriend and happy relationship had swamped all of the gossip. In that moment, I wanted to disintegrate into a thousand tiny pieces. All I could was bite down at my tongue and watch as Mark turned his eyes away from me and held out a very steady hand.

"Mark, actually," He corrected her. He'd plastered on his most charming smile, the sort of one that he only reserved for high risk situations. "We met at Addison and Derek's wedding..." My Mother showed absolutely no level of recognition. Mark's smiled wavered. "I was the best man..."

I squeezed my eyes closed, inhaling sharply. 

When I opened them, my Mother was staring at Mark, her eyes showing a rare glimpse into the internal working of her brain. Now she recognised him— I was sure that she was thinking exactly what I was. 

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mark's hand very slowly fall.

"Charmed," My Mother said eventually.

It was the sort of answer you'd give if you needed a blatant lie that was as blatant as it seemed. Later, I'd lie to Mark and tell him not to take it personally, Bizzy's botox made it so she constantly had a look of disgust on her face. 

When she looked at me, I could tell that she was planning on lecturing me at the wedding reception. I bristled under her gaze again, unable to meet her eyes.

"I'm not even going to ask," She shook her head but we both knew that it wasn't just going to be pushed under the rug. 

Things were never let go when it came to my Mother. I wouldn't have been surprised if she was going to bring up some time I'd embarrassed the family honour when I was 3 years old or something.

"That..." I said very quietly, "Is wise..."

My Mother seemed to inhale very sharply in an attempt to keep herself from saying anything further. She looked from me to Mark and then to my outfit, her eyes returning to stare holes into my dress. 

I watched as her impassive, paralysed face, twitched with distaste— I could hear the words before they made themselves known.

"You look like you're dressed for a funeral."

I looked down at my dress and the heels I'd put in the back of the taxi on the way to the hotel (Mark had almost suffered a stiletto to the eye). Subconsciously, I ran a hand over the black skirt, as if to flatten invisible creases. 

My lie was immediate and second nature. "It's one of Addison's."

"I know," My Mother said, not tearing her eyes away from the fabric. I almost flinched as she sniffed loudly, not scared to hide her discontent. "She wore it to your grandfathers funeral."

I didn't know how to reply to that.

Instead, my eyes just flew to the suitcase behind her, a thought striking me.

"Is Dad here?" 

It was an innocent question, one that hid a lot of panic. My parents were the divide and conquer type; I'd never been able to cope with them all at once. I watched as my Mother laughed, her face barely moving as the chilling sound tumbled out of her lips.

"Your Father is on a golf trip in Georgia," She ran a hand through her hair and I felt the familiar weight of their martial bullshit fall onto my shoulders. I averted my gaze, avoiding the way Mark was staring at me. "I decided to take this as an opportunity to relax. When you reach a certain age, weekends like this are luxuries—"

Her eyes flickered between the two of us again. I felt my skin crawl.

Eventually, my Mother seemed to tire herself out. She did that sometimes, the judgemental thoughts and the poison in her veins made her broaden her horizons. 

Bizzy left us in the lobby, telling me not to be late to the ceremony. We had an hour. I watched her go, waiting until she was out of sight until I finally allowed myself to breath. When I was sure that she was gone, Mark was the first one to speak.

"Did you know she was going to...?" He trailed off uncertainly. 

I couldn't bring myself to look at him. Be here, I figured was the ending of his question.

"No," was all I could manage. 

My voice was small and crushed and was far too fragile for my liking. I bowed my head, blinked through a misty sheen and kissed my teeth. 

When I had composed myself, I shot Mark a bitter smile. "Looks like you're not the worst part of my day, who would've thought?"

He didn't reply. There was an expression that passed through his eyes, one that I couldn't quite catch. Mark looked away, turning head towards the elevator where my Mother had disappeared into. I couldn't even think about following his gaze. 

I was shell-shocked. It felt as though I'd just been electrocuted. Between my Mother's sudden appearance and Mark's perfectly charming smile, I struggled to organise my thoughts.

I'd been dumb to think that this was going to go well. I'd been utterly stupid to think that everyone wouldn't know about---

"Patrick," I said.

"Patrick," Mark confirmed, a very slow, amused grin unfurling across his face. I felt my own burn in embarrassment. It was enough for me to animate, my head shaking as I exhaled shakily. He handed me my bag and chuckled. "Derek got me all caught up."

Of course. I made a mental note to apologise to Derek for my initial paragraph.

Curtly, Mark cleared his throat. "I was going to ask—"

"It was a.... very dumb... last minute thing and I really am not proud of this whole—"

"Patrick Swayze?" Mark spoke over my rambling, causing me to raise my eyebrows at him. It unsettled me that he knew me well enough to know where I'd plucked the name from. From the look in his eye, I knew that he knew exactly what movie I'd been watching when Laurie had phoned. "Dirty Dancing, really?"

I let out a sigh. "God forbid I actually get to choose a movie for myself to watch, Mr Top Gun."

It was a welcome change of tension. 

Despite the immense weight that crushed my chest, I allowed myself to laugh as Mark rolled his eyes. There were too many thoughts crammed in my head for me to feel grounded. I held my gym bag to my chest and thought about how badly I wanted to leave this state and never come back.

"So, where too, Miss Dirty Dancing?" Mark's head turned towards me, raising his eyebrows expectingly as if he was waiting for me to bark orders. I blinked at him, finding a break in the chaos that was my consciousness, one that allowed me to make a solid decision. "What's our plan until the wedding ceremony?"

Our? I could practically hear the shards of my heart that rattled around my chest like the inside of a Russian doll. Yeah, no.

I opened my mouth, closed it and then shoved my bag back to him. Mark was caught off-guard and took a few staggered steps backwards. 

When he looked at me, his brow was furrowed. There was a very brief pause; he was full of confusion and I was full of discomfort. 

I struggled to formulate a coherent sentence.

"I'm going to the bar."

***

In all fairness, Laurie's wedding was dreamy.

It was the sort of event you'd expect to see on a magazine cover. The ballroom in the hotel was decorated with hundreds of fresh flowers, a string quartet played a very smooth background tune to their vows and her dress was quite possibly the most beautiful piece of clothing I'd ever seen. They had more guests than I had even realised was possible. 

Laurie looked like a Disney Princess and her new husband was the full package; he'd just recently hit the Forbes Rich List out of nowhere and she was completely set for life (till death or alimony do we part).

Even so, throughout the ceremony, ever so often, I'd catch Mark's eye as he sat beside me, and I'd just grimace very lightly.

The reception was what I was least looking forward to. It marked the social poaching: when each socialite would down half a bottle of Prosecco and begin the annual hunting season for gossip. I watched the people around me as we survived through the entrances, were seated at a table at the back of the room and opened the bottle of champagne in the centre of the table. 

Once I'd filled my glass, I allowed myself to find it funny that I was seated in between my ex-boyfriend and my mother, at a table full of girls I'd despised throughout boarding school. What I also found utterly hilarious was the way our name cards looked together.

Mark squinted at the Patrick card in front of him but decided not to bring it up.

I knew most of the faces in the room. Each pair of eyes that met mine brought back a wave of childhood thoughts, memories and emotions that I really didn't fancy revisiting. My old mathematics teacher stopped me on the way his table, one of the girls from my brief stint in choir practically pounced on me and I received a very enthusiastic "OH IT'S BEEN SO LONG!" from a girl who had been ruthlessly mean to nine year old me. 

Every single interaction made me sink lower and lower in my chair.

My mother noticed. 

She would've frowned if she was physically able to: "Posture, Elizabeth."

As if she'd pulled on my marionette strings, I rose in my chair. 

Beside me, Mark was silent, only talking if spoken to, choosing to just smoulder very quietly in the background. Ever so often, he'd glance over at the end that clutched my champagne glass. It was almost white from the strain, my knuckles floating underneath my skin like snowy mountaintops. My fingers were trembling very slightly— I massaged my fingertips until I could trust myself to let go.

"You okay?" He asked quietly, leaning in so no one could hear.

I didn't reply. 

I just turned my head away and took a very long mouthful of champagne. Imagine asking that question to your ex-girlfriend, the same one that you'd told very clearly, that you didn't give a shit about them.

I felt as though I was a child again. Elyse Betcher, a girl I'd bunked with through boarding school was sat across the table, grinning and showing everyone pictures of her kids. 

She clearly didn't feel like a child— she had her own. She passed her photos over to Bizzy and my Mother had the audacity to fawn.

"Oh, how adorable," She said, sighing at the picture of a very ugly looking baby. 

I glanced over at it, trying my best not to slump. My mother's eyes sparkled as she stroked the babies' cheek with a perfectly manicured finger. 

"Oh, I would love some grandkids of my own, you know?" She fawned with that same impassive expression "Maybe one day... Elizabeth."

The look she shot me was patterned with discontent, as if as an accusation. My reply was a very strained smile. I let out a short breath, covering the exhale with a gulp of alcohol:

Over my dead fucking body, Bizzy.

Conversations like that cropped up a lot. In a blink of an eye, Mary Cahill was leaning across the table, telling everyone how amazing her nuptials in Cancun had been last year ("Oh the sunset altar was just to DIE for!") and everyone was telling her how it sounded like paradise. With mirth in her eyes, my Mother seemed to glance over at me and sniff. 

She didn't have to say anything but everyone seemed to get the message. Across the table, Mary seemed to stare at me, her face darkening slightly as everyone simultaneously recounted my failed engagement.

I just refilled my glass of champagne and wondered whether they were going to leave me to finish the whole bottle myself.

At some point, the grandest bitch of my boarding school nightmares appeared with a charismatic smile and the smell of brimstone. I raised my eyes to see Vivianne Holloway gracing us with her presence. Tall, willowy and the human version of a bad omen, she tilted her head to the side and fixed me with the same scathing stare that my Mother had perfected. 

Unlike the others, Vivianne took time to personally greet me. She flashed a smile that screamed a thirst for blood and flesh— she smelt what I'd imagine hell to smell like.

"I thought I'd never see the day..." I begrudgingly, I got to my feet and embraced her as if we were best friends. "Elizabeth Montgomery."

"Vivianne," I greeted with a smile so plastic it was a certified electrical insulator.

There was a man beside her. I figured that this was her fiancé, the man she'd managed to sink her claws into. When Vivianne grasped my hand, she made a point to press her engagement ring into my hand, the diamond almost tearing into me. 

I looked between the two of them, noticing how they encapsulated the sort of couple my mother wanted me to be in. I swallowed the sour taste at the back of my throat and just continued smiling.

"Laurie told me you were almost going to miss us," She said it in a way that made me think she wasn't heartbroken at the thought. Her eyes swirled, glancing over my shoulder at everyone sat at the table. I watched her lips twitch. "She was devastated—"

"Oh, it was just a miscommunication," I said airily. I didn't like it how just one look at Vivianne's face transported me back to being a kid at boarding school. "She sent the invitation back to Riverside... I live in New York now."

"Ah," Vivianne's eyebrows raised. I also didn't like how her tone made it seem like she was constantly mocking me. "The big city? Well, William and I live out in Old Greenwich, don't we darling..." She looked over at her fiancé he just shrugged, opting to not speak at all. He was staring at his phone, probably watching the world tick by. "Oh, have I introduced you to my fiancé? This is William Cargill—"

For such a rich man I'd never met someone so bland. Mark shot me a glance out of the corner of my eye; he was completely lost. 

I couldn't tear my attention away from the woman in front of me— it was the same as it had been with my mother. If I stopped staring into the depth of her soul I'd be turned into stone, like a reverse Medusa.

"And who is this?" 

Just as my Mother had, Vivianne was the one who broke the stand-off. She seemed to replace the light bulbs in her smile, cranking it up to full wattage as she turned her eyes onto Mark.

I followed her gaze and suddenly forgot everything, ever.

"Hi, I'm Patrick Sloan."

My chest tightened; it was as if I'd just been lassoed and all of the air in my body had been gouged out in one blow. Between Vivianne's 'nice to meet you' and Mark's perfectly charming smile, I struggled to mask my discomfort. 

I watched them shake hands, watched the way Mark seemed to perfectly manoeuvre through the mine field that I'd thrown him into— all without a single bead of sweat. It must've only been a split second but to me it felt like a million years; I blinked very slowly, completely stupefied.

"But most call me Mark," He said easily and then he tilted his head in my direction. I tried my best not to squirm when he placed his hand on the small of my back, moving closer to me. "I tend to go by my middle name... Vivianne, is it?"

Dear lord. He had this all figured out.

"Sloan?" She tilted her head to the side, "As in the Sloans of Rochester?"

"No," He said, "Manhattan."

End me now.

There was a very tense moment in which Vivianne realised that Mark was very much not in any substantial social circle. I watched the light in her eyes flare up, her lips curl very slightly and the hand she had on her fiancé's arm tighten— it was as if I was watching a snake curl up and get ready to strike. I smiled at the floor. 

Neither men seemed to know exactly what was going on, but we did— we'd spent too many years in bitchy socialite female warfare to know what was about to happen.

"Well," The slightly incredulous chuckle that fell past Vivianne's lips was enough to make the hairs on the back of my arms to rise. "That's a pleasant surprise—"

"Is that Vivianne Holloway?"

My mother popped up from her chair, face made up into the most expressive look I'd seen on her in years— her eyes were wide from surprise, despite the fact that we all knew she practically stalked the social lives of women like Vivianne. 

I stepped back, watching as Vivianne got throw out of orbit by the interruption of the solar flare that was Bizzy Forbes. In amongst the ambush, I threw a look over at Mark, who was visibly bewildered and slightly panicked. He had no idea what was going on. I jerked my head downwards, urging him to sit. He seemed to get the message that he didn't have any other choice.

"When I heard your engagement news.... I swear I have never been happier...." I almost flinched at the sound of my mother's uncharacteristically delighted voice. I avoided looking anywhere but at the table infront of me. My skin crawled. "I have been waiting all evening to see this beautiful engagement ring..."

I tried to ignore my mother's voice as I sunk back into my place at the table, trying my best to not just say fuck it and down the rest of the champagne bottle. I did consider it for a long time, striking up a staring contest with my empty glass. 

The whole time, Mark was frowning slightly, gazing at me as he tried to make sense of what the hell had just happened.

"You're boring to her," I said quietly. Mark's eyebrows rose as I leant towards him, speaking in undertone and extremely terrified of people overhearing. "You're dirt under her heel..." When his face contorted I rolled my eyes and chuckled in distaste. "Or at least to stilted bitches in the upper 8%."

"A commoner?" He repeated, scoffing slightly. I watched his ego practically die right in front of my eyes. The light in his eye was snuffed and he brought his drink to his lips, snorting. "They should google my name, don't they know what a doctorate looks like?"

I just sighed heavily.

"I'm not going to disagree," I said tightly. 

I eyed Vivianne out of the corner of my eye, watching as she was completely dissuaded from talking to either of us. My Mother was good at the distraction technique, she'd been perfecting it for decades. 

"The moment they find out you're a plastic surgeon they'll be asking for your phone number," I murmured to him, "They don't know the difference between cosmetic and plastic surgery— "

Mark frowned. "This is a lil bit..."

"Crazy?" I supplied, "Yeah, welcome to suburban politics. It's like a bad episode of Dynasty in here." I thought about that a bit too long and then snorted. "Shit, it is an actual episode fo Dynasty... I'm in a nightmare." I gestured to him, wincing audibly. "I don't want to be here or with you so this is literally hell."

I watched Mark's face twist as I turned away. 

My mother appeared out of her conversation, managing to angle Vivianne into a different direction. Somehow, the thought of talking to her was far more favourable than joining Mark as he mulled over how much I wasn't over our breakup— I turned to her and gave her a very shaky smile.

She looked far from impressed. Her eyes bounced between me and my ex-boyfriend and I could hear the steam bubbling up behind her face— but that was the thing about my Mother. Mark would've never had known that she was fuming, no one at the table even seemed to bat an eyelash. The world continued on its axis. 

But I didn't, I'd spent 18 years studying every single thing that made her tick; I could tell that she was angry. It caused the hairs on the back of my neck to rise.

"That was inconvenient." My mother said, in a tone that I knew all too well. 

I averted my eyes to the table and just pressed my lips together into a thin line. Beside me, Mark was talking to one of the girl's plus-ones, a businessman who started a very enthusiastic conversation about Manhattan.

I knew what inconvenient meant, it meant that I was being troublesome, that I was causing problems for her... She'd jumped up and saved my ass because, otherwise she would've suffered the consequences of my stupidity. 

I blinked at her. Don't be dissuaded by her actions, she only fended for her family's reputation.

I couldn't exactly disagree. It would have been so much nicer if Derek had come along. 

My mother loved him, people loved him— he was so personable and nice and already had standing with these sorts of people. After all, he wasn't the guy who Bizzy had watched hit on every single woman at Addison's rehearsal dinner. He wasn't the guy who slept with her drunk daughter. 

Mark... on the other hand...

"I know," I said quietly, my cheeks burning slightly. It was as if I was five years old, getting scolded over talking out of line. "If it's any consolidation, Mark and I are not actually dating so—"

My mother let out a long breath. I watched as she raised her glass of wine, one that was wide and filled to the brim with Shiraz, and nursed it with an impassive expression.

"Finally," She said, in what I vaguely identified as relief, "Some good news."

Somewhere behind us, Vivianne's diamond ring felt a little bit heavier.

***

I would've loved to say that I'd enjoyed the evening, but then I would have been both delusional and a liar.

I spent the duration of the wedding reception watching the people around me. I sat at the table, trying my best not single-handedly drink my way through the hotel. I was half-buried in darkness, having moved out of the spotlight for interrogation; I'd had to put up with it for hours, a stream of people gravitating towards myself and Mark, bombarding us with questions about our lives.

We both work in surgery.

Yes, we're very busy.

Oh, we're so very happy.

Yes, we've been dating for a long time.

We're both very career-orientated.

We've never been happier.

Yes, busy! Always so busy!

No, no plans for anything just yet—

Did we mention how happy we are?

At some point, Mark had just decided to fly solo. 

He was stood across the room at the bar, talking to some of the guys as if they were old friends. That left me alone at a table, accumulating a slight traffic jam of half drank champagne bottles. My mother had abandoned me a long time ago, being pulled away into a little satan circle with all of her equally stuck-up friends. 

I let my shoulders finally sag and my smile wither— for a moment, I allowed myself to breathe.

It was weird, sitting in this room filled with people I'd known my whole life. 

Despite Laurie's desperation to drag me here, she'd never spoken to me once— I could see her dancing with her new husband, having the time of her life being surrounded by all of the women who'd accosted me throughout the evening. She looked happy. She didn't even look like she had to fake it either—

At that thought, I swung my attention back to the bottles of champagne— fuck, the sad hours had begun. 

They liked to creep up whenever the planets were aligned in a certain way, whenever the north and South Pole were in a very certain position— or whenever I was drunk enough to say fuck it and actually allow myself to feel sad.

In all honesty, pretending I had a boyfriend because I was so scared of what other people would perceive of me was probably the worst idea I'd had (up to that point, mind you). 

It'd been shitty enough in concept but the ill-fated irony of Mark turning up... I was surprised I hadn't started sad hours on the train journey here.

It was still too fresh.

I hadn't been able to compartmentalise it like I had with Calum. Pretending to be a couple with a guy who I was not over was really not as easy as it— well fuck that, it sounded as awful as it was. 

I'd found myself tensing whenever Mark brushed against me, my skin almost tarnishing under his gaze. I didn't want to feel like this— the sort of emotion I felt when he looked at me wasn't heartache or regret or anger or pain—

It was the humiliation of saying I love you and not hearing it back.

No one noticed when I slipped out of the reception for air. I'd almost forgotten what it was like to stand. I got to my feet, pushing in my chair and slipped out of a French door at the back of the room, shivering when the cold air overcame me. 

The hotel had a set of grand gardens, stretches of manicured hedges and trees, headed by a wide patio littered with seating. On the far corner, a handful of guests smoked and talked politics— I headed in the opposite direction, taking very poignant and not at all drunk steps towards a lonely bench.

My first thought when I sat down was that I really needed to stop feeling sad all the time. It was beginning to be really fucking annoying.

My second thought was that I really needed to get better friends. The people in that room hadn't been my friends for decades. They weren't particularly worth any of my time, yet I'd still come when Laurie had asked.

My third thought was interrupted.

"You getting some air?"

I'd been followed.

I heaved a very heavy breath and sat up, my head tilting to the side as I squinted through the darkness. I could see the outline of Mark, leaning against the wall. He said it lightly as if we weren't at odds with each other. 

Maybe this was what was driving me mad, the fact that there were so many things I needed him to say that he just wouldn't—

"No," I muttered, brewing a sarcastic comment. "I'm learning to drive."

I sounded like a child that was on the verge of a tantrum. 

He let out a breathy laugh and, in the darkness, I mentally pencilled in the sight of his amused smile. He gestured to the bench, asked whether he could sit beside me and, with a tight throat, I just shrugged. Mark sat anyway. I wished he hadn't.

I sounded like a child that was on the verge of a tantrum. He let out a breathy laugh and, in the darkness, I mentally pencilled in the sight of his amused smile. He gestured to the bench, asked whether he could sit beside me and, with a tight throat, I just shrugged. Mark sat anyway. I wished he hadn't.

"About time," He said dryly. He shifted beside me. "Isn't it kind of rude to do it during a wedding, though?"

It was a harmless joke that dug a little bit under my skin.

"Rude?" I repeated, eyebrows raising. "Rude is their language, it's their native..." I bit my tongue, stopping myself from rambling. I just opted for a tired sigh. "They'll survive."

Mark didn't disagree.

I couldn't put into words how I felt at that moment, sat beside him. 

We'd been alone many times that day, but there was something about being sat outside a loud event that struck me. It was a reoccurring event: us sat side by side while people

"I wasn't expecting it to be so..." He trailed off, appearing overwhelmed. I could hear it creeping into his voice. It was rare; it wasn't often you saw the great Mark Sloan off-balance. "This wedding is so much different to Addison's, the people in there are just..."

"Addison was wise with her friend choices," I said, dropping my eyes to my lap. The hem of the dress was fraying slightly; I picked at it, wishing that I was back in New York having a long sleep in my bed. "She chose all of the nice bitchy ones— I've always been shit at choosing things."

It was a very subtle jab. As he had for the whole evening, Mark elected to not take the bait. It left me exhausted— it was like I was sat beside a brick wall.

"That Vivianne...." I could hear his frown in his tone. "I don't like her."

"No one does," I said, "She was the mean popular girl at school. She used to pull on girl's ponytails and kick the backs of their legs and shove them into muddy puddles and..." I found myself thinking about it a little too vividly, so I blinked at just shook my head. "It's crazy, isn't it? She's practically the apex predator here now... she's engaged to a Cargill."

"What does that even mean?" Mark asked, "Why is the fact she's engaged to some business guy so important?"

"Money," I told him. "That's the only reason any of them do anything here. It's like... a strategy. We all get raised to dig our little manicures into as many old-money families as we can—" I finally turned my head to give him a bitter smile. "Archer was told to be a career man. My Mom told me to find a husband."

Mark's face was unreadable. 

I watched him search my face, as if he was trying to read my thoughts. His mouth was in a line, face illuminated by an overhead lamp. I was half in darkness— I found comfort in that. 

Over the past six months, I'd found comfort in being unseen. It was an addictive feeling; being able to pretend that you weren't even there. It was a contrast to the scalding hospital lights were every movement you made was closely scrutinised.

"She loved Calum," I said before I could think against it. "She loved the fact that he was a lawyer— she loved that his family was prolific. Everyone in that room loved Calum—"

"To be fair," Mark interrupted, clearing his throat. I bristled at the sound. "They probably all loved Dirty Dancing too... it doesn't mean they're right."

My laugh reverbed through my chest.

"Oh... Fuck you, it's a great movie."

"I don't know..." He said, shaking his head. "I'd say Top Gun is better."

"Patrick Swayze," I said pointedly, disagreeing with him. "Patrick Swayze is better."

Mark paused. "Hm," He rubbed his jaw and very slowly conceded. "I'll admit, the name 'Patrick' is growing on me."

My immediate reaction was a groan.

"God, don't even mention it—"

I pressed my palm into my face, wanting nothing more than to burst into flames out of sheer embarrassment. I was perfectly happy to just pretend that none of this was happening. Unfortunately, the champagne I'd drank seemed to have no effect on me tonight— it was sad too, the one time I actually need it, it'd fallen short (or maybe that was a good thing, it stopped me from doing dumb things around people that I couldn't afford to embarrass myself in front of).

"It's not even funny," I continued, resting my head against the wall and staring up at the stars. "It's mortifying—" I paused, feeling my feet throb in my heels and the thrum of the reception music against the back of my skull. "I must look like a fucking joke—"

"You don't."

"I do," I said, "All of those people have their whole lives sorted and I have to pretend that I have a boyfriend to make them look at me like I'm... worthy." It sounded much more tragic as I vocalised it. "They have kids and weddings and cars— and I can't even..."

It wasn't even worth saying.

"It sounds boring," Mark said. 

I felt a brief sense of deja vu from the conversation we'd had years ago, when we'd locked eyes across a college mixer and he'd told me how a linear plan was boring and impartial.

"It sounds sane," I said, "They have engagements that don't go to shit and I have... I don't even know what I have." 

I was completely consumed by a very slight mental breakdown (just a tiny one, honestly just a very fun detour), that I completely missed the look that passed over Mark's face.

"I lied."

Those two words were enough for me to practically give myself whiplash, looking over at him. It was enough for my brain to come to a complete halt, my brow furrowed and my heart skip a beat. 

He wasn't looking at me, just rubbing his hands together and staring over towards the guests smoking on the other end of the patio.

"Lied?" I repeated, my voice wavering. 

Lie. Lie Lie. 

Lied about what exactly? He couldn't just say shit like that and then not look at me. My brain was picking up a lot of things from the nether— I was far too paranoid to think about this sort of stuff. Was he about to confess that he'd cheated on me? Was he about to confess that—

Mark just shrugged.

"Earlier," He specified, obvious to the thoughts that were flying around my head. "I lied to that Vivianne girl..." A uncomfortable muscle jumped in his jaw. He pressed his hand into his thigh and avoided my eye. "Uh, my family was originally from Rochester."

I just blinked at him.

"My Dad used to be really into all of this," Mark's head turned to stare at the French door, the one that he'd left ajar in his wake. "He used to do the whole Addison thing— the events, the drinks, the charity galas... all of it." He paused. "I don't remember any of it, they stopped doing it by the time we moved to Manhattan but... I think my Mom hated it so they stopped. They abandoned their families and all of this... shit and just... moved away."

I'd never heard him speak about his family before. It was a subject that no one ever spoke about. It was brushed over and disregarded as something Mark didn't like to mention. 

Once, Derek had told me that Mark didn't like talking about, it wasn't something he particularly liked reminiscing about. So I just sat there with bated breath, caught off-guard by his suddenly candidness.

He was very visible uncomfortable. It made my heart throb.

"Wow," I said quietly. "The frog's a prince... who would've known?"

My joke, thankfully, seemed to relax him a bit. 

Mark laughed, head bowing as we both thought about how fucked the idea of this social climate all was. I didn't agree with how people were treated in my family's social circle— it was Dynasty but on crack. People shouldn't have felt lesser because of their social status. People shouldn't have to pretend to be people they weren't.

"I've never thought to be grateful of it," He continued, his voice thick with his own thoughts. I just listened to him, looking over the hedges and the gardens, trying to find New York in the distance. "For ages, I was angry about it... Taking an only kid away from their extended family... it's... it's not great— but then tonight, it's just... I realise it was for the best."

It was quite possibly the most genuine I'd ever seen Mark Sloan and I was completely lost for words.

"Those people in there..." Mark shook his head, "If I'd turned out like them... I'd be miserable. They're all like clones of each other." He tried to go for a lighter tone, letting out a chuckle and leaning back. "I'm pretty sure all of them are miserable and hate their lives—"

"They are," I said, dismissing his tone change with a bitter smile. "They pick people apart for sport. It makes me wonder why the hell they're all so stuck in it... They deserve their privileged, any of them— they're all fake and disingenuous and plan really shit parties, to be honest with you." I paused, "It makes me angry for the people who don't get these sort of chances, y'know?"

There was a brief pause.

It was only small but to me, it stretched out for a long time. 

It settled in all of my pores and made my muscles twitch with discomfort. Mark was staring at me again— with his bright eyes that made me feel see-through. It made me feel almost ill; did I still have my heart on my sleeve, was it possible to stuff it back in my chest? I felt the familiar mortification, the awkwardness that a four little word had wedged in between us.

"I don't like weddings," was all I could bring myself to say.

Mark just shrugged. "I don't really have an opinion on them."

It was so tempting to make a comment on how he always seemed to end up in someone's bed— but it dwindled at the realisation that I hadn't seen Mark flirt with anyone tonight. He'd stuck at my side for the duration of the night without me even realising. 

The only time he'd left had been to talk to some guys that I vaguely recognised from my teen years. I closed my eyes and inhaled slowly— at least he actually seemed to want to help me get out of here alive.

"I hate them," I reiterated, "I hate this whole thing— I hate the whole engagement thing as well— I don't think I'm ever going to bother that again—"

I hate you, I almost said, but it wasn't exactly true.

Instead, I just chewed on my bottom lip and thought very sad thoughts.

"Why are you here, Mark?"

My question caused him to sigh. 

He shifted beside me. 

There was a prolonged pause in which Mark seemed to wince very slightly at his own thoughts. I could practically hear the train of thought as it bustled around his head, screeching and whining just like our train out of Grand Central Station.

"I told you, I wanted to help."

"Why?" I said immediately, my tone sharp. He wasn't looking at me. He wouldn't look at me. He staring into thin air, his head whirring away beneath his skull. I wished that I knew what he was thinking. "Why do you want to help me?"

Mark's head lowered, almost in shame.

"I felt bad about..." 

He didn't finish his sentence, but we both knew exactly what he meant. I stared at him, feeling my stomach twist and my eyes prick and my face go numb. Suddenly, I felt humiliated again. It was funny, how I could feel that so vividly even after six months—

"Ah," I said, tone twisted with bitterness. My stomach dragged with the familiar feeling of embarrassment. I let out an equally sour laugh. "I don't need your pity—"

Mark didn't speak.

"I appreciate you trying to help me," My voice sounded oddly strangled, as if I'd folded it over and over and stretched it into a series of mangled syllables. "But like I said in the taxi earlier, I don't need your help. Honestly..." I thought about the look on my mother's face. "I was delusional to even think that you coming here was a good idea."

"You're mad." He said it quietly, matter-of-factly, as if he hadn't noticed it before. It made me laugh again.

"No," I said quickly, hanging my head slowly. "Just humiliated."

Mark chose to look at me then. 

Our gazes crossed, his eyes boring into mine. He looked uncomfortable again (Oh what a treat it was to experience it twice in one night.) I watched his thoughts float through his head, I watched as he seemed to debate something. A muscle jumped in his jaw; it clenched and unclenched in a cycle. His eyes burned into me with an intensity that made my mouth feel dry.

"Beth, I..."

He stopped.

I looked away immediately. I could feel it in his voice. 

I could feel it in the energy that came off of him in waves. There was something on the tip of his tongue. 

Mark stopped, but the silence he left was far more worse than the words he couldn't say. I bit down on my own tongue, stopping myself from speaking.

I wanted to tell him that I meant it when I said okay. I was okay. It was okay. I didn't need his pity. I didn't need his help. What I needed was him on a train back to Manhattan and a bed all to myself.

"I know you don't need my help," Eventually, words seemed to escape the confines of his mouth and he was speaking. Speaking with what seemed to be reckless abandon. "I know that you don't need shit from me but I just need you to know that I... I feel bad... I shouldn't have... I never meant to..." 

He was tongue tied and it made my heart beat violently against my ribcage.

A beat of silence passed.

"I never meant to..."

He repeated those four words and they seemed to take all of his energy with them. I wasn't looking at him but I could pinpoint the moment he seemed to give up.

"I'm not a feelings guy," His voice was quieter than it had been before. It was the same sort of vulnerable, candid tone he'd used when he'd spoken about his family. "That sounds like a shitty excuse and it really is... but I just... when you said that to me I just really..."

"It's okay," I said, mostly because I couldn't afford to say anything but that it was okay. 

Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Wasn't that what I was always? 

Little Beth Montgomery never speaking her own mind and saying Okay because it's just easier than the alternative.

There was something so startling about the rawness of him. It felt as if the alternate universe that I'd dipped into had infected him and crawled under his skin— what happened to the professional conversations over Post-Op notes? 

I wasn't sure what I preferred; the gap between what we said and wanted to say, or this unbridled moment of honesty. I was quite tempted to say the first option, but then he said something that was quite possibly the stupidest thing he'd ever said:

"I should've said that I love you back."

I stared at him. Gradually, Mark met my eyes. It was slow. His attention dragged. It was as if the words had caused him to flinch. They were honest. T

hey were-- I couldn't quite make sense of my thoughts. Only one thing stood out to me;

"You don't have to do anything," I said, my voice barely a sound. I struggled to put the swelling in my chest into words. I almost was brought to tears by the concept of what he was suggesting. "Not on my accord. I never expected you to lie and say it back—"

"It wasn't a lie."

We just stared at each other.

Again, I didn't know what— I didn't know-- I didn't— Fuck.

My head was a barren wasteland. 

Any thought had been diminished into a empty space. I was sure that my brain had just decided to take a five minute long vacation. 

Throughout that five minutes, Mark and I sat side by side as we had for many years, soaking in the silence, letting our minds race. Neither of us were comfortable, we both twitched and moved like skewered organisms that were slowly dying out.

Love. Love. Love.

By the time the final smoker, at the end of the patio, had disappeared back inside, I'd formulated a coherent response. 

We listened to the french door click shut. We listened the swell of silence as his discarded cigarette smouldered against the patio-- it was far away, burning like a very lonely cinder against the paving slabs, a soft, dying light. 

My words were softer.

"I don't know what to do with that."

It was honest. It was said honestly with a very honest voice and an honest face. We weren't looking at each other again. There was a subconscious distance between us on the bench. While I blinked at the moon, my body was caving in on its self, shuddering and aching and wondering what the hell was going on.

"Neither do I," replied Mark. He sounded honest too. He sounded tired, as well, as if it'd been something he'd been carrying with himself for the past six months. "I figured that... after everything, it's shit for me to say."

"It is," I agreed. "Six months."

"Six months." He repeated.

I wondered what he'd done in those six months. 

Had he slept with women? Had he flirted and made out and had nasty bachelors sex in his research facility? Had he been really happy with himself? Had he patted himself on the back for dodging a bullet— and now was he thinking that he was some sort of martyr for coming back and 'helping' the woman he'd left on that street back in New York. 

I didn't know whether to cry or laugh or just vomit— I really wasn't having a good day today.

"Mark," I said his name with the intention to continue, but I couldn't bring myself too.

It was said so faintly that I was half convinced that he hadn't heard me. But then I felt fingers on my chin and he turned my face towards him. A pair of electric eyes and a sad smile met me. 

I stared at him, too surprised to even speak—

"I don't pity you," He said, "I love you."

Love. Love. Love.

"Mark-"

"I don't pity you," Mark repeated, "I'm too smart to do that."

"Mark, I just—"

"I love you."

I wasn't exactly sure how he expected me to respond. But he was looking at me in a way he'd never looked before— it was with eyes that were round enough for me to swim in, a tenderness that I felt directly in my chest. 

My heart was throbbing again, my eyes were welling and I felt an inextricable need to stay quiet.

His thumb stroked my face and I just existed, for that moment, in the palm of his hand.

"I care about you," Those words were said so quietly that I would've missed them if it wasn't for the fact that he was millimetres away from me. My breathing hitched. My lip wobbled. "I care about you a lot... and I...."

I didn't know what to think. I sure as hell didn't know what to do.

So I just didn't do anything. 

I looked down at the rise at the top of his wrist and wondered what my mother would think if she knew that her daughter was hung up over some guy who managed to love people and abandon them at the same time. 

In all honesty, my mother probably wouldn't have cared if the guy came with a family fortune and a squeaky-clean imagine. I was sure what Mark brought to the table, other than the feeling of his fingers on my chin and the audacity to miss something he'd pushed aside.

"Mark," I began.

My voice was hoarse. 

I sounded as if I'd been crying for hours— maybe it was just the champagne. Maybe this was all just one drunk hallucination. I paused to check whether he'd interrupt me. He didn't. He just watched me, watched as I planned my response.

"You can't do that..." His brow wavered. I watched his jaw clench again. "You can't just toss me aside for six months of hookups and then pick me up again when you want something different..."

He licked his lips, his jaw clenched and then unclenched. His eyes averted and his smile slipped into a light grimace.

"I know."

"Why?" I asked, "Why didn't you just say it when you had the chance?"

Mark hesitated, his fingers gently fell from my face and he just sighed. My words were a light beg, soft and demanding, asking for him to tell my why walking away from me had been easier. Why did he run away? Why had he just left me on that sidewalk and taken great joy in diminishing me?

There was this tension in him. 

It was as if he was walking a wire. I could see the strain in his jaw, see it in the way his shoulders bunched and his arms drew back into himself. We'd re-entered territory that was foreign to the both of us; he took a deep breath.

"I-I don't know."

Don't know? 

I watched Mark, watched as he rubbed at his jaw. It was a nervous movement-- it reminded me of the time he'd sat in that bar back in Manhattan while I complained about being stood up on my date. It was a sign of discomfort, of clear distaste at the fact that this conversation was happening-- but at the same time, I felt this innate sense of relief, a movement past something that caused my heart to swell.

"I don't say that to people," Mark admitted, and I could tell that it had taken a lot for him to say those words. He'd moved his head away. He was looking towards the distance. Gone was the gentle touch on my chin, the earnest look in his eyes and the warm feeling in my chest-- I felt oddly vacant without his touch. "It doesn't happen to me.... I don't... I don't know what to do with it--"

I stared at him.

"I should have said it," He said lowly. "For the last six months, all I've thought about is you... and I don't know what the fuck to do with that. I don't date people... I don't know what..."

My eyes traced over his face. I searched every single muscle, every single line, every single flicker of the emotion that was boiling beneath his skin. My lips parted for a sigh, one that seemed to take a thousand years. He was avoiding my gaze, tight and uncomfortable, shoulders raising as I shook my head softly.

"Mark I..." I couldn't make sense of the tightness in my chest. I could feel everyone of his micromovements, I could feel the thud of my heartbeat against the inside of my chest. "It doesn't make it right..."

"Beth--"

"You can't just change your mind about me and love me when it's convenient for you...."

"I know that---"

"I'm not here to be won back," I struggled to vocalise the thoughts that floated around my head. "I'm not... I'm not going to wait for you to decide what you want. I'm not going to sit here and wait for you to love me. I don't do that I... I don't wait around--"

"I know," Mark said softly. He raised his head to stare obliquely at the sky. There was something sad about the way he inhaled sharply. Then there was a very slow chuckle. He shook his head. "You move so fast I don't think I can keep up half the time."

I just stared at him.

"But I can try," He continued. "I want to try."

Inside my head, I was thinking long and hard about the past six months. I knew for certain that I could survive without this man. 

I hadn't lied earlier. I'd been fine. I'd loved him, I'd been sad over him, but I could live without him. I didn't need him. I was beginning to feel like I didn't really need anyone-- loneliness was beginning to feel different to me, maybe it was the pills, maybe it was the fact that I'd grown estranged to the intimacy of a moment like this... but either way, I did not need Mark Sloan.

But, did I want him?

"You love me?" I asked quietly, not exactly sure why I needed to ask him that question. There was a brief pause and, within that pause, I could heart my blood pounding in my ears. I felt numb and cold, outside of my own body as I saw Mark move uncomfortably. "Or you loved me?"

It felt important to distinguish. I needed Mark to think this through. 

I needed him to be sure, to not be wrong. I couldn't deal with wrong. I didn't think I'd survive another moment like that-- another moment of crushing humiliation where I realised that Mark couldn't handle this just as he'd warned. A crushing humiliation where I realised that I wasn't enough.

He waited a lifetime before replying.

"Love," He replied, his voice barely a murmur. "Definitely love."

"Okay."

It felt like a shitty response, but it was all I could find within me. With numb fingers, I played with the edge of my dress. I squeezed my eyes closed and dragged in a long breath. I was trying to slow myself down for once, pull on whatever break I could find and grind myself to a halt. He wasn't wrong-- I moved too fast for even myself. 

I could never exist in a moment, I could never think about anything but the future--

Okay. Okay. Okay. I was saying that word too many times.

"I lied before," Mark looked up at me as I spoke. I wasn't exactly sure where I was going with this, but it felt correct to say. I couldn't decipher the look in his eye. "When I said... When I said I guess I love you..." There was a brief contortion in his face, one that conveyed dread. I could heart the word lie echoing around the inside of his head. "It was a lie."

"Beth..."

His tone broke my heart. The amount of pain on his face made my heart twist and warp. Mark looked away. I recognised the way he tensed— it was the exact same way that I'd buttoned myself together and shut my apartment door. 

It was the slow rejection of someone who was distancing themselves from you. 

A sour taste rose at the back of my throat. I watched him second guess everything he'd said, I watched him spiral down the same hole that I'd tumbled into.

"Look at me."

He didn't.

"Hey, look at me."

"Beth," The way he said my name made my heart squeeze tightly. "I don't think—"

"Mark," I said, in the exact same tone. "Just look at me."

His head turned back to face me. It was slow, painful sight. 

He was frowning as if that was the only expression he could manage— the walls that had fallen away in the past ten minutes were rebuilding, his steely exterior replenishing. But his eyes were so raw. They glimmered at me, a reflection of the emotions I'd felt six months ago—

And then I did something stupid: I kissed him. I kissed him so gently that he seemed to forget how to breathe. I could feel his surprise, he was caught completely off-guard by the gesture. There was a brief window of time, with my hands running up the back of his neck, that he didn't seem to react at all. It was a flicker of a second, the betrayal of a distracted conscience, and then he seemed to snap back to life-- Immediately, his hand cupped the side of my face and he drew me towards him, as if inhaling me whole.

When it was over, I was left with a crushing weight on my chest.

"It was a lie because I didn't guess... I knew... I know," I watched the dawn of it in his eyes. The hope started there and worked its way down into the way he held the side of my jaw. It was a delicate touch, one that made skin rail with goosebumps and my heart ache. "It hurt so much when you just..."

"I know," Mark repeated. His thumb glazed my cheekbone. It felt calming, almost as if he was comforting me. It was soft and consolidating. "I know, I know, I know--"

In retrospect I'd wonder if it was condescending.

"You should've said it back."

"I should have."

I chewed the inside of my cheek, closing my eyes as I repeated those words back to me. In the following years, as our relationship dragged itself to ruin, I wondered whether he was honest. I wondered whether he was just feeding me lines that he'd ripped straight off of a pack of cliches. I didn't trust cliches. 

I didn't like sentences like that— they left a sour taste in my mouth and a heaviness on my chest.

"What now?"

My question was soft, it was spoken as I leant my forehead on his chest and breathed in deeply. His cologne felt familiar. His touch felt familiar. The way I felt his lungs swell with a sigh as he asked himself the same question-- it felt familiar.

My world didn't revolve for this man. I knew that. But in that moment, caught in between his hands and with the softness of his fingers trailing down my spine, I figured that maybe it wouldn't be too bad to orbit around him. Mark held be with such care and softness that I could've stayed there for the rest of the night. Dare I say, I could've stayed there for forever, existing in this soft, gentle moment where all that mattered was the thrum of his heartbeat against my forehead.

"It's your call," Mark's words made me frown, my eyebrows pulled down. It felt like I was at work, stood over someone's body. It was almost an invitation to call time of death. Do we just walk away? Or do we fire up the V-fib for another shock to the system?

I paused.

"I'm not dumb," I said quietly. "I'm not who my family wants me to be— my world does not revolve around sitting down and waiting for a man." I inhaled shakily and blinked away tears that pearled on my eyelashes. "I have shit to do, I have a life to figure the fuck out—"

"I wouldn't expect anything else," I couldn't see his face, but I could hear the smile in his voice. It sounded like a sad smile.

"I can't watch you walk away again," I continued. There was something so delicate about the way that Mark held my shoulder. My eyes were closed, my fists were balled and he was holding my shoulder as if he couldn't let go. "If we do this... you can't walk away again... Mark I swear I can't--"

"I don't think I can."

There was something so heartbreaking and raw about the thought of walking away. Again, for a moment, it felt as though I'd hallucinated the confession-- but it was real. His voice was a low mutter, I felt it against my skin. I lifted my head, I drew backwards and looked at him, watching as he tilted his head to the side, brushing away my exhaustion.

"Okay," I said quietly back to him.

"Okay," He repeated, a very slow smile growing on his face. It blinded me.

I almost didn't recognise the look on Mark's face. It was tender. It made my heart tie into knots and my bones ache and-- I had to reach out and hold the expression in my hands; his eyes flickered as I ran my thumb across his skin, his mouth twitched as I traced the outline of his lips. I wished I could frame this moment, or imprint in my mind: A soft moment in time, a moment where we just stared at each other. A slow moment, a rare breath where I just could think and feel.

I was beginning to worry that I could only slow down when I was drunk. It was a thought that came to me when I was at the bottom of a glass of wine. Intoxicated, my mind allowed itself to slow-- I was no longer hurtling around the universe with a dread of what would happen next. I wasn't thinking and thinking and thinking. The thought of relying on alcohol to be human enough to grasp these moments filled me with terror.

"I love you," I tilted my head to the side. I felt like a kid that was desperately holding onto their parent for affection-- fuck, I had been that kid. My eyes welled slightly and my lips parted and I held my thumb against his bottom lip, trying my best not to let the universe flatten me. "Please don't walk away."

"I couldn't," Mark replied. He pushed my hair behind my ear. "I couldn't if I tried."

I smiled.