L A Y L A ' S P O V

Drinks with Penelope is always a good idea, in the moment. The next morning though? Not so much.

One reason I'm sure I'll never become an alcoholic is because of how shitty the hangover is. I feel fragile, exhausted, achy and any noise above a whisper makes me want to cry.

I've yet to open my eyes but I can hear Penelope's groans of discomfort beside me, no doubt feeling exactly as bad as I do right now.

Somewhere around our third glass of wine last night, I confided in her about the fight Derek and I had yesterday and the distance leading up to it. After listening to me ramble through it all, Penelope too concluded that his behaviour has been weird lately.

"Thats so not like him," She had said, her eyebrows scrunching together tightly. "Wait.. maybe he's proposing."

"Nah," I had told her, with the same sheer bluntness Derek delivered in that exact sentence to me when I asked a few weeks ago. "Not any time soon."

Somewhere between our fourth and fifth glass of wine, which was like water to us at that point, Penelope had the brilliant idea to give Derek a taste of his own medicine with a dose of distance, and convinced me to not go home last night and to stay over at her apartment. And for some reason I agreed, which I am seriously now regretting while I fight back the urge to throw up all over her living room floor.

We ended up passing out on the couch sometime in the early hours of the morning. My head is pounding as I reach between the cushions for my phone. When I realise it's dead, I sluggishly pull myself up to a seated position.

My car is parked outside but I'm in no state to drive right now so with a lethargic form of mumbled permission from Penelope, I request an Uber from her phone.

I eventually muster up enough energy to make it to the kitchen to get some water. I rub at my eyes and groan when I realise that the hazy blurriness in them is not from the hangover, but from the fact that I took my contacts out at some point last night, not realising I didn't have my glasses with me.

"Are you nearsighted or farsighted?"

"Far," Penelope grumbles into the pillow she's clutching, mumbling about her computer screens doing her no favours.

"Damn," I sigh when I realise I can't even borrow a pair of her glasses. My short distance is fine, my difficulty is seeing things far way.

Just before I get the notification that my ride is downstairs, I throw a blanket over Penelope and tuck her in since there's no way she's moving from this couch for the foreseeable. I also leave some pain meds and water for her on the coffee table.

"As much as I hate you right now.." Penelope flashes me the brightest grin she can muster up in her fragile state. "I had fun last night."

"Hate me?" I have to laugh. "It was your idea to open that third bottle and you know it, Penelope Garcia."

"Shhh," She mocks, turning back to her beloved pillow. "I'm sleeping."

When I eventually make it in to my Uber, I roll down the window as soon as we get on the road and hope and pray the fresh air does me some good. I cannot wait to get home.

Derek went out for drinks with Spencer last night and part of me is hoping he's feeling as hungover as me this morning so I can convince him to take a sick day with me. We can nap until the late afternoon, order food and eat it in bed and finally talk. Because whatever this fight is? Im over it. Maybe Penelope was right. That night apart might be exactly what we needed.

The joyous feeling I was expecting when we round the corner onto my neighbourhood is quickly forgotten because what I see rocks me. I blink rapidly. My long distance vision is so blurry, but it is clear enough to know that a girl just walked out of our front door.

All I could think about on the whole drive is getting a warm shower and crawling into bed for the foreseeable future, but now there's only one thing on my mind.

"Who the fuck is that?"

As I now realise I asked that question out loud and the only other person in this car is a complete stranger to me, the driver gives me a quick how am I supposed to know look.

I'm practically sticking my head out the fucking window to catch a glimpse of her and what I see only makes the pit in my stomach sink deeper. I can see just enough to make out that she adjusts her skirt and blouse before climbing into her car parked in the drive way.

I honestly can't tell if my driver being as slow as slow as a snail making his way down the street is a good or bad thing because my fight or flight is triggered and my mind is scrambled. But as the car closes in on the the front curb, her car is pulled out of the driveway and out of sight.

I contemplate on telling him to floor it and follow her, but I don't. Now on complete auto pilot, I thank the driver and make my way up to the house. I pass Derek's truck on the driveway so I know he hasn't left for work yet.

I've always loved this house for many reasons, one being the fact that it always gave me this warm, comforting feeling inside. But right now as I step inside, the house feels cold. Ice cold and eerily quiet.

The hungover nauseous pit in my stomach churns as I make my way up the stairs to our bedroom all while the little voice in the back of my head is screaming somethings wrong here.

The bedroom door is open and as I approach, I see him. Derek is sitting on the edge of the bed, his back is to me and his head is hung in his hands. My eyes scan the scene before me. He's only in boxers and the sheets on the bed look like they were freshly rolled around in.

I swallow my emotions and say the only thing I can think of right now, too disgusted to even say his name.

"Tell me you didn't."

My voice startles him.

I take a steading breath and try my hardest to not show the million and one emotions swirling inside me right now. "Tell me you didn't sleep with that girl I just saw walk out of here."

I'll believe him if he tells me that this isn't what it looks like, that I'm just jumping to conclusions and what I think has happened here can be explained away.

My heart breaks a little more with each beat of his silence.

One second passes.

Two.

Three.

And then, a low, "I can't."

He can't.

He can't tell me he didn't sleep with her because he did.

He slept with someone else.

We stare at each other in silence. I'll give it to him, he does look remorseful but quite honestly, I don't give two fucks about how sorry he may be.

I can't. All it took was two little words to shatter my heart to pieces.

Nothing he could say would change the fact that this is over, but while I stand here, fighting back the urge to burst out crying, what hurts more is that he's not even making an effort. He's not trying to tell me he's sorry, that it was a mistake, that it will never happen again. He doesn't make any effort to fight for us. He can't even string a sentence together to plead for us. For me. He's just.. silent. That hurts a hell of a lot more than anything right now.

"Was she worth it?"

Was fucking some girl, god know if this was even the first time, I could be just the first time I caught him, worth ruining everything we've built together. Not even just ruining. Lighting our future on fire and stomping on the ashes because there is no coming back from this.

Derek doesn't respond to my spiteful question and that's probably for the best. I don't want to know. I don't want anything else to do with this situation.

Instead, he hangs his head in shame because he knows I'm done here. I don't say anything else, I leave him standing there while I turn on my heel and walk away, just like I told him I would when this situation was a hypothetical, outlandish what if.

I don't let myself look, or even think about any and all of the memories we've made together here as I pass every room on my way to the kitchen.

Freckle and speckle look so excited to see me, hopping around their playpen, so blissfully unaware of how my life just flipped upside down in a matter of seconds.

I load them into their carrier because there's no way I'm leaving them behind. A whole ten seconds later the fresh air outside hits me as I stand on the porch and take a second to breathe.

A small part of me wants to wait to see if he chases me. But I don't because the bigger part of me knows that because of how he just acted, he won't.

I set off on foot to the first and only place I can think of to go right now and it's only a few minutes before I'm walking through Spencer and Averie's front door.

Straight out of a movie, I walk into the most wholesome scene that any other day I would appreciate just how cute they are cooking breakfast and eating together, but I can't find it in me to right now.

Averie's eyes brighten in a greeting when she sees me but only for half a second. Then I see the alarm bells ringing. Her eyes drift briefly down to the bunnies in the carrier in my arms and I know she knows.

She quickly mutters something to Spencer about taking Aidan out of the house for a few hours and before I know it, both of them are gone.

When Averie and I are alone, she doesn't ask what's wrong or pry for any details. She simply wraps her arms around me and I give up on fighting the tears threatening to spill and I finally crumble.

-

A/N: Hey.. so I want to start off with saying how sorry I am about how long you guys have been waiting for an update and I appreciate how patient you have been, but quite honestly writing has been that last thing on my mind the past while because I'm drowning in grief, but just know I am trying, I promise 🤍