Page 37 of Love In The Air
Feelings. Ugh, what a terrible word. She hated it, she hated this. She’d only recently gotten used to not disliking Chance and now he had to go ruin it by claiming to love her. What kind of psychopath did that?
Fear clawed its way up her throat, but she used ire to push it back down. Ire was good, it was familiar.
“Whatever, it’s not your job to protect me, no matter how you feel.” She moved to gather up her stuff, digging around in her bag for her keys.
“No matter how I feel?” His words sounded behind her, deep and honest. “And how do you feel?”
She sucked in a sharp breath. His question echoing in her head, pulling dreams and wishes from her she never let herself examine before. But then she remembered her mom, the months she spent crying late at night after her dad left, when she thought Iz couldn’t hear.
She had.
She thought of all her past relationships. The ones who always told her she was too much, too intense, too closed off, too focused on her goals. No one ever stayed. Not with her. Why would Chance be any different? If she let herself dream, let herself hope, she’d just get hurt again. It was inevitable.
Icy calm washed over her body. She turned and stared him straight in the eye, letting the cold, emotionless state take over as she spoke.
“I feel like getting a good night’s sleep so I can come in tomorrow and work on the move Jen knows I can do. I’m sorry, Chance, but we’re done.”
The shock on his face had her turning and heading to the studio door, but it was the pain in his gaze that made the tears leak from her eyes. She drove home in silence, allowing them to fall as her heart and head fought with each other. All her life she’d been sure of her decisions, but for the first time in her life Iz had no idea if she’d just made the best decision of her life or the worst.
14
A knock on the door interrupted Iz’s pity party. It had been two days since her fight with Chance. Two days since she started rehearsing the new move with Jen. They’d practiced and practiced, and she had managed to get the move down. Jen had been ecstatic. Chance had stoically offered his congratulations. But the win didn’t feel as good as it should have.
Normally Iz would be gloating over proving herself right. Basking in the glow of her accomplishment. So why did she feel so…empty? Something was wrong, and she didn’t want to put her finger on it because she feared she knew exactly why her win didn’t feel like a win.
“Izadora, I swear if you don’t open this door up right now!”
She sighed at the sound of her bestie’s growl, muffled from beyond her closed apartment door. Rising off her bed, she trudged over to the door and opened it.
“Hey, Tori.” she greeted her friend.
“Don’t you ‘hey Tori’ me.” Tori pushed her way inside.
“By all means, come in.” Iz deadpanned as she closed her door.
Tori glanced around, turning with a raised brow. She knew what her friend saw. Messy bed with unwashed sheets because she couldn’t bring herself to erase Chance’s scent from them. Dishes piled high in the sink because she’d lost the motivation to clean. Fast food wrappers everywhere because Iz didn’t cook for one and the one person who had treated her to his mouthwatering meals was gone.
Because I pushed him away.
“This place looks worse than the time Winnie broke up with you.” Tori nudged at a dirty sock on the floor with her foot.
“She didn’t break up with me. I broke up with her,” Iz insisted.
“Only because she gave you an ultimatum, move in together or break up and you panicked and picked the latter.”
True. But Winnie hadn’t been right for Iz. Her ex-girlfriend never really supported her aerial dreams. She thought it was a silly hobby, not a passion literally burning in Iz’s soul. They never would have made it through a year with Iz on tour.
“What happened with Chance, Iz?”
She lifted her chin, shoulders going rigid as the past few days flew through her mind. Iz opened her mouth fully prepared to tell her best friend that nothing happened. Everything was fine. But to her absolute horror, when she started to speak, nothing but a mournful sob came out.
“Oh, sweetie,” Tori opened her arms.
Iz rushed into her friend’s embrace. They stood in the middle of her chaotic, depressed mess of an apartment as Tori let Iz get it all out. Once the tears slowed down, her friend moved them to the couch. Tori passed over a box of tissues and sat quietly as Iz explained everything. Starting with her and Chance’s agreement to be fake friends, how they tried to burn off their attraction to each other, and their fight the other night, ending everything.
“So,” Tori said slowly, tilting her head as she took in everything Iz said. “Let me get this right. You two faked a friendship that turned into fucking, which lead to a real friendship and even feelings, and now you’re throwing it all away because he doubted you could do a move?”
“No.” Iz realized the past few days that she had been using that as an excuse. A convenient refrain from her past. An easy out so she could ignore all the messy, complicated emotions running through her. Emotions she had no idea what to do with. All her bluster about Chance sabotaging her, trying to make her look bad in front of Jen, it was all a front to cover up the real reason she threw up walls against him.