smiling, he was just looking at me.
‘So you think you’re the only person who has a big scary break-up story?’ he asked, eyebrows raised. ‘It’s OK to have a past you know, even if it’s a recent past. Seriously, so many people put so much faith in those dumbass rules. I hate that you thought you couldn’t tell me that.’
I looked back at him, trying to work out what to say next. ‘No, it wasn’t that, I, well, I think I could have told you. If I’d wanted to. But I don’t want to be that person any more. I don’t think I liked her very much and I didn’t want to be that person with you. Now, when I’m here,’ with you, I didn’t say, but I wanted to, ‘when I’m here, I like the person I am.’
‘I like her too,’ Alex said, stroking my cheek and wiping away stray tears I hadn’t even felt escape. ‘And I do know how you feel. You’re not the only one that has had shitty things happen to them and then reacted, you know.’
‘I left the bloody country,’ I said, furiously rubbing the tears away myself. Why wouldn’t they stop? ‘The more I think about it, the more pathetic it was. I can’t believe I would do that.’
‘Maybe you wouldn’t if it happened today,’ he suggested. ‘Maybe you wouldn’t have if it had happened a day earlier. Who knows? And while we’re sharing, I have your “I’m pathetic” break-up story beat hands down.’
‘I don’t believe it,’ I said, trying a weak smile. ‘What’s more tragic than running away?’
‘I really don’t think you want to know,’ Alex smiled.
‘Out with it, Reid.’
‘OK, since we’re sharing, but you’d better know this breaks every one of your friend’s rules.’
‘You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,’ I said hurriedly. I had a feeling I really didn’t want to hear his story after all.
‘You caught your boyfriend cheating, right?’ he asked. I nodded. ‘I caught my girlfriend cheating too. With my best friend. In my bed.’
‘That’s horrible,’ I said. He looked so sad. ‘No one can blame you for taking that badly, surely?’
‘Apparently it had been going on for months,’ he continued, taking his turn to stare out over the rooftops. ‘On and off, they said. Needless to say, I didn’t take it well.’
‘Well, what happened?’ I wondered what he could possibly have done that made him feel so bad. ‘Did you hit him?’
‘Yes but that he had coming,’ he said simply. ‘The dumb thing is, what they did to me wasn’t half as bad as what I did to myself.’ He let out a long sigh. ‘And I just want to preface this with this is what I was doing, this isn’t what I’m doing now.’
I nodded cautiously. ‘You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to,’ I said again, really wishing he would listen, praying he wasn’t going to tell me something that would reveal him to be anything other than super perfect.
‘They didn’t stay together once I found out, she kept telling me it was a mistake, that she wanted to come back, that we could work it out, but I couldn’t accept it. I was, whatever, heartbroken I guess, but I had this wounded male pride thing going on too, you know? So, instead of meeting her to talk like I said I would, I went out with the guys, I picked up this girl and for a couple of hours, I didn’t have to think about what they had done to me.’
‘That’s not that bad,’ I said, trying not to be jealous. This wasn’t about me. I wondered what she looked like? ‘Just a rebound thing, right?’
‘You’re going to have to let me finish, it gets a little shittier.’ He tried a smile but it didn’t really work. ‘After that first night, it just got easier and easier to go out, pick up a girl each night and just forget about everything. I kind of convinced myself I was making up for lost time, but at a pretty speedy rate.’
‘Oh?’ I couldn’t really think of specific words to put together into a sentence. And he didn’t want to come upstairs with me? This is not about you! a little voice reminded me. ‘But to make her jealous?’
‘Yeah, except somewhere along the line, I stopped being devastated and just turned into a total dick. And I know it’s a cliché, but it didn’t make me happy.’ He paused to bite at an already gnawed-down fingernail. ‘In the morning, I hadn’t changed anything. I was still the guy who had been cheated on, only now I was just as much of a shit.’
‘But why keep … well, why do it if it didn’t make you happy?’ I asked. My imagination was being stretched to its limit today.
‘I didn’t know what else to do,’ he said. ‘And then I kind of figured I’d finally come up against someone who made me want to stop. I met you.’
‘Oh.’ I let go of his hand. This was all so confusing. ‘But when I asked you upstairs, you said no?’ It was also getting more and more difficult not to take this all to heart.
‘I know,’ he said, snatching my hand back. ‘It’s just, when we started talking it was different. Usually, when a girl knows you’re in a band they start acting differently and it stops being honest, it’s just about hooking up with the guy in the band, which I get sounds totally pretentious but it’s true. But you, you knew and it didn’t phase you at all. I was just me, I didn’t have to be the guy in the band.’
‘I didn’t say I would go out with you because you’re in a band,’ I lied a little bit. It didn’t feel like the time to get into my groupie fantasies.
‘And that’s the reason I didn’t come upstairs with you,’ Alex said urgently. ‘If I had it would have been just the same, another night, another girl. I had a really great time with you. For the first time in a year, I wanted to see someone again. I’m kind of having to learn how to date again, to be with someone for more than just, you know, sex.’
I didn’t know what to think. Part of me was saying he had been hurt the same way I had, he’d just handled it differently. But another, really loud part of me was telling me he was trouble, did I really think it was a good idea to keep seeing someone who had slept his way around most of downtown Manhattan? I didn’t know what to trust.
‘So that girl at the gig, she was telling the truth?’ I said, piecing things together.
‘I don’t know exactly what she said, but probably,’ he said. ‘Jesus, I shouldn’t have told you any of this. I just thought, while we were laying our cards on the table, I wanted you to know I’m not perfect. I really like you, I really like the way I feel when I’m with you and I want to see you again, however long you’re going to be in New York.’
‘I like you too,’ I said slowly. ‘But it’s all a bit much at once to be honest.’
Alex nodded and looked down. I hated this, I didn’t want to feel this way. And I hated the thought that he might be feeling this way too. Not knowing what else to do, I reached my arms up around his neck and slid in front of him, brushing his floppy fringe out of his eyes. He looked at me, surprised.
‘You’re not going?’ he asked, leaning in close.
‘Every single little part of me is saying I should,’ I said, not sure I was making
