10

Hayley's POV

My heart was torn apart. It was stretched painfully between my lover and my best friend, to the point where I didn't even know which was which. I almost wished I could have two boyfriends at the same time without feeling like a whore. Oops, excuse my language.

I looked up at Josh who was still leaning against the door, smiling weakly at me. He was trying so hard to be friendly and understanding, and all I could do was deny him. It all felt so wrong.

Sure, I loved Jack. He was not only a great boyfriend but an amazing friend, who'd helped me through a lot of things. But just a few hours ago Josh had revealed to me that he'd been the one to ask Jack to do that, to "take care of me once he was gone." Maybe that didn't really matter, but now I couldn't pull this thought out of my head—the thought that Jack had only been just another gift from Josh.

Josh was so special. He had a sort of pull on me that no one else had, not even Jack. Sure, we'd been pulled apart before, but I had always longed for him, even when I managed to convince myself that I didn't. And suddenly, I felt like I would never be able to walk away from him. Not entirely. Even if I did, he would still be there, in my every thought. And that actually was kind of creepy.

No. I wanted Josh for real, not just as the memory of the perfect man I never had.

But how could I have that without losing everything else?

Josh's POV

Well, this was awkward. The last thing she'd said to me—"I will never forget you, Josh Ramsay" in a melodramatic voice—had honestly freaked the fuck out of me. It felt so much like a goodbye. Why would she ever have to forget me? It wasn't like we would never see each other again.

Right?

"So, Hayles…" I said to break that horrible silence. "Wanna see something really awesome?" I wasn't exactly sure how awesome it actually was, and I wasn't exactly ready to show it to her—or anyone, for that matter—but it was the only thing I could think of.

"Sure!" She seemed happy to finally have something to do. I knew I was.

I quickly searched my desk for that piece of paper I had left there a few days earlier—dammit, why did I always forget in which drawer I left stuff? Finally, I found what I was looking for and ran to grab my guitar before sitting next to Hayley.

She giggled and said, "You don't have to rush like that, you know. I have time."

"I'm scared you'll vanish," I answered honestly—TOO honestly. She laughed again, but I could tell she knew that I meant it.

"Ok, so…" I took a deep breath and handed her the paper. "It's not much, but it's the beginning of a song me and Matt are writing. I mean, I know you're practically an expert in that stuff…"

"Not at all!" She shook her head, smiling widely. "I had a LOT of help with writing my songs. Jack pretty much did all the work."

For some reason, I had a lot of trouble believing that. "You're just being nice."

Surprisingly enough, she didn't deny it. She just smiled at the paper, reading the words scribbled in my sloppy handwriting—and occasionally Matt's annoyingly perfect one—with careful attention. Too careful.

"So, you wanna hear it?" I asked nervously, pulling her away from her study of my lyrics. For some reason, I almost felt like she was reading something very private, like that was a diary or something. Of course, it was kinda stupid of me to make a song with it if it felt so goddamn intimate. Fucking genius.

"Of course I wanna hear it!" Hayley stared at me expectantly. My fingers started shaking slightly as I placed the guitar on my lap and cleared my throat. I remembered the chords clearly, and the lyrics were carved into my brain forever.

Staring blankly into space, I strummed the guitar once. "I never took you for a trick but sometimes, I don't know what you want. I can take it if you need to take this out on someone." I was so weird to sing it like this, for someone who'd never heard it before. Sure, I'd written songs before and sung them to people, but not personal songs. And not to such special people.

Hayley listened carefully, without moving a finger. I gained confidence with every word, and soon it didn't matter whether it was personal or not. It was just me, her and the music.

"Yeah, you can take it all away and I'll miss. There's a little bit of you in all this, and you can say you only think you know. Please, there's a better bit of me to see yet, cause you haven't seen any of my best. You know I hate myself without you now…" I was actually pretty proud of those lyrics. I guess staying up for endless hours every night did pay off in some way. "Hurts the same when nobody knows, guess that's just how it goes. And I… I won't say anything at all." I wasn't exactly sure what the next chord was, so I winged it. Of course, it ended up sounding really bad. REALLY bad. Way to finish that song like a pro, Ramsay. "Ouch," I mouthed, throwing Hayley an apologetic glance. "Well, that's all we got for now. But I guess the second verse will be pretty much the same, so I guess from now on it's a piece of cake."

Hayley sat up straight with an exaggerated smile, clapping eagerly. "That was amazing! Really, REALLY amazing!"

I smiled half-heartedly. I wasn't sure about that. "Yeah, I guess it's pretty good…"

Suddenly, she grabbed both my shoulders and forced me to look her in the eye. "Josh. That. Was. Incredible. Ok? Stop being so hard on yourself." She waited until I finally nodded and she let go. Then, she looked back at the paper still in her hands and bit her lip. "If you don't mind me asking, what was this about, anyway?"

Uh… "Well…" I searched for the right way to explain it to her.

"If that's ok with you!" Hayley added in front of my hesitation.

"No, it's fine! I just… I'm not sure how to put it." I chuckled dumbly. Wow, I must've looked so fucking stupid. "Basically, it's about everyone around me thinking they know everything about me without even knowing my fucking last name. And judging me and always… blaming me for everything." Yeah, that seemed accurate. "Like my mom." Ok, that was going too far. "I mean, she knows my last name, but…" Alright, it was time to shut up.

Hayley nodded, somehow understanding something from my terrible description. "I like how it isn't TOO obvious," she declared then. "You're good with words." She smiled sweetly and I could feel myself redden.

"Yeah, uh, I wanted it to be… broad, in some way. I wanted everyone to be able to relate to it, not just ME. It's pretty metaphorical… If you know what I mean."

Hayley nodded again. "I try to do that too." She smiled at the ground thoughtfully.

Silence.

And then her eyes slid from the floor to my desk to my end table, until they suddenly locked on something. She squinted for a second, and then her face lit up in amazement. I glanced from her to the end table in confusion, trying to figure out what she was looking at.

"What IS that?" she asked, getting up slowly to pick up the mysterious object.

Oh. That. It was the porcelain figure of a swan, but not just any swan. An origami swan. Don't ask. "It's uh, a paper swan. Except it's not paper."

"Wow, this is so beautiful!" She picked it up carefully to study it closely. Er, ok. Whatever.

"If you say so… It was a gift from my aunt for my birthday. She's kind of weird. Thinks I'm into birds and stuff."

Hayley chuckled. "Well, I wish MY aunt had given me this."

"You can have it if you like," I said quickly, glad I had finally found a good use for that creepy object.

Hayley looked at me with such marvel in her eyes that I wondered if that swan wasn't actually some lost treasure from Atlantis worth millions of dollars or something of the sort. "Thank you SO much, Joshie, you're the best!" I rolled my eyes. Why did people enjoy calling me "Joshie" so much? Oh right, because it pissed me off. "Hey, want me to show you something too?" she asked happily, putting the little white figure back on the end table. I smiled and nodded and she quickly grabbed a random piece of paper or my desk. "Can I use this?" I nodded again, curious as to what she was gonna do.

And then she started folding the paper with the utmost precision, transforming it into a beautiful swan just like the porcelain one in a matter of seconds. I watched in bewilderment as she placed the tiny figure on top of her palm and presented it to me proudly.

"Teach… me… master," I said breathlessly, stretching out my hands towards the swan and making them shake dramatically.

Hayley giggled and handed me another paper—yeah, I had a lot of fucking paper on my desk from the time I used to go to that thing called "school"—before grabbing another one for herself and saying, "Alright, but it's not easy!"

I shrugged smugly and took the paper from her hand with an air of defiance. "I think I can do it…"

I couldn't do it. I didn't know why, but my paper was such a bitch compared to hers. It kept sliding from my hands and folding at the wrong places, so after ten minutes of wrestling with it, all I managed to make was a shapeless mass of ruined paper. "Look, I made a golf ball!" I shouted happily, holding it up like a trophy.

Hayley laughed and grabbed it from my hands, examining it with a look of disapproval. "You weren't listening to me, were you?"

"I was!" I said defensively. She ignored me and handed me the second perfect swan she had folded before starting to unfold mine.

"No, this is wrong…" she muttered, folding it back differently. And then, miraculously enough, the shapeless ball turned into a pretty little bird. I stared with wide eyes as she gave it back to me proudly. Wow.

It wasn't as beautiful as hers, but compared to what it had looked like thirty seconds earlier, it was unreal. "How did you…" I trailed off, discouraged. What was the point of asking? Hayley crossed her arms with a superior smile. I looked back at my swan. "I shall name it Francis!" I declared grandly. But suddenly I felt like something was missing. I got up from the bed slowly, picked up a pen and drew a small dot on each side of the tiny figure's head. "There, now you can SEE, little one! Go! Explore the world!" I swiftly threw Francis towards the small widow like a paper plane, and for a second it actually looked like he would spread his wings and take flight… Unfortunately, the window was closed, and Francis ran straight into it before bouncing back and falling on the floor. Aw.

Hayley gasped dramatically. "Francis! Nooo!" She rushed to Francis' side, picking him up with an exaggerated sad face.

"It's too late…" I whispered, shaking my head. "He's gone."

Hayley headed back to the bed, but before she could sit on it something happened. One of the perfect swans she had folded earlier had ended up on the floor, and somehow she'd managed to step exactly on it, and slipped. Before I knew it, she was falling.

Hayley's POV

I swear, my life flashed before my eyes.

All I knew was that one second I was peacefully going to take a seat on that comfty bed, and the next I was falling face up into nothing. I squeaked and braced for impact, but the pain never came. Instead, I was caught by two strong and careful arms. Phew. I had been inches away from death.

Once he was sure I was ok, Josh started to let go of me, but stopped midway. Instead, he hugged me from behind and rested his head on my shoulder. "Be careful," he breathed, and I could almost hear his taunting smile. And suddenly, he was kissing me, and I turned in his arms to kiss him back. I felt my heart beat faster and faster and the butterflies dance in my stomach like they always did.

Of course, they was always that guilt at the back of my mind, but unlike before, it seemed to dim with every second instead of escalating towards unbearableness. The more we made out, the less I seemed to care about anything else, including my, er, boyfriend.

Because after all, no matter who I was dating, he would never replace my one true love. Boyfriends came and went; he had come and had never left—not in my heart anyways.

"It's you, Josh… It's always been you," I whispered between two long kisses. Everything escalated quickly from there. Once he knew I was ok with it, he didn't hesitate. And I didn't hold back.

Soon, my shirt was off, and his shirt was off, and the light was off—except for the lamp—and my head was spinning while my heart was going crazy. Somehow I ended up on the bed again, with him on top of me, but that changed quickly.

Once I was sitting on him, a few seconds later, I pulled away for just a second to stare at him—hell, he was so perfect—and before I could lean back in, something caught my eye. Dozens of thin little lines covered his stomach, just a teensie bit whiter than his already pale skin, barely visible. Maybe I had seen them only because I already knew they would be there. I gulped and Josh quickly pulled me back close to him. "Don't mind them. That ended a long time ago, you know that. They'll be gone soon."

He smiled a little and I forgot everything but the color of his eyes. And then, he placed another soft kiss on my lips and click, we were off again.

That night was the most beautiful night of my life. That night, I stopped being a girl and became a true woman.

If Francis could talk, he would have a lot to say about that night.