Hey everyone!
Hope you're having an amazing week...
Here's a little update I hope you enjoy.
thanks for reading a reviewing! It means the world!
Happy reading!
Xoxo,
Nina
"What are you doing here?" The voice was cold and incriminating. To Kim it felt like knives stabbing her body. "Don't just stand there, answer my question. What the hell are you doing here?"
"Listen. I don't care about whatever beef there's between us right now, but out of respect for Adam I think you should drop the attitude. Not here Victoria." It took her some minutes but her reaction kicked in and it was on point. classy but firm.
"Respect?" Tori almost laughed. "Says the bitch screwing with a man with a girlfriend."
Kim rolled her eyes. Arguing with her was going to be totally useless. "That's not at all what happened, but whatever. And to answer your question I came to check on him."
"Well, I'm here now. Not that any of you cared to keep me on the loop of what was going on. Thank you for that." The sarcasm dripped from Victoria's words and Kim couldn't understar what it was that Adam saw in her. "Anyway, you can leave. I'll take care of him now."
The brunette took a deep breath because if she didn't she was certain that she was going to punch the young lady's face. "I'm not going anywhere."
"The audacity you have." She stood up and walked closer to Kim. "Don't you realize that you ruined everything as soon as you got here. If it weren't for you and your stupid case Adam wouldn't be in this position in the first place."
Kim froze and her insecurities bloomed in a matter of seconds. Yeah Vitoria was rude, but the words coming out of her mouth were hurting Kim, and they were hurting her because a part of her thought the same things Tori was thinking.
"You even tried to destroy our relationship, but I'm not gonna let that happen. We're getting back together."
Hearing that took Kim back to the day of the explosion. The words coming out of Adam's mouth as he talked to Kevin in the roll up now matched with Tori's. What if they had decided to give it another go? After all she was the one to tell him that it was it with them. That all they needed was closure. Was it fair for Adam to keep waiting for her to be ready?
Kim was not expecting this curve ball, and it was sure cracking the freshly built confidence in her and Adam's non-existent relationship.
"Do yourself a favor Kim, just go away. Let him live his life, with me."
The brunette said nothing. She felt like screaming but it wasn't the pace to do it and even if she hated Tori right now, the hate she was feeling for herself was probably just as intense.
The knot on the throat was getting too tight, the burning of her eyes was unbearable and her dignity didn't allow her to cry in front of Victoria.
She just turned around and left.
Kim stormed into the apartment, slamming the door behind her. The noise made Erin jump and observe her friend carefully as she walked full force into her room.
Lindsay knew better than to ask what was going on, so she quietly stood up from the couch and followed her friend.
The brunette was livid. She found her carryon bag and threw it on her bed as she bunched all her clothes in her arms only to stuff it in the bag.
"I guess we're leaving." Erin said softly. One of them had to keep their cool.
"Uh huh. You can tell the chief that we'll be there tomorrow."
"Ok. Do you want to talk about it?"
"No." Burgess' answer was firm.
"Fine. But we both know you'll regret this later."
"I don't want to talk about it now, Erin. We can discuss anything you want once we're back in DC."
"Of course." Her tone made Kim stop on her tracks and look at her friend.
"What are you trying to say?"
"Oh, I'm not trying. I'm just stating a fact. You don't want to talk about it now because deep down you're not sure of what you're doing and you know that saying it outloud will make you realize how stupid it probably is.
I love you Kim, but you really have to find a way to deal with your emotions and your fears better." Erin sighed. "Continue packing. I'm gonna go ask for our plane tickets for tomorrow."
Kim waited for her friend to disappear to close the door to her room and just collapse on her bed and cry.
Erin was right, Tori was right, but her feelings were real and she had no fucking clue how to make things work. Maybe the best she could do right now was let Adam be happy, let him decide what he wanted to do and who he wanted to be with.
Once again Kim ran away from Chicago. But ultimately, she ran away from him.
It was friday night, girls night out in DC and Erin and Kim were meeting up to have a few drinks and just disconnect. Hopefully.
Lindsay was early. She sat on a small table and waited for her drink to arrive as she was scrolling through her feed.
"Have you talked to Jay?" Kim's voice made her shift her eyes from her phone screen over to her friend and she seemed annoyed as hell.
"Um… Is that a trick question?"
"No, it's not." She took a seat opposite her friend at the same time the waiter brought Erin's glass. "Can you get me a double scotch? No Ice?"
Erin's eyes opened wide when she heard her friend order.
"Sure." The man agreed politely. "It'll be here in a second."
"That kind of day, huh? What does Jay have to do with it?"
"Nothing. I just talked to him today and he told me that Adam has been up and awake for the past two days. TWO."
She couldn't help but emphasize the last word.
"Yeah."
"You knew?"
"Well, I did talk to Jay and he told me."
"Nice of you to fill me in." Kim shot back bitterly.
"To be honest Kim, I'm not sure what to do or say any more when it comes to you and Adam. After I practically begged for you to tell me what had happened when you went to Med you never said anything else. I don't know what you want or what you feel anymore." Erin shrugged. "I guess I'm just giving you some space."
The waiter came back and Kim's glass was now neatly placed next to Erin's, although the content didn't last long, because Kim downed the whole thing in one big gulp.
"Sorry." Kim apologized. "I guess I'm pissed because a part of me was hoping that Adam would reach me you know? This sucks. He's so immature."
"That's fresh coming from the girl who ran away. Did you write to him?" Erin was not holding back. She loved her friend to death, but right now she needed to be held accountable for her actions as well.
"Yes!" The confession filled her eyes with tears. "I think he blocked my number."
"Wait, what?" Erin was confused and seeing her friend crumble down like that was breaking her heart. "Why do you think this?"
"I wrote to him right after we landed here in DC. He wasn't awake yet and I knew that, but I wanted him to know that I was here and that I wanted us to talk and sort things out. And today after talking to Jay I started to overthink, you know?" Erin just nodded as Kim kept venting. "I wasn't getting to any positive conclusion so I just grabbed my phone and called him and the call didn't go through."
"I… I don't know what to say." She covered Kim's hand over the table trying to comfort her a little.
"Neither do I. I'm so mad, Erin."
"At him?"
"Yes! And at me. I told him to leave everything behind, I told him that everything we experienced in Chicago was closure. I never told him upfront I loved him." Kim ran her hand through her face in pure frustration. "What was I expecting to happen after the way I acted?"
"Do you want me to try his phone? Maybe you can talk to him."
"No. If he doesn't want to talk to me then I have no other choice but to respect his wishes. after all is the least I can do for him. I love him, Erin."
"I know."
"And I want him to be happy." She said, wiping the tears from her face.
"You deserve to be happy, too."
"Uh huh. I guess I need to own my decisions first."
"Let's get another round and just forget tonight. Yeah?"
"Yes."
Adam was happy to wake up in the comfort of his own house.
On Friday night Kevin had dropped him off at his place and after hanging out for a few minutes Adam crashed. He was still tired, so he was looking forward to having the weekend off and slowly starting going back to work.
The first thing he wanted to know when he woke up was if Kim was ok and where she was. To say that he was disappointed to find out that he had gone back to DC without saying a word to him was an understatement, and after that, he tried to avoid the subject everytime Kevin or Jay brought it up.
When he got out of bed, he made himself something to eat and headed to the couch. He knew better than to take his medication on an empty stomach, and although he just wanted to chill and rest, he didn't want to be drowsy all day.
Just after he had made himself comfortable there was a knock on the door that made him roll his eyes. He was very clear when he told his friends that he wanted to be by himself today and that he was going to ask for help if he needed it.
Almost dragging his feet across the room he went over to the door and opened it without even looking.
"Hey stud. Looking great."
"Tori, hi."
"How are you feeling."
"I'm good! Can I come in?"
"Tor, don't take it personally, but I was kind of hoping to be by myself today."
"Come on. Just a little bit. It won't take long." She batted her eyelashes around and looked at him with an innocent face. He didn't fall for it, but he also didn't have the energy to fight or argue with her. He took a deep breath and stepped to the side allowing her to walk into his apartment.
"Thank you."
"Sure."
"I have something important to tell you."
"Ok. Shoot." He said after reaching the couch again and lying comfortably on it.
"I got the internship in L.A."
"Oh wow! Congratulations." He sounded happy and he really was. He knew how important this was for her, but also the huge opportunity that it meant.
"Thank you. But I'm not taking it."
"Why?"
"Well, after the last talk we had and everything that happened later I don't want to go. I want to stay here with you. We can try to build back what we had."
"Tori, no. I can't let you do that."
"It's not like I need your permission Adam. I'm a grown up, I can make my own decisions."
"I didn't mean it like that. I know you can do whatever you want, but I can't let you believe that if you stay, things between us will go back as they were before."
"They can be better than before."
"Tor, you need to do this, this is your dream and you can't postpone it for something that won't work." He shut his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose. He was not in the mood to deal with this right now, but it was the best time as ever to get it done and over with. "You're a wonderful girl Tori, I truly think that and even if you don't believe me right now I deeply care about you and I'm so sorry if my words are hurting you right now and if I have hurt you before. That was never the intention."
"Adam, stop. What happened, happened, it was a moment of weakness. I get it, I've been through them too. I know what it's like to feel tempted and I can forget and forgive that. Let's just try one more time." Her innocent eyes made an appearance again, only this time her teeth biting her lower lip were also complementing her look. "Let's go to bed, let me remind you what being with me is like."
"This is not about sex and it's not about temptation. It's about what I feel. I thought I was ready to move on but I wasn't. Like I said, you're a great person and you deserve to be loved right and my heart is not where it should be to try anything with anyone."
"With anyone that's not Kim."
"This is not even about being with Kim. She's not here and we're not together, but I guess I'm still in love with her. Agreeing to try again would be completely unfair to you, you don't deserve that and in all honesty is not something that I want to do."
"Seriously, what does she do that I don't?"
"Nothing. And since we're at it, we didn't have sex. Believe it or not it was Kim the one who hit the brakes and it was to respect you and what we had going on."
"I don't care what you say. I'm not going to like her any better."
"I don't expect you to, I just wanted you to have the facts straight. I'm not a victim here. I know I sound like an asshole telling you this, but Tor, I'm in love with her. Even if she doesn't care and goes back to her hometown without saying a word, she has my heart in her hands and I need to solve that before starting anything. And you, you need to follow your dreams."
His words hit her heart, she wasn't used to having mature conversations, she was used to solving things the way she thought it was easier, usually involving sex and although his words were raw and a bit painful, she appreciated the honesty.
"Thank you."
"You don't need to thank me, you just need to be happy."
She nodded and smiled weakly. "Can we still be friends?"
"You mean to get you and your friends out of jail and speeding tickets?" Tori laughed as she wiped her face with the back of her hands. The emotions were catching up to her.
"No, like real friends."
"Of course."
"Hug?"
Adam nodded and stood up, instantly feeling her arms around his waist.
"Take care Tor, I know you're gonna kill it in L.A."
"Thanks." She smiled and they started to walk together to the door. "So, as your new friend there's something else that I need to tell you."
"What did you do?"
"Well, I may or may not have ran into Kim at the hospital and told her to go away because we were going to give our relationship another shot."
"Oh."
Yeah, he was mad. But at least he was beginning to understand what was going on a bit better.
"Thank you for telling me that."
"Yeah and um, just for you to have the facts straight." She imitated him. "One day at the hospital I kind of violated your privacy." Adam furrowed his brows, not having a clue what was about to come out of Victoria's mouth. "Ok, so, Kevin brought some of your things, your phone included. It buzzed, I checked it out…" She stalled. She wasn't sure how to continue.
"Go on, Tori."
"It was a message from Kim. I mean you need to understand, I was furious."
"What did you tell her?"
"Oh no, nothing. I just deleted the message and blocked her number."
"Oh, that makes it better." He said in full irony.
"You think so?"
"No, Victoria. But thanks for being honest about it."
"I'm sorry." She really looked like she was, which made Adam sigh.
"It's ok. I guess we're even now."