75

irl

despite being as tired as they were, they both struggled to fall asleep. the situation was so sudden, neither of them could've possibly thought this is how their night would go.

it would be impossible to say who the breakup was "harder" for, they were both very much grieving the loss of the other.

kaia felt guilt and dread, she was angry at herself for leaving him, but she still had chloe and everyone who loved her by her side through the whole thing.

matt felt alone. he felt isolated and not good enough, he felt like if he couldn't even get kaia to stay, he didn't deserve anyone.

he obviously knew that his family still loved him, but he blamed himself for kaia leaving.

there was an unspoken understanding sitting between them, that's why matt layed on her chest instead of the other way around, he needed the comfort, he needed to feel loved.

she plays with his hair and softly scratches his back, staring at the ceiling and not knowing if she should say something.

she feels him breathing deeply and slowly, relaxing into her and feeling held.

one of his arms is wrapped around her torso, the other hand is delicately running along the tattoos that sit on her arm.

"i can't sleep." he whispers.

"me neither." she agrees.

"do you wanna talk now or wait until morning?" he asks.

"up to you. i do wanna stay laying like this, though." she slightly laughs, tracing patterns into his back with her nails.

"where do we even start?" he turns his head up to her.

"me apologizing?" she shrugs.

"you don't need to apologize, you basically already explained why you left, it's okay." he shakes his head.

"i can never forgive myself for doing that to you." she sighs.

"you did what you thought was right." he states.

"but it wasn't right, we could've just talked about it and not destroyed these past few months of our lives." she briefly shuts her eyes to think.

"is there something specific that still bothers you about the first time? in the driveway when you were with james." he clarifies.

"kind of, i just can't place it. i don't know, i was in denial that i loved you because we had been best friends for over a decade, i never thought you'd see me like that." she starts.

"you never thought i would? i never thought you would. kai, bestfriends don't exactly cuddle and be that close to eachother like we did." he laughs.

"i know, but i always cuddled with chloe, i thought it was normal and you didn't think anything of it." she breathes.

"everytime we would lay together even just to watch a movie, i was totally daydreaming about you the whole time. nick and chris teased me enough just for acting like i liked you, imagine how much worse it would've been if i was open about it." he continues tracing her tattoos with his finger.

"platonic male and female friends don't just get matching tattoos, though." she laughs, pointing to the "i promise" tattoos on her's and his wrists.

"i never thought of you as platonic, i just knew you did, so i acted like i did, too." he shrugs.

"you remember when i dated brian in grade 9?" she asks.

"ugh, yeah. unfortunately." he sarcastically rolls his eyes.

"and how i told everyone we broke up because he didn't love me?" she continues.

"yeah, he was a dick." matt nods.

"we broke up because we got into a fight about you. he saw me texting you and he started yelling and asked if i liked you, i paused for a good ten seconds before i said no, and he got mad and left me." she explains.

"really? that would explain all the dirty looks him and all his friends gave me." he looks at her.

"yeah, i didn't want to tell you because i knew you'd immediately know i had a crush on you." she nods.

"so, that day in the driveway, was it weird for you? like, me trying to kiss you when we never talked about liking eachother?" matt asks.

"not weird, i just had a million thoughts racing through my head, my first physical instinct was to kiss you because i had liked you for so long, but i remembered james, and didn't want to ruin our friendship." she answers, still playing with his hair, the fan humming in the background.

"kinda too late for that, huh?" he jokes.

"yeah. way too late." she agrees.

"so, why did you still feel bad about it? i mean, we talked about it. i thought that us being in love was enough to forget about that." he begins twirling her hair.

"it should've been enough, that's what i didn't realize. you're all i've ever wanted, i didn't want you to keep being my boyfriend if there was any chance you were still hurt by me yelling at you." she sighs.

"but i told you i wasn't hurt by it anymore, there was no reason for me to be upset. i was the one that lashed out at you for being happy with james." he shakes his head.

"james did nothing but cause problems for us, i just wanna leave him in the past. i can't stand the sickening thought of his fucking face. he's the reason all this happened, i never wanted to break up." kaia rolls her eyes.

"then, what are we supposed to tell people? we just ran into eachother and now we're friends again?" matt asks, cringing at the end.

"ew, i hate that. friends is so weird." she laughs, looking up at the fan.

"i agree." he nods against her chest.

"then what do we do? if we rush this again, what if more bad things keep happening? don't we have to wait for you to trust me again?" she asks, looking down at him.

"trust you? i never stopped trusting you, i thought you just didn't love me anymore." he shrugs.

"don't say that, of course i do. i want to be with you, but i feel like i'm not open enough about my emotions with you to understand eachother." she admits.

"then just talk to me. we can have these conversations every night, no secrets. and trust me, i'm not complaining if i get to just lay here and listen to you talk for an hour." he smiles.

"you'd listen to me talk about my emotions every night? that would bore you to death." she laughs.

"no it wouldn't, that would mean i'd be with you every night. i'd be living the dream." he laughs too.

"do you think that if we talked about things more, like me feeling guilty about the driveway, that that would be enough to make things work again?" she asks.

"i'd do anything in the world to make things work with you again, you're my only love." he smiles.

"i wish we talked about this that night, we never would've had to breakup." she breathes deeply, smiling at him.

"don't consider it a breakup, consider it a brief lapse in judgement, now we're back to normal?" he jokes, playing with the hair next to her face."

"i want you to be my boyfriend again." she laughs.

"ugh, fine. if i have to." he jokes.

she laughs and he scooches up to be on the pillow, he wraps his arms around her and she cuddles into his side, facing up to look at him.

she reaches her head up to connect their lips, easing into the kiss as the moon is still shining on them through the window.

he smiles so full of joy into the kiss, one hand next to her jaw to hold her in place as he kisses her softly.

"i love you." she manages between kisses as she adjusts herself next to him.

"i love you more." he replies, pulling his lips away from her mouth and trailing them down along the side of her face and to her neck.

she scratches his hair and holds the back of his head as he begins to kiss her neck more harshly, they both hold eachother still where they need the other to be.

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