Page 61 of Becoming Selfish

Closing Marc’s door behind me, I take a deep breath once I’m alone in the hallway. I close my eyes for a moment to collect my thoughts when I hear Marc tell Ali, “He’s a fucking idiot.”

I actually feel worse tonight than I did after last week’s party. I expected more from Eli after his apology and confession last weekend. I thought he was sincere when he told me how he felt, but in reality, he was full of shit. And once again, he has shown his true colors.

I haven’t looked at my phone for a while now. Every time I checked it and saw the lack of missed calls or texts from Eli, my stomach dropped in disappointment, so I figured it best to keep myself from looking at all. I’ve laid here in bed for a couple of hours, with my eyes locked on the ceiling, unable to sleep.

I really thought he was different with me, but once again, I shouldn’t be surprised that he’s proven everyone else correct. Am I really that naive that I keep allowing boys to lie straight to my face? If my relationship with Zac taught me anything, it was to spot the red flags early on, and Eli is waving his red flags all over Alyssa’s Instagram.

My room is pitch black, except for the small amount of fluorescent light coming from the hallway through the gap under my door. When the space around me suddenly gets a bit darker, I snap my head in the direction of my door to find the shadow of two feet facing my room.

Somehow, I already know it’s Eli. I locked my door tonight in case he came by because I didn’t want my anger with him to dissolve as I’m sure it would once I saw his face.

Sitting up in my bed, I anxiously await his next move, and because of the stillness around me, I can almost hear my own heartbeat accelerating in anticipation.

I hear Eli take a deep breath before gently knocking on my door.

“Logan?” he softly says.

God, I missed his voice.

“Logan, will you please open up? I’m sorry that I’m so late.” He knocks again, this time a little louder.

I stay silent. As much as I want to let Eli in and look into his whiskey brown eyes, I need to hold my ground. I’m not a weak person, but I can be when it comes to this boy. Instead, I walk closer to the door to be near him, but I stay quiet so that he doesn’t know I’m awake. Even though it pains me to hear the desperation in his voice, I need to remember how little he cared for me when he left me waiting for hours. I’m not even mad at him. I’m just disappointed.

“Please. I know I fucked up. Can I just talk to you for a minute?” he asks, his voice rising in volume as he jiggles on the doorknob before realizing it’s locked.

He lets out a loud sigh, followed by a small thud, which I assume was his forehead resting against the door. “Fuck,” he says under his breath.

I hear him lean his body against the door, and judging by the lack of light coming into my room, I assume he slid himself down to the ground and is now sitting with his back against it.

“Maddison? What the hell are you doing here?” I hear Ali ask, outraged.

“Nothing, Ali. Go back inside,” Eli says, trying to brush her off and keep her out of his mess.

“You have some nerve showing up here! You were supposed to be here hours ago!”

I stay close to the door to hear Eli’s excuse as Ali defends me, but I also remain quiet. I don’t want anyone to know that I can hear their conversation.

“Yeah, I know. I fucked up,” Eli responds, sounding defeated.

“You should just go back to your party.”

“How did you know about that?”

“It’s all over Instagram, you dumbass!” she shouts. I can just picture the look of disgust on her face right now.

“Okay, okay. I’ll handle my brother,” Marc chimes in out of nowhere, trying to calm her down.

“I can explain what happened,” Eli tells him with desperation in his voice.

“She’s right, EJ, you are a dumbass.” I can hear the frustration with his brother through his words. “What the fuck, man?”

“Fuck. I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Eli says with so much sadness in his voice that the tone hurts my heart.

Marc lets out a heavy sigh of disappointment. “Let’s go. You can sleep it off in my room.”

The light begins to peek through the crack under my door as Eli stands up.

“I told you I wasn’t going to have your back if you fucked up,” Marc reminds his brother.

---