Page 77 of Elijah
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By the time the boxing finished at two in the morning, Alex and Lucas were passed out and it was just me and Sam still drinking beer and picking at left over poppadum.
“You leaving them there?” Sam asked, pointing at the two men lying prone on either end of my sofa.
“Yeah, I’ll get a blanket from upstairs.”
“I’m surprised there’s not some nice, girly throw in here already.”
“Not happening.”
“Oh it will brother, believe me. She’ll have all her nice little knick-knacks in here before you even have time to scratch your arse. Thought they might be in here already. Didn’t you say she’d asked you to unpack a couple of boxes?”
“Yeah she did.” I flicked the TV over trying to find something to distract us, finally settling on another repeat of The Office.
“And why haven’t you?” Sam asked, once I’d put the remote down.
I snapped my head in his direction, totally irritated by him. “What?”
“Why haven’t you unpacked the boxes that Mia asked you to unpack?”
“Does it matter?” I grumbled.
Sam thought about it for a second. “No, not really, just seems strange you’ve had two weeks and still not unpacked them.”
“What fucking point are you trying to make here, doctor fucking psychobabble?”
“Didn’t say I was.” Sam grinned at me.
“Don’t fucking mess with me, Sam. What the hell point are you trying to make?”
“Seems to me you haven’t unpacked them, because you don’t actually want to unpack them, because you don’t actually want her here and you need to man-the-fuck-up, Eli. You need to tell that girl not to come back here.”
My blood thundered in my ears as I looked at my brother, wanting to fucking punch him in the throat. With the tempo of my heart speeding up, I moved to the edge of my seat and pointed at him.
“Where the fuck do you get off telling me how I feel, or what I should or shouldn’t say to my own girlfriend?”
“Because I’m your bloody brother, man. I love you and I want what’s best for you, and pretending that you love Mia when you still love Amy, is not what’s best for you.
You can’t deny that she moved in here on the wrong end of a conversation. There was no way you’d have asked her if she hadn’t misinterpreted what was said. The relief you’re feeling that she’s not here is fucking obvious, Eli. You’re more relaxed, your shoulders aren’t hunched under your fucking ears, and I haven’t once seen you pinch between your eyes.”
I looked at him incredulously. Yes, that was a habit of mine when I was stressed, but I didn’t do it when Mia was around, I was sure I didn’t.
“I don’t do that around Mia,” I protested.
“Yeah you do, bro,” Sam sighed. “You don’t realise it, but you do. I’m not saying you don’t like her, you do – you may even think that you love her, and maybe you do, but is it really that gut-clenching, all consuming, heart squeezing love that you felt for Amy?”
I breathed in and out deeply, my nostrils flaring as I watched my brother.
“Eli, just fucking be honest with yourself, bro. If you feel all those things, well great, but if you don’t, please don’t waste your life on a relationship that doesn’t fulfil you. One that’s safe, just because you’re too fucking scared.”
“Scared,” I hissed, glancing at Lucas as he stirred on the sofa. “What the fuck do I have to be scared of?”
“You’re scared that your damn soulmate might just break your heart again, and that’s stopping you going out there,” he said as he pointed toward the window, “and making her listen to you when you tell her you never have and never would cheat on her, because you fucking love that women with everything you have Eli. You have since you were seventeen years old, and you have to make her believe that.”
I reared back in my chair, staring at my brother whose eyes were wild with emotion. His biceps were tensed and his body taut as he inclined toward me, vehemently urging me to talk to Amy. I’d never seen him so agitated or emotional, not even when our grandad died.
“Sam, what the hell-.”
