Page 41 of Agony

At eight o’clock, I drove Addie to LAX. At eight fifteen we hugged each other good-bye. I held in my sobs until she disappeared from view and sat down in a chair, crying like my heart had just broken.

At 9:04, I finally collected myself and walked out of the airport.

I was still wiping my eyes when I ran right into Arsen.

“Hey, baby doll,” he said quietly.

“Arsen, what are you doing here?” I asked.

“Adesynne sent me a message and told me she had just left. She said she thought you might need me,” he replied, using his thumb to gently wipe away a tear.

I looked up into his beautiful, hopeful eyes and fresh tears started to spill over. I threw myself into his arms and he held me tightly against him.

Now I was crying for two different reasons; my broken heart over Adesynne leaving and my healing heart at Arsen being in the right place when I needed him the most.

“Shh. It’s okay, Neve,” he whispered softly, running his hand over my hair. “Come on, let’s get you home.”

“I know. I don’t understand why I’m so sad. It’s not like she died; she just went back home. I wonder if this is how she felt when I left,” I said softly.

“I’m sure she did. Come on, I’m going to take you home,” he said, guiding me out of the airport.

Arsen drove me straight home. He sat with me when we got there to make sure I was okay, but I really just wanted to be alone.

It had been at least a half an hour and he didn’t show any signs of leaving. I stretched out on my couch and pulled the blanket up to my chin.

“Thanks for coming tonight,” I said, closing my eyes.

“You’re welcome,” he replied.

I started to become a bit frustrated when I didn’t hear any signs of him getting up to leave. I opened an eye and looked at him. I sighed internally when I saw that he was laying on the other couch, eyes closed, and his arms crossed over his chest.

He has no plans of leaving,I thought to myself.

I closed my eyes and rolled over on the couch so that my back was facing him. I guess this would be the part where most girls would feel “taken care of.” A guy that genuinely wanted to be with them, showed up like a super hero when you needed him, made sure you were okay, and planned on staying the night to make sure would wake up as okay as you were when you went to sleep.

Not me.

The frustration was slowly turning into anger and I was doing my best to contain it.

I was almost completely asleep when I heard my phone vibrate. I opened my eyes, unsure how it had been taken off of silent, but I rolled over and reached for it in case it was Adesynne.

It was a multimedia message from a phone number I didn’t recognize.

Curiously, I rolled flat onto my back and pushed the icon.

A second later, there was a picture of Jareth making a super sad face; pouty lip and all.

I pressed down on the picture to make it fill the screen and used my thumb and forefinger to make it bigger. Since it was pretty dark wherever he was, it made it hard to see his arm, but I was pretty sure he had some decent muscles going on.

Must be a California thing.

Wherefore art thou, Juliet?was the caption of the picture.

When I was able to get my giggles under control, I turned the camera on myself and snapped a picture. I looked at it and saw my hair was standing up so I deleted it, smoothed my hair, and did it again.

I sent the picture of myself sticking my tongue out and captioned it:Certainly not Verona!

I almost dropped my phone a few moments later when Jareth’s phone number started to blink across the scene. I pushed my blanket off and ran over to the door, slipping into my house flip flops and stepping quietly outside.

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