Words had always failed Jane. He could never fault her for always trying to express herself with her physicality, and he did not fault her for leaving him now. There wasn’t much left to be said. All the stresses of the world had come upon them both, it had seemed. Nothing would ever be so simple. Not anymore. 

Upon this cold floor, he thought about how she had been feeling. She had to have developed her feelings for him far after her denial of him…right? It was the only way anything made sense. He had always operated with the sense that Jane wouldn’t [i]consciously[/i] hurt him, but…subconsciously? He wasn’t sure. Jane was an enigma to even herself, or so it seemed. 

But what did it matter? Her words echoed in his head. 

[i]”I don’t know how I will feel in a week, a month.”[/i]

It was the brutal fucking truth he had taught himself to ignore. He could sit and pretend that those words hadn’t bothered him. That he was like her; free, searching…longing for what’s there. But he wasn’t. His world was of logic and her’s of passion. This small entryway into her own world, for him, this seemingly insignificant shred of passion in his angular world, had already destroyed them both. He couldn’t possibly imagine what it would do with them together.
 
It was all so much to process. The past few months had felt like an insurmountable climb. He was like a dog chasing cars. And now that the car had stopped…what now? He had grown so comfortable in denial, that acceptance was the ultimate trial. To open himself up now was far different than it had been even on the roof top that had shared a few nights ago. That was admitting to her that he had his own weakness for her. Like showing someone a valuable treasure. And now that she had reciprocated, it was more like handing it over. Such a valuable, worthless thing, his affections were. So easily manipulated. Altered. Crushed. With so many things to do and see in the world, it always felt like a pointless waste of time.

But then he remembered the kiss. And that feeling…that moment of happiness and electricity, that moment seemed like a first high. I feeling he'd always chase but never quite reach. 

Rob shook his head slightly, trying to clear out this thoughts. Sliding out his phone, he called Austin.

“Hey man,” he had said. “We’re downstairs.”

Right. The party. They had been waiting for them. 

“We’re uh—“ he started, feeling his voice breaking. [i]Wait…was he going to cry? Why the fuck would he cry?[/i] He shook the thought and tried again. “We’re not going to go.”

“Great,” Austin’s voice came flat upon the line. “Who’s more upset this time?” 

“Could you, uh, meet me on the roof?” 

“…whatever.”

[hr]

This rooftop was far more windy and cold than the last he had stepped foot on. It had been far easier to access (in fact, it seemed people were allowed up here), but much more difficult to find a warm place. Rob had stood around, smoking two cigarettes before Austin came up.

“A little warning would’ve been nice,” he said to Austin as he approached. His friend could only roll his eyes.

“It’s Jane,” he said. “What were you expecting?”

“Oh, yeah,” Rob countered, playing cool. “Fuck me, right?” 

“Jesus Christ,” Austin said. His usual, sarcastic demeanor had suddenly dropped in favor of his seriously, but-really-man tone he would take on to prove the gravity of his words. “You like a girl, she likes you back, and you’re really going to lock into self-loathing mode?” 

“I don’t—“ Rob choked out. “I don’t want to be, man. I don’t want any of this shit, but here I am. Hating myself for being so vulnerable.” He thought for a moment. “It’s like going to a movie, but being told the ending before it begins.”

“She told you she didn’t know how long it could even last?” Austin said. Rob nodded.

“It’s not going to hurt any less if I know it ends. If anything, it just hurts a lot fucking more now.”

“Look,” Austin said, grabbing his shoulder for a moment, “here’s the thing. For one, you don’t know how you’ll feel either. This moment, you like her, the next, you may not. There’s a big fucking difference between like and love. You can feel how you want to. But your love—or at least the kind you feel for Jane—that can be a choice. It’s something developed over time. And two…she’s trying, man. She wants so bad to not hurt your feelings. She’s never wanted to. She’s trying to tell you that, and maybe you’re just focusing on the wrong aspects of what’s coming out of her mouth.”

Rob nodded, before turning and taking a smoke. “I guess I get what you mean.” 

“I’ve never seen Jane like this,” Austin said, pulling a cigarette from Rob’s carton. “She might think of herself as someone who’ll drop you in a moment, but from my point of view man, she’s probably just as scared as you. Because both of you are feeling ways you haven’t ever felt before. At the very least, [i]just give it a fucking shot.[/i]”

Rob smiled for a moment at the way Austin finished his thought. 

Austin left soon after, saying he was going to meet back up with Sam for another party. This left Rob alone with his own mind on this cold rooftop. 

It was if two pieces of a puzzle had slowly come together. He wasn’t sure how long they had been there in the first place, but now everything seemed so glaringly obvious. He felt a wave of calm hit him for the first time in what seemed like forever. 

All of his thoughts and feelings were slowly being acknowledged. And all he had done was panic.

The truth was, he wanted Jane for who she was, and it seemed that she wanted the same thing. He told himself long ago that it was what he wanted, but now that he was faced with it, he had initially panicked. 

But why had he done so? 

Because…it was scary. New, and different. But it was what he wanted.

Being with Jane was something he could predict. There was no consistency, but would there had been with anyone? He wasn’t sure, but he sure did doubt it. 

He knew he had no need to label what he had with Jane. And he knew Jane wasn’t going to force him into anything else. She wouldn’t be the constant entity he had tricked himself into wanting but knew would be wrong. No cheesy romantic dates. No trouble for forgetting to respond to a text. No unnecessary drama about the most trivial of things. 

And as Rob made his way back to his room, he felt that initial wave of calm continue to grow. He had let the thought of endless possibilities freeze him in place for far too long. He had to learn how to react to his own terms. Make choice. Be true to his own feelings and desires. He had denied them for so long, it was what had gotten him into the mess in the first place.

Rob made a pact with himself as he crawled into bed. If Jane could force herself to confront her greater inhibitions, if she could meet him on her terms as she had done for him…then he could easily return the favor. 

And so he’d start tonight. 

In little more than his boxers, Rob made his way from his room to hers, entering for the first time since they had stayed in.

On her bed was a small mountain of blankets. It had even taken a while to find her in the dim lighting, but at least, he saw her head near the trail of blonde stands it had left behind. 

She seemed asleep, but very recently. Dried tears stained her face, shining from the city lights peering in from closed curtains. She looked so pained.

He began to have second thoughts about his initial plan to act on his own feelings. [i]What if it’s not what she wants? What if she wanted to be alone? God, this is so fucking creepy of me to do.[/i]

He came to a sense of clarity as he thought through the mountain of worries he had. Perhaps that was what Jane had felt when he had acted upon him. So many risks involved…so much self-hatred from the selfishness of the act he was about to take on. 

Sensing his own hesitation, he realized that he needed to act. Standing above her in the room, like this, wasn’t helping with his own feelings of creepiness. 

Without thinking, he decided to act. 

“I can’t remember how often you did this to me,” he whispered so softly he himself could barely hear it. His words were hardly louder than his own thoughts; purposely said so Jane wouldn’t be bothered by them. “But it always made me feel better. So I guess this is revenge. I just hope…it makes you feel better, too.”

He slowly pulled at the comforter, making room beside Jane for himself. “Promise I’m not a creep,” he muttered even softer than he had earlier. He laid down as gently as he could. He was too far in now. He had chosen to react physically. Only time would tell if he would come to regret this later.

Slowly, he wrapped his arms around Jane’s body, and closed his own eyes. No thoughts, no words, just…physicality. And for a split-second, he didn’t feel so selfish for having done this. Each time he had held Jane before it had been for his own pleasure in own mind.

How? And he wanted to do was make Jane feel better. Without words, without thoughts of whatever the future would hold for them.

Just the silence, and the contact shared between them.