Wrong
Wow, I haven't posted in forever! I wanted to sit down and write today, but what I intended to write didn't happen. What follows is not fanfic. To be honest, it's not technically fiction at all. I was fiddling around with POV and doing the old "when all else fails, write what you know" and this is what happened. I started it in August, but it really demanded that I finish it today, so I did. It's unbeta'd and only 500 words.
Wrong
A part of you always knew he was Mr. Wrong, but that part of your brain always seemed to short out when he touched you. And no matter how you tried to set that boundary, his hands seemed to find their way onto you. Sometimes, it was a shoulder rub after a hard day’s work, others, an arm thrown casually around you. There were nights watching movies, sitting too close together. But the worst? The very worst were the nights you slept in his bed.
He always had a girlfriend, and only briefly was it actually you. You’d tell yourself that sharing his bed wasn’t wrong if nothing happened, but the morning after always left you feeling like the other woman, even when he didn’t lay a hand on you all night. If you were his girlfriend, you wouldn’t be okay with him sharing his bed with another woman. You knew this as solid fact in the harsh light of morning. And yet.
Eventually, you couldn’t take the mixed signals- his hands in your hair, running along the shell of your ear, would throw you off balance, ruin your decision making skills. You used your words, told him what he was doing to you.
“You can’t touch me like this and have a girlfriend. You know what this does to me. I don’t know what to think. Friends don’t do this.”
He was willing to cross whatever lines you’d allow behind each other woman’s back. He didn’t respect the relationships he chose over you. You found ways to rationalize it away. You were best friends. What did they have in common? He was using them to hide from a serious relationship with you. This thought alone should have been the red flag that sent you running, and yet you stayed, hoped he’d grow up just that little bit more, and left yourself in situations you’d lecture your friends about getting themselves into.
Your friends fell into two distinct categories- those who loved him and pushed you back to him each time you worked up the courage to break off your friendship, and those who saw through the hollow charm and hated him. Hated him for what he did to you, stringing you along like a puppy on a leash, dropping just enough crumbs for you to follow along on the edge of sated. Of course you defended him, even more staunchly in the end, because admitting he was Mr. Wrong meant admitting you’d been taken for upwards of 7 years. Taken in by the charm, taken over by the implied promises of someday, and taken down by the realization you weren’t as smart as you thought you were, couldn’t actually protect your own heart, thumping loudly on your sleeve for all to see.
He was the lesson you didn’t know you needed to learn, and truthfully, if you ever saw him again, you would thank him for it. After all, he sent you straight into the arms of Mr. Right.
Wrong
A part of you always knew he was Mr. Wrong, but that part of your brain always seemed to short out when he touched you. And no matter how you tried to set that boundary, his hands seemed to find their way onto you. Sometimes, it was a shoulder rub after a hard day’s work, others, an arm thrown casually around you. There were nights watching movies, sitting too close together. But the worst? The very worst were the nights you slept in his bed.
He always had a girlfriend, and only briefly was it actually you. You’d tell yourself that sharing his bed wasn’t wrong if nothing happened, but the morning after always left you feeling like the other woman, even when he didn’t lay a hand on you all night. If you were his girlfriend, you wouldn’t be okay with him sharing his bed with another woman. You knew this as solid fact in the harsh light of morning. And yet.
Eventually, you couldn’t take the mixed signals- his hands in your hair, running along the shell of your ear, would throw you off balance, ruin your decision making skills. You used your words, told him what he was doing to you.
“You can’t touch me like this and have a girlfriend. You know what this does to me. I don’t know what to think. Friends don’t do this.”
He was willing to cross whatever lines you’d allow behind each other woman’s back. He didn’t respect the relationships he chose over you. You found ways to rationalize it away. You were best friends. What did they have in common? He was using them to hide from a serious relationship with you. This thought alone should have been the red flag that sent you running, and yet you stayed, hoped he’d grow up just that little bit more, and left yourself in situations you’d lecture your friends about getting themselves into.
Your friends fell into two distinct categories- those who loved him and pushed you back to him each time you worked up the courage to break off your friendship, and those who saw through the hollow charm and hated him. Hated him for what he did to you, stringing you along like a puppy on a leash, dropping just enough crumbs for you to follow along on the edge of sated. Of course you defended him, even more staunchly in the end, because admitting he was Mr. Wrong meant admitting you’d been taken for upwards of 7 years. Taken in by the charm, taken over by the implied promises of someday, and taken down by the realization you weren’t as smart as you thought you were, couldn’t actually protect your own heart, thumping loudly on your sleeve for all to see.
He was the lesson you didn’t know you needed to learn, and truthfully, if you ever saw him again, you would thank him for it. After all, he sent you straight into the arms of Mr. Right.