| torn up

~ chapter 36 ☁️

I'll admit it takes me a while to even force myself to get up to leave the garden after that.

For a second, I wonder if I'm somehow dreaming, or rather having a a nightmare. Because this is not the way it's supposed to go. Mason was not supposed to have just almost kissed me like that just to have run away at the last second. But when I pinch myself a second later only to wince when I feel the weak sting of it upon my skin, I find myself bitterly laughing at possibly having ever thought this could all just be a horrible dream gone wrong.

I've had lots of dreams about Mason and I, many of them did end up with us kissing but not one of them has ever ended as pathetically as tonight has. After I force myself to accept what has just happened, I find myself almost wanting to burst into tears as I try to make up excuses for Mason and what could have possibly led to him ditching me the way he had.

But I can't think of even a single one.

He clearly wanted to kiss me, didn't he? He was the one who had initiated it, he was the one who kept complimenting and fawning over me beforehand so why hadn't he gone through with it?

I know I could sit here for hours upon hours, trying to justify his behaviour but deep down, I know it isn't worth it. Something clearly stopped him from kissing me tonight and the only way I'll get to the truth is by hearing it from his mouth himself. And yet I still can't encourage myself to get up and find him to question him. And at this point, I don't think I could even really face him at all.

If I was Piper, I wouldn't have even let him get away. I would have grabbed him and questioned him there on the spot. But I'm not Piper, am I? I'm just little, boring, invisible Willow Allen who can't even get a kiss from her crush she so seemingly repulses him that much. Because that's really the truth, isn't it?How quickly he had pulled away and how standoffish he had acted straight after, anyone would have thought my touch had the potential of burning him.

I know there's no point, sitting here and feeling sorry for myself. I'll end up leaving just as gloomy as I would had I left a while back, probably just more cold really. And yet that doesn't stop me from doing exactly that.

The possibility of having to see him after tonight has me feeling physically sick. I know I can't go back to acting normal around him, acting the way we did before with the memory of tonight and how cruelly he had rejected me like that. Would he try to act normal, as if nothing had happened? Or would he actually try to find me and explain to me what exactly had been going through his head for him to behave the way he did? I can't decide which one sounds worse at the moment, all I know is that eventually we're probably going to have this out and I'm not looking forward to it at all to say the least.

By the time I eventually get up and head back towards the house, I don't know long I've been out here. But I am aware my skin has gone numb from the cold, I've been sitting there so long. In a weird way, it's almost oddly comforting as it distracts me a little from the pain in my heart. Unfortunately, it doesn't provide a massive distraction though, something which is evident from the amount of moisture in my eyes.

I refuse to let myself cry over what just happened, and I don't. Not technically, although I do lose track of the amount of times I have to blink to stop any tears from escaping my eyes. I hate being this sensitive, but every time I think back to that moment, I just want the ground below me to disappear because of how suddenly heavy my heart feels in my chest.

Taking a breath to recompose myself as I eventually find myself standing at the backdoor to the house, I pray that I don't bump into Mason who is most probably somewhere in there partying. Making my mind up, I open the door and quickly push my way through the crowds, not even looking up in fear  I'll recognise someone. It's not that I look a mess or that I'm that sad anymore, faking a smile right now probably wouldn't prove too hard. I just don't really feel in the mood to have to make small talk with anyone right now. Which is why I continue hurrying through the house until I finally am outside again, this time however standing on the front lawn.