the 1 | chaennie

15. If This Was A Movie

I know people change and these things happen
But I remember how it was back then
Wrapped up in your arms and our friends were laughing
'Cause nothing like this ever happened to them
Now I'm pacing down the hall, chasing down your street
Flashback to the night when you said to me
"Nothing's gonna change, not for me and you"
Not before I knew how much I had to lose

-

"It was actually a while before I felt fine that first time too. I had this white shirt of hers - this shirt, actually," Rosie said, plucking at the soft fabric of the shirt she wore, just a little too big, with the sleeves rolled up, and her eyes crinkled faintly at the corners as she smiled slightly. "I used to put it on and sit on the floor and it would smell faintly of her, and I'd think about what I'd done wrong. About how I could make her miss me enough to come back. She had my scarf and I had her shirt, and we never gave them back to each other. Eventually the shirt stopped smelling like her."

Gently trailing her fingertips over the front of the shirt, feeling the soft fabric and thinking about all of those times she'd worn it, sitting on the floor and missing Jennie, and wished that she could still smell the hints of sandalwood, bergamot and lotus blossom from the fresh perfume Jennie wore. It reminded Rosie of late nights, out in the dry desert or up in the dusty foothills, the warm breeze ruffling Jennie's hair and sending the scent of it drifting towards her in an intoxicating cloud. She swallowed thickly, before giving Nayeon a wan smile. Her interviewer looked at her with pity, catching Rosie off guard as she sat back in her seat, her stomach twisting uncomfortably as she was reminded once more of how much she was revealing.

Nervously clearing her throat, she ran a hand through her hair, giving herself an even more disheveled look, which she knew would irritate Hyeri to no end, and gripped the arms of her armchair as she squared her shoulders and raised her chin. "I said before that loving her didn't feel like a movie, and it didn't. It was quiet and comforting and warm, just so ... peaceful. But when she left ... I wanted it to be like an old film, or a silly romantic comedy. Because in those films, they always come back. And I knew that I would've taken her back. If she said she was sorry, I would've taken her back in a heartbeat."

"You didn't?"

Rosie quietly chuckled. "No. No, I didn't. Not straight away. Weeks went by and I suffered in silence, too embarrassed to tell my mum that we'd broken up, because she'd warned me that I was making a mistake putting all my faith in a relationship at twenty years old. She'd call and I could tell it was uncomfortable for her to ask about Jennie, but she'd ask anyway, trying in her own way, I suppose, and I couldn't- I couldn't tell her it was over. I lied for weeks . And a part of me lied because I didn't want to believe it was over. But it was, and I was hurt, so, of course, I wrote about it."

"Of course."

"And the more I wrote, the angrier I became. I was still hurt, of course, and, well, my skin has never been quite as thick as I've pretended it was - although I've been forced to toughen up a bit over the years - and so I cried a lot. I'm a hopeless romantic at heart. I've always loved that big, grand idea of love and romance, and I thought I had that with Jennie. So I was completely gutted, and I had to put the pieces back together. And when you're picking up those pieces and looking at how you've been broken, how carelessly your heart has been shattered, it just makes you angry. So I was angry, and the more time that passed, the angrier I became, until I stopped crying and I got on with it, because I'd made the decision to put my career first anyway, and that's what I was going to do."

"Did that help you move on? Focusing on your music?"

Sighing, Rosie shrugged defeatedly, "in a way, I guess, but also, not really. They say that time is the best healer, but I didn't so much as heal but get used to it. And I had no choice but get used to it, because what was my alternative? Not write songs about her? Stamp those feelings down into little boxes and put my career on hold because of one woman? I knew there was another alternative too. I knew it, of course, I did, but I wasn't ready for that."