the road home // josh kiszka

just like honey

chapter song: just like honey-the jesus and mary chain

//

february 2017

-JOSH'S POV- 

"I'm such an idiot." I groan. 

"What'd you do now?" Sam asks, popping his head out of the kitchen. 

"I totally screwed things up with Y/N yesterday." 

He raised his eyebrow, waiting for me to go on with my story. 

"She saw me at the bar with a girl, I had just met her too. God, I can't get the look she gave me out of my head. Then she just left without a word." I shook my head. 

"Did you at least try and talk to her? Clarify things." 

"I did, and she said she's willing to talk but I'm not even sure what to say. Plus with the news, I'm not sure now is a good time."

"You have to tell her, man. You'll regret it if you don't."

"I don't know, man. She has a boyfriend. Besides, I don't actually know her all that well." 

"You know her soul, dude. She has been vulnerable with you so many times. If that's not a tell tale sign of her interest in you, I don't know what is." 

"You think she's interested in me?" I asked, hopeful.

"I'm not sure whether it's romantic or what, but she's definitely interested either way." He shrugged. 

"Okay, I'm going to go talk to her then."

"Best of luck." 

**

I had texted Y/N to meet me at the coffee shop I knew she liked. I wasn't sure exactly what I was going to tell her just yet. There were so many things I wanted to say, but the words seemed to not even exist yet. Did I even have the right to tell her I loved her? Did I love her? I didn't even know. 

I got there earlier than she did, which was what I had been hoping. I needed time, although that was a luxury that I didn't quite have at the moment. In the corner of the coffee shop, I thought I noticed a familiar face. I scanned the shop to see if I was hallucinating, but as it turns out, I wasn't. I spotted Evan sitting in a corner booth, with some other woman, his arm wrapped around her waist. It took everything in me to not go over there and punch that smug look off his face. How could he be with someone else while he was dating Y/N? My thoughts were derailed when the bell on the door of the shop chimed. I had noticed since I had started to really get to know Y/N, and developed feelings for her, I could always sense when she was near me. It was as if every atom in my body was being electrically charged and finding their way over to her. She had the same pull on me as the moon did on the magnificent oceans. 

"Hi." She greeted me. 

There was no emotion coloring her words today, and her eyes were puffy from crying. I felt a pang in my heart, as there was nothing I could do to provide comfort to her right now. We hadn't really been in a situation like this before where the air between us hung heavy, laced with unspoken words. 

"Hey." I said, softly. 

Her eyes were fixed on a point past me, and I knew exactly what she was focused on. Evan. I gave her a sincere look, trying not to make it seem like pity.

"See you around, Y/N." He smirked, as him and the woman he was with exited the coffee shop. 

She returned his comment with a scowl. 

"Y/N." I said gently, redirecting her attention to me. 

She raised an eyebrow. 

"Can I get you a coffee?" I asked, innocently. 

She sighed and leaned into me, trying to steady her breathing that had started picking up. Without thinking, I placed a soft kiss on her head and stroked her hair gently. 

"Come on." I said. 

I linked her arm through mine and walked her over to a booth to sit down. My heart was beating so fast, I needed to step away for a minute. I ordered our coffee and waited until they were ready to return to the booth. I hadn't told Y/N, but the first time we had met at the coffee shop I had made a mental note of her coffee order, just in case. I returned to the booth with our coffee, placing hers in front of her. 

"Its a vanilla latte." I stated. 

"Thank you." She said, barely above a whisper. 

I nodded and slid into the seat across from her. 

"Y/N, I'm really sorry." I said. 

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Josh." She said. 

"Yes, I do. I didn't know what to do when I heard that you were with someone. I felt so lonely. I-"

"Josh, you don't owe me an explanation. I have no right to be disappointed." 

I was silent for a minute, my brain running a mile a minute. 

"Are you though?" 

"Huh?" she asked. 

"Are you disappointed?" 

She nodded slowly. 

My heart was pounding so loud, my ears were practically ringing. I had to tell her. 

"Y/N, I..."

She looked up at me with a blank expression, intrigued but exhausted. 

"I have wanted nothing more than to be with you since the minute you walked into the guitar center." I blurted out. 

"What?" she asked, surprised. 

"It's true. My heart has belonged to you since that moment. You were the only person I wanted to share every joy and every sorrow with. My mind always fluttered back to you. I knew I had no right to be upset when I saw you with Evan, but it took every fiber of my being to not fall apart right in front of you. You're the only person I have thought about every single day for the last year and a half." 

She was silent for a minute, pondering everything I had just thrown at her. 

"Evan broke up with me last night over text. I thought I was going to be more shaken up over it than I was, but the only thing I could think about was how horrible I felt after I saw you with someone else. I knew I had no right. I hadn't even known that I had felt that way about you. You were just Josh. Sweet, lovable. You had always been right in front of me, and I didn't even see it." 

I could help the smile that spread across my face like a wildfire in a forest. 

"So what does this mean for us?" 

"Did we want to give it a shot?" she asked

I raised an eyebrow. I knew exactly what she meant, but I needed to hear her say it. It hadn't felt real yet. 

"Do we want to try dating?" She reiterated, a slight blush appearing on her cheeks. 

"I would love that more than anything, but there's something I need to tell you before we decide." I sighed. 

The news was good, but in this moment, I was going over every moment in my head, wondering if it had been a mistake. It felt like I was destined to be here, with her. 

"Yeah?"

"We got the record deal. I'm leaving school and we're going to Los Angeles for a little while to work on the album, with talk of a small scale upcoming tour."