Under Your Skin | Jude Bellingham

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"Now, Hannah, as your friend, I am going to be completely open and honest with you..." Chloe said once we'd returned home and cosied up on the sofa with a hot drink and a blanket wrapped around us. "What the fuck are you doing?"

"I don't know," I groaned.

"I know you're hurting because of Jude, but Felix doesn't deserve to be lied to. You need to message him and cancel the date."

"Yeah, but Chloe, you didn't see his face. I didn't want to hurt him."

"But Hannah, pretending to like Felix and going on dates with him is going to hurt him a lot more than just telling him you're not interested in him as anything more than a friend."

I sighed. She was right. Chloe was always right.

"I think I might've pissed Jude off as well," I said sadly. "I started interrogating him about Grace, and I don't think he liked that."

"So when did you realise you had feelings for Jude?" Chloe asked gently. "Last time I checked, it was Trent you wanted."

"I thought so too. It was only last night that I realised how I really felt about Jude. I think I've liked him for a while — I was just in denial about it."

"Are you going to tell him how you feel?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because he obviously doesn't feel the same if he's getting back with Grace!" I explained.

"You don't know that, Hannah."

"I do. And telling him how I feel would just make things awkward between us. I don't want to lose Jude. My life wouldn't be the same without him
in it."

Chloe gave a slight smile. "And to think that when you came here, you still hated his guts," she said.

"Funny how things change, I guess."

"Well, look, don't give up on Jude just yet. I still think you should talk to him about how you feel. In the meantime, make sure you end things with Felix before the situation gets worse."

"Okay," I sighed. I knew that telling Felix the truth was going to be extremely difficult to do, but it had to be done. He didn't deserve to be mistreated.

* * *

I tried to tell Felix the truth, but every time I composed a message or tried to tell him face to face, the words just wouldn't come out, and I ended up changing the subject. He was getting more and more
excited about the date we'd arranged, and Chloe was getting more and more frustrated with me, and understandably so. I lay awake in bed the night before the date, praying that a miracle would happen and I'd see Felix and start falling for him instead of Jude. Unfortunately, life wasn't at all that easy. I'd gotten myself into this mess, and it was up to me to get myself out of it, yet I was too much of a coward to open my mouth.

I figured that going on one date wouldn't do any harm. I'd go, have a nice time, and then tell
Felix that I'd enjoyed his company but didn't see the relationship going any further.

I reluctantly got out of bed and headed downstairs, craving one of Jude's signature hot chocolates. When we'd become friends, and whenever he stayed the night at our house, he'd always make me one if I couldn't sleep. We'd end up chatting for hours, and on one occasion, Jude had carried me up to my room after I'd fallen asleep mid-conversation on the sofa downstairs.

Perhaps Jude and I were in sync because, sure enough, when I entered the kitchen, he was sitting on one of the barstools, scrolling through his phone. He briefly looked upwards to see me standing there but said nothing. "Hey," I said anyway, trying to break the ice. It'd been five days since the party, and we hadn't spoken to each other since. "Can't sleep?" I added, trying to make conversation.