love came calling, twice // olly murs

6.

He gave a disgusted chuckle, bringing the drink to his lips before swigging down nearly half. "Turns out, he was still seeing her. Turns out, he had lied to me and was still lying to you and he had never told you. When I confronted him about it, he told me he would break things off with you," Amelia gave a gasp of pain and Olly winced. "He told me he knew it was unfair and wrong to you and that he was going to let you go. But he didn't. Instead, he proposed."

Olly stood in the kitchen of his the house, eating Oreo cookies out of the bag and chasing them with milk. Rubbing his hand over his face, he sighed. It had been a long day.

Tom had proposed to Amelia at a barbeque thrown by Taylor Jones, in front of all their friends and Olly had left the festivities right after that. Most assumed it was because he was completely upset with the thought that his best friend was actually making the ultimate commitment to a girl Olly hated. That wasn't entirely the case. Ever since the phone had rang three weeks ago, Olly had been waiting for the moment that the news that Tom had broken up with Amelia dropped.

Instead he was there to witness their proposal. Licking the filling off of an Oreo, he tossed it in his mouth, hoping the sweet taste would get rid of the bitter one that had lingered there since Tom got down on one knee.

Hearing footsteps behind him, he glanced over his shoulder and stiffened when he saw who it was. He scoffed and shoved another cookie in his mouth.

"What are you doing here?" he said in between bites. "Shouldn't you be at home? Celebrating or some shit?"

Tom shrugged, patting the top of his perfectly coiffed black hair. "I just had some stuff I wanted to grab from my room." He looked at Olly before clearing his throat. "Not happy to see me?"

Olly turned his back to Tom, grabbing his glass of milk and downing it. Wiping his mouth on his sleeve, he dug his palms into the counter top and leant his weight against it. "You're a son of a bitch, you know that?" Olly asked quietly and Tom didn't respond.

"I know," he admitted, swinging his car keys around his finger. "Please try and understand why I did it Olly."

"Did what, exactly?" Olly turned to face him now. "Cheated on Amelia? Lied to me about telling her? Said you were going to break up with her and then deciding to propose to her instead? Sorry, Tom, I don't think you can explain any of that."

Tom looked at him pleadingly. "I can't hurt her, Olly. I can't. I can't hurt either of them."

"Do you love her?" Olly asked suddenly and Tom's gaze flickered to the ground. When he didn't respond, Olly laughed bitterly and folded up the bag of Oreos, getting ready to leave the room.

As his foot was on the first step of the staircase, Tom called out to him.

"Why do you care, Olly?" The man said, his voice low and frustrated. "Why won't you let me deal with my own faults?"

Olly gripped the banister, trying to restrain himself. "Because you dragged me into this time and time again, Tom. You've lied, time and time again. You can't face your own faults and you don't seem to understand that by flipping proposing to that woman, you're hurting her more than you ever would if you were honest with her."

"You didn't answer my question," Tom said, folding his arms. "Why the flip do you care what I do with my life? What I do with Amelia? You two can't even be in the same room together."

Olly looked him straight in the eye then and he saw Tom flinch. "You know perfectly well why, Tom." He turned and began to walk up the stairs. "Now leave before I say something that causes us not to talk for a month again."

"Will you be at the wedding?" Tom called out to him and Olly winced.

"Yes," he responded. "But not for you."