"You're actually upset right now? Look at everything the world has given you, Luke."
"And that's great, but I'd rather have you."
• the story before "count on me" by sircalyum • book 1
// smut included //
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WEDNESDAY EVENING. It was half past six in the evening and I was sitting on the couch, a bowl of popcorn in my lap. I mindlessly ate piece after piece as I loosely listened to what Madalyn was telling me about Howie. Apparently, they were in a fight over something Howie had said—Madalyn wasn't telling me specifics—but they got into fights like this that lasted a couple of days every three months or so.
"Sometimes I just wonder if I'm keeping myself from something better." I froze just before plopping another piece of popcorn into my mouth; Madalyn had never said such a thing regarding Howie. I looked over at her slowly with my brows furrowed and she sighed heavily before hugging a pillow into her chest.
"What?" I asked, wanting her to repeat what she had just said.
"I love Howie—that's not a concern here, it's just... fuck, I don't know. We've grown up together... what if we start to grow apart in the next couple of years? What if we're sort of doomed? I mean, is Howie really going to be the person I spend the rest of my life with?" My jaw dropped as I continued to listen to Madalyn speak, only because of the number of times I had heard her talk about how she couldn't imagine spending her life with anyone else. "Please don't look at me like that, Jo. I honestly need to talk this out."
"I'm sorry—this is just really shocking, Mads."
"It's not like I want us to break up or something! I'm just talking hypothetically." Madalyn groaned before she covered her face with the pillow in her hands.
"You were saying that you wanted to spend the rest of your life with him last week, Mads. He can send you a picture of him in a new shirt he bought, and your go-to reaction is 'he's really mine forever, huh?'. You're obsessed with him and he's so obsessed with you... if he's not it for you, then I don't believe in love." Madalyn had uncovered her face by the time I finished and her lips curled into a smile. "What in the world got you thinking about this? What did he do?"
"He wants me to move in," Madalyn blurted out her words, and my lips parted ever so slightly. "We're in a fight because I basically told him I didn't think it was the best time to."
"I'm not totally following, Maddy. Why wouldn't you want to?"
"Because of... you," Madalyn said before biting her lip gently. My heart sank at her words and my stomach began to swell with some sort of anxiety. "That sounds dumb, I know... but I don't want to end this journey with you so soon, and I don't want to leave you on your own."
"Madalyn... we've been living together for two years. You have to let me go at some point," I told her, even though the thought of not living together anymore made me incredibly sad. Living alone made me even sadder, but I would never hold Madalyn back from something like this.
