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thirty-five:: when he's not like the others.

[Ten Responses to the Phrase "Man-Up" by Guante]

when there's not even two weeks left of school yet i just officially met a cute, poetic and woke, boy -that i've been crushing on for like a year- who's literally moving to the other side of the US for college. he called me creative and pretty and complimented my art and he's leaving... on the bright side, he seems to like me and texts back really fast so...

anyways here's the next chapter, hella long because i was in my feelings at the time.

THIRTY-FIVE: when he's not like the others.

A few days sleeping without Paul and I'd been missing him... A lot. A lot to where I could see him in everything; the controller to my video game would feel too small in my hands and I'd been craving his. The brown of the couch when I was doing homework would start to resemble the color of Paul's eyes and the white of our pillows, the brightness of his smile.

With a certain curly haired angel on my mind, I'd been struggling to focus on my French homework, my eyes not distinguishing the difference between Est-ce que and Quest-ce. My mind was done conjugating and more focused on when I could see him.

I chewed on my pen, a bad habit I'd had, as I leaned back on the couch I was nestled in. Normally, I'd have been in my room at that time... It was around six thirty and I knew my father would be pulling up any minute now, I didn't want to talk to him. Something was different that day, I'd been so caught up daydreaming about Paul's perfect brown eyes that I wasn't even aware of when Dad's car pulled up outside, only to jump out of my skin when the door shut.

He did a double take when he'd seen me on the couch, probably because he'd noticed the lengths I was going to to avoid him: saying I wasn't hungry at dinner time only to sneak downstairs hours later and eat, going straight upstairs after school, and leaving the living room when his car pulled up.

My father had gotten used to the lack of my presence so when his eyes had met mine, he couldn't help but stare. When he'd established that I was there, he didn't avert his gaze but instead a soft smile cracked into his stony expression,enough that you could still clearly see his exhaustion and he ripped off his suit jacket, throwing it across the loveseat.

His green eyes were centered on me and I quickly looked down, hoping he'd just exit to his room and leave me alone and without a lecture.

"I... I didn't think you'd be down here."

I shrugged.

Placing his briefcase on the table, he popped open the latches before sitting down, far enough to be comfortable and he started taking papers out. Within the stack, I could clearly see his signature on divorce papers and he quickly tried to hide it. When it was obvious I'd seen, his smile dropped and he tried to form words, my hands instinctively going to pack up my homework.

"Julian..." I didn't stop, zipping up my backpack with shaky hands and going to stand but his hand gripped my forearm. Whipping my head over to meet his eyes, I could see the tears building, "I can't stay with her when she hurts you guys. I support you and the moment she kicked you out, I knew I had to do this."

But that was it, I didn't want it to be about me. It was always about me nowadays and I hated that. My throat was closing and my emotions weighed heavy on my shoulders. "Don't divorce her because of me!" I'd croaked out before I could stop myself, my head shaking and my words cracking and my eyes unfocused as he tried to stop me.