"What... What's going on?" Ryan asks. The way Ryan's looking at us with an open mouth and questioning eyes, it's as though Levi and I have just been caught red-handed in the midst of a crime scene. It feels like that too.

A feeling of dread churns through my stomach and makes everything turn cold; the feeling has a stronger impact due to the sudden shortness of breath I'm feeling. It all feels horribly familiar, the impending feeling of something awful- the panic that surrounds it...

I urge myself to take deep breaths and keep calm. Yes, I've just been seen hugging Levi by Ryan, but it was platonic. It was just friendly.

I force this idea into my head try and begin to explain myself. "I... Nothing's going on-"

"Is this what I think it is?" Ryan interrupts, his eyes flitting between Levi and I. My heart begins thudding erratically at his increased suspicion.

"No!" I cry. "I swear it isn't-"

"What the hell were you two doing, then?" Ryan demands and I turn quiet with shock. I've never seen him like this; he's never lost his cool so quickly. Ryan stares at Levi and I accusingly, his gaze cold and hard and anything but trustworthy. "Why did you just come home with him?"

"Nothing happened," Levi intervenes, taking a step forward and speaking the words I'm finding so difficult to say.

Ryan's eyes narrows as his words fill the air and the surrounding air feels tighter, as if our atmosphere's increased in pressure. "I didn't ask you," Ryan states quietly, his voice sounding startlingly dangerous, "I'm talking to her." I flinch at the way he says the pronoun, he's never spoken to or about me like this. I can't even remember a time his voice was so icy.

"You don't seem to be listening to Ruby- she's already said nothing's happened," Levi says and I can't decide if I want to tell him to stop interfering or if I'm grateful he's defending me. I lean towards the latter.

"Are you speaking for my girlfriend?" Ryan asks, his voice taking on a whole different tone, its decibels drop and the quiet, slow quality of it sounds... menacing.

"What if I am?" Levi asks and I notice him straightening, drawing himself up to his full height as his jaw clenches. His voice too has changed; it now has a sharp edge to it and the air's still, as though it's waiting for something to happen.

"Ryan," I say, stepping closer toward him, I don't know if it's in an attempt to console him or to try and come in between the sudden aggressive stiffness between the two young men before me. "Don't get mad-"

"I want you to listen," Ryan says, stabbing a finger in Levi's direction and ignoring me. "I'm already pissed- you just drove my girlfriend home from God knows where and I want answers-"

"Maybe it's you who should be listening, mate," Levi says, the last word ringing with contempt and making it sound like an insult rather than a term for a friend, "we've both said nothing happened."

Ryan's fists ball up and he knocks me aside as he comes to stand nearer to Levi in an attempt to intimidate him. "I'm not your mate," he spits angrily.

Levi laughs mockingly. His posture is strained and tense and I realise with a rush of alarm that it looks as though he's ready to start a fight. "That's lucky for me-"

"Stop it!" I cry, staring at them both. Ryan's face has flushed a blotchy red and he looks just as ready to throw a punch and I can't comprehend why. I get he's angry but this is going completely beyond anything I was expecting.

Levi exhales heavily before looking away from Ryan at me. He swallows and I see his stance relax a little. He opens his mouth to say something but I get there first, "I think you should leave." I voice the decision before I've even really thought of it but that doesn't detract from the sense of it. I need to explain things to Ryan and Levi's presence is going to make that impossible.

Levi looks down at me in surprise before the expression's taken over by something impassive. Even though he appears unaffected I notice a glint of hurt in his eyes. He regards me for a second longer, as if waiting for anything else I might have to say. After being met with silence Levi nods slightly.

"Alright," he says emptily, and all the previous anger's left his voice. I still don't know how he can switch to being calm so easily but that idea's pushed aside by the guilt I feel as I watch him turn around and stride to his car. He drives away without giving so much as a second glance.

I try and ignore the sudden emptiness that occupies my insides. I want to go on staring after Levi, but I can't. I turn back towards Ryan and though I feel a little more exposed without Levi by my side, I swallow hard, determined to get him to listen.

I take a deep breath. "We just went out and he drove me back, that's all," I say. Each word sounds wrong, they're unsteady and clumsy-sounding and Ryan doesn't fail to notice it.

"You just 'went out'?" he scoffs, completely incredulous. He drags a hand through his hair and scrutinises me with his sharp, blue eyes. "Usually I wouldn't be getting so mad but for fuck's sake... I can't be taken for an idiot anymore."

I struggle to completely comprehend his words. "What... What do you mean?"

Ryan sighs and his anger appears to subside a little, it's replaced by something which is worse to view. Hurt. "I've seen you with him one too many times," he says.

"We're just friends," I say, my voice quiet compared to his steady one. Even that statement sounds like a lie, it holds some truth but it shouldn't, not when Ryan thinks the opposite. There's something else about it, something about stating that Levi and I are friends that sounds inherently wrong...

"You told me you didn't even know him," Ryan replies, shaking his head and appearing more hopeless.

"That was then-"

"And what's changed?" he asks, frustration quickly returning back into his voice. "What's suddenly made the two of you best chums?"

I try and think of an answer but come up with none. I can't answer how Levi's gone from being a virtual stranger to so much more. I've barely just got my head round him just being there.

"Nothing happened," I whisper, the words are all I can think of, they're all I'm desperate to say.

"That hug didn't look like nothing," Ryan says, and while he sounds contemptuous his expression abruptly softens into something sadder- his mouth tugs into a frown and his eyes look down to the ground. "I can't actually remember the last time you hugged me like that, you haven't come near me- not at all these past few weeks."

Guilt is sent gushing through me, sending nausea to churn the contents of my stomach around. "Please, just listen-"

"You know, sometimes I think what have I done wrong?" Ryan continues, still ignoring me. If this feeling of worry wasn't so strong, I probably would've begun to feel angry at how keeps cutting me short. But I can't feel frustration, not when this whole mess is because of me.

"You haven't done anything wrong," I say, hating myself for fucking things up so badly. Things were great with Ryan; they were brilliant until that goddamned day the files were mixed up and every day since.

Ryan sighs and looks me straight in the eye. "I know I haven't," he says and my face flushes at how he so easily shoots down my effort to console him. "At least now I do. Now everything seems to make sense."

"I don't understand," I say, shaking my head- what makes sense?

"You don't think I haven't noticed anything?" Ryan demands, looking pained. "You don't think I haven't seen how distant you've been- how you're always with him?"

"I-"

"Whenever you're around me you always seem distracted, you seem like you're looking out for someone else, waiting for someone else. I guess I convinced myself that I was just imagining it but seeing the pair of you today," he stops to cast a wistful smile that makes my stomach tighten further, "I guess I've been right all along."

"No," I immediately say, refusing to let him insinuate that Levi and I together.

"You keep saying nothing happened," Ryan says, losing his smile.

"It didn't-"

"Then answer me this," he orders and I still, my muscles tensing as I wait for a question that'll decide everything. "Has something happened?"

I want to close my eyes as silence drifts between us, serving as an answer itself. Tears prick my eyes as I realise that this is the moment when everything catches up with me, when the lies come to an end and so does everything else with Ryan.

I understand that there's nothing else I can do but to just admit it.

"Yes," I eventually breathe- the word barely more than air escaping my mouth.

Ryan recoils backward like I've just hurt him physically. He stares at me in silence for a moment, in quiet, pained shock before he manages to open his mouth, his voice barely louder than mine,

"When?"

I drag in a breath, unable to say everything but capable of answering him. "In November," I manage to say and Ryan flinches, like I've struck him again. "But it was nothing; honestly, it wasn't even a kiss- I didn't mean anything-"

"Well at least now I know when everything turned to shit," he says quietly and the panic properly begins to set in when I hear the disgust in his voice.

"Please," I say, hating how defenceless I sound. "I'm so sorry-"

"I don't want to hear anything else," Ryan says, the revulsion as evident as ever. "I can't even believe you'd do something like that."

I'm unable to think of anything to say, there's nothing I can do to take away the expression on Ryan's face that feels like he's looking at me properly for the first time, truly seeing what I am. It breaks my heart.

He swallows before giving an sad smile. "All this time I was in a competition I didn't realise I was in,"

I'm humiliated to notice that I've started crying, hot tears slide down my cheeks and I don't want to face the fact that it's because of me that he's standing here, looking so dejected and betrayed.

"I'm sorry-"

"I don't think I need to say it's over," Ryan says, sounding far too final. He gives me one last look that feels as though it pierces through me; it's a fusion of upset, anger and disappointment and it freezes me to the spot. I watch through blurred vision as Ryan turns his back on me before storming off to his car that I hadn't even noticed was parked right outside the house.

I can't even say a word or take a step toward Ryan in protest as he gets into the car, barely taking more than a few seconds to get the ignition going. He drives off at a speed barely beneath the speed limit and it doesn't take more than a minute to lose sight of him.

The first thing I can apprehend is the shock I'm feeling. Everything's imploded so quickly and effortlessly it feels like our relationship was a house of cards that has collapsed from a nudge of someone's hand. I drag a hand across my face, shoving the tears away from beneath my eyes but not becoming any calmer. My breath's just as shaky and my fingers have begun trembling.

The front door swings open and Granddad appears on the steps, he peers down at me, his expression a picture of concern.

"Ruby?" he asks, evidently anxious, "I heard... Is everything alright?"

I can't answer him. I rush up to the house and into it, distractedly thinking of how I need some water to calm myself down. I hurry to kitchen and reach for a glass, barely focusing on what I'm doing- my thoughts are simply consumed with the knowledge of how I've fucked everything up, how I can't blame anyone, not even Levi, for making everything go to shit.

"Ruby?" I hear Granddad's voice at the door. It sounds tentative and the unfamiliarity of hearing hesitance in Granddad's voice has me turning to face him. I plaster on a watery smile.

"Yeah?" I ask, embarrassed at how thick my voice sounds.

Granddad's quiet for a moment, as if deciding what to say. "I'm not very good at all this," he begins slowly whilst rubbing his bristly chin and looking at me apologetically. "But that's not the point. Do, do you... want to tell me what's happened?"

I slouch against the kitchen counter, wishing I could bear all my problems onto it instead of my weight. "I've ruined everything with Ryan," I say, my voice wavering.

I watch Granddad try and remember who Ryan is as he furrows his thick, white eyebrows. "That boy you're with?"

I nod and in fragmented sentences that barely make sense, I try and explain some of what's just happened. How things have been going wrong between Ryan and I for months, how I've been a shit girlfriend and how all this shouldn't have happened.

Granddad merely sits, listening. I notice a little apprehension surrounding him; he's never had to deal with this kind of thing before, not when Dad is his only child. Even then, he's listening hard, evidently trying hard to review the situation and come up with something right to say.

"I need to fix this, Granddad," I say, finishing badly explaining everything. "I need to make it right-"

"Do you, love?" he asks gently. I blink in surprise at his response, not expecting it to be what he'd reply with. 'Of course I have to fix things,' I think. I don't get the chance to think of just why I have to because then Granddad continues, his voice soothing and steady, "Sometimes, even if it's just for a little while, it's best to leave things be."

Deep down, I think I understand what he's saying but right now, I don't want to. There's nothing I can think of but just amending things with Ryan, making things right with him and reverting everything as it was before.

Granddad nods towards the ugly plant that was gifted to him. In the past few days Evie had decided she did still love the plant and had tried to revive it with jugs full of water- all it's done is make the brown, lifeless leaves rest in a pool of muddy water.

"Sometimes," Granddad says, "it's just not worth watering a dead plant."