Listen to "Let somebody go" by coldplay ft Selena Gomez

"Scientist" by coldplay

"James?"

With a wide-eyed gaze I stared at him from the open wooden door.

He was standing before me, those eyes, they are just as I remember them, only dimmer than ever as they casted a shadow while he looked at me. His face, it was still the same, after all, it's only been two months. God, it feels long ago.

"I see you weren't expecting me, as always."

I was completely tongue tied, I didn't know what to do. I didn't understand why my feet were glued to the floor, or why my eyes were ever fixed on him, or why I couldn't comprehend anything other than James was standing infront of me, by the porch, and holding roses in his hands. With stiffness in his features.

"Betty......I'm here on your door step and I planned it out for weeks now, but, it's finally sinking in. And it's taken forever for me to realise that I want you in my life and it's taken me even longer to say it but this would be the last time I can dream about what happens when I see your face again. I know I let you down, and I know I'm probably the reason you left New York, but the only thing I want to do is make it up to you."

There was sincerity in every letter of every word from him, but I won't deny the fact that James looked rather..... Scared, and I couldn't decipher the worry in his eyes as he waited for me to speak.

But I didn't say a word. There was a painful knot growing at the back of my throat and it overwhelmed me. So Instead, I proceeded to shut the door with trembling hands. I wasn't sure whether I was even ready to face him and I hated the way my body was shaken.

James stopped me. "Please, give me five minutes." The way his gaze burned through me, I wanted to look away, I really did, but I don't know why I let that door open again. May be it was because I needed some kind of closure.

I forced myself to speak, keeping my voice as collected and controlled as possible. "I gave you time, months.... third, forth and hundred chances, I was always right there. What more of my time do you wish to waste? For how long do you want to keep on using me? You should leave James, I've moved on and I have a happy life here."

Speaking shouldn't be this hard, it's like I couldn't breathe.

If regret was a colour, then its painted on every inch of James's face as he heard me address him for the first time in months. And not by a language he preferred to hear.

"I never wanted to use you." His voice was gentle.

I averted my gaze from his disappointed face, and spoke with an even calmer tone. "That doesn't matter anymore, there is nothing you can do or say that will buy you more time with me. These few minutes were all you had. And they are all you'd ever get."

"Is it because you found somebody else?. Was that all I meant to you, replaceable?" He dared to question.

"That was what I meant to you, James, don't turn this around. I left New York, met someone, built a relationship and swore to never look back. Don't forget that you were never mine, you never wanted to be mine, you never wanted anything more with me."

He grew grim, "Do you love him?"

"How did you find me?" I asked instead. "Who told you I was here?"

"Doesn't matter now." He rephrased. "Come back with me."

I doubled back, baffled, trying to unravel where in the world did James even get the nerve. "And then what? Go back to normal. The normal where I'm your lover, where I'm the other woman?..... Please just stop James. Aren't you tired of never settling down?"

"We can be together this time. We can be more than a secret affair. We.could.even.settle.down."

I exhaled, "W-what?"

"You want more, right?! We can have more. We can have it all. I know you loved me, and I'm sure you still....."

"Betty..." I heard Enos exclaiming from the backyard and I took a step back. Moving further away from James after remembering that the man I currently adore was just on the other side of the house. "I'll be right back." With Enos is where I belong.

"Get out, I already have it all with someone else. There is nothing more you can give me that I do not already have."

James took a step forward, leaning over the edge, "I can see it in your eyes that you don't have it all. I know there's something missing and those eyes never tell me lies."

"Shut the fuck up."

"You don't love him." James said.

I pointed at him, "You don't know anything James."

He wasn't giving up. "I might not know anything, but I know I miss you."

He managed to stroke my pulse. "Well you're too late. Whatever you have to offer I do not want it."

James shuttered the roses to ground in a fit. "Bullshit. That's bullshit. The Betty I know would never fall in love with someone else that quickly."

"I'm not the same naive love sick puppy you knew. Its refreshing to see that you can't stand the idea of me moving on with a man who actually loves me."

James placed both his hands on the door frames and stood face to face with me, he was getting pissed, I could see it, "He might love you now but that heart of yours already belongs to me. You were meant to be with me and nobody else."

Something quivered inside my chest as James looked straight into my soul. Now more than ever my heart was pounding painfully. "You are so full of yourself, an arrogant son of bitch. What makes you so fucking confident that I was even ever In love with you?"

"William told me."

I froze. "William?!!!"

"He opened my eyes actually. The reason this relationship of yours won't ever work out Betty, Is the same reason why the relationship that you had with Callum ended. You can't love anyone else but me."

"There is something seriously wrong with you." I announced. I was angry then. I was really angry. I was so angry I could cry. "You are unbelievable. You think that you can just show up in my life whenever you want and reverse everything. You think that I'm some sort of trophy given to you by the forces above. You are delusional."

James run his fingers over his black silky hair. "Not really, I'm just less oblivious than you are. You can't deny it any longer Elisabeth, you still love me. So put down this act of yours and come back home with me."

Home? I wondered if James meant what he meant to mean. I wondered if he actually believed that he was my home. And to think he'd even assume such a thing shocked me. "What are you talking about? Do you even here yourself?"

"I spent months searching, I'm not going back to New York without you. Whatever lies you've been feeding yourself that have made you move-in with this guy and his father need to end now."

"That guy...he is my boyfriend."

I'm certain James was seeing black. He was affected by my words and his jaw hardened . I never saw him acting this way, he seemed so desperate to have me back. He spent months..... he claims he spent months thinking about seeing me again.

"What did you mean by wanting it all with me?" I inquired. "Why are you doing this? Why can't you accept the fact that the affair we had was over a long time ago? What is this even about?"

"You are safer with me."

What!!!

"I'm always hurting with you," I exclaimed with a bitterness, remembering the emotional wreck he turned me too. "The pain of knowing you would always go back in Merissa's arms, the idea that I was only ever going to be your dirty secret, the trouble you caused with Callum, you pushed me into doing things I never thought of doing. And not to mention that I was on the other end of Merissa's anger, she took it all out on me. You were never held accountable, I was punished for both our sins. I was always the one suffering in the end. I paid the price for the both of us, James. You made me miserable. I lost my best friend, I lost my mind and I lost my love for New York." I was strongly holding back the tears.

James clenched his fists, he knew I was right. I could see something in his expression, may be I mistook it for guilt, pain, anger or sadness. But there was something lurking there, even in his voice. "The worst thing I ever did was what I did to you. Let me correct this."

"I'm not asking you to fix anything. All I want is for you to leave me be. I can't love you in the dark, not anymore."

"You don't have to love me in the dark, things won't be the same as before Elisabeth." He tried to reach for my hand but I drew it back, shaking my head. He frowned, probably hating the distance I created.

"It's over James. You need to let me go."

He said nothing after that and a silence fell. I could hear him breathing, I could hear the way he tapped his fingers on the door frame, he was drawing my face with his green eyes, mapping everything closely. "You are still so beautiful."

"James...."

"And you look so much healthier now, brighter, lively, you're hair is longer too."

I exhaled, knowing that my heart was always going to betray everything else that made sense. "They are waiting for me out there." I reminded him. "I don't want Enos to find you here. I can't deal with that."

"You must really care about what he thinks. Does he even know we are meant to be together?!"

I corrected him again. "You can't decide on things like fate or the future or destiny James. It's not in anyone's ability."

"But you love me." He shot and ceiled the bullet. "What other proof do you need to understand that you don't belong with that man?"

I fired back, "You want me to abandon everything and everyone, all my plans, the progress that I have made, because I love you but at the same time you don't and won't ever love me back. You don't even love me James." At that point, I was sure the tears weren't staying under. "Tell me if that isn't gaslighting? How can you be so selfish?"

James was quick to lean in and wipe the tears from my cheeks. "I'm sorry."

I pushed his hands away. "Do not touch me."

I saw the pain in his eyes as I pulled further from his embrace. "If you really care about me then you'd leave me alone. I can't go through that shit again with you. I won't be able to."

I wiped my own tears.

"There's a man waiting for me, and he actually loves me. If you really give a damn about me, then you'd want me to receive some type of love in my life."

He was quiet for some time and then he spoke again, with a wave of frustration. "God damn it, Elisabeth, I want to love you. I really want to love you as you deserve."

"BUT THEN YOU CAN'T." I finished, feeling a familiar ache in my soul. "You aren't capable of that and you know it. I know it too. What are you even doing here?"

I don't understand where he is going with this. What is he doing at this house if he doesn't feel anything for me? If he doesn't even love me?! Has he gone mad.

"Betty, you are the only person in my entire life that has made me feel anything remotely close to love in years. When I'm anywhere near you that's the second I feel something other than motivation. That's the only moment I actually want to be happy, that I slightly believe I'm not an hopeless case. That may be I won't be this empty shell forever." I felt his walls slowly tumbling down for the very first time since I'd met this man. He sounded like somebody else. He sounded almost like the ghost of an honest version of himself.

James had just taken his guard down and he instantly realised it because he shifted his eyes from mine. "Let me try to love you back."

"I don't understand what you're asking of me."

"May be I have feelings for you. May be I believe we can be something bigger than this mayhem." He sounded indecisive, uncertain of whether he was saying the right things and that made me realise we are far from ever making anything work.

"I can't." It was hard to swallow. "I can't do this James. I can NOT do this." Even after the things he just said. It's too late.

"I'm the one who can not lose you." He said.

I shouldn't even be listening to him nor having this conversation. There is simply no point in any of this.

"May be you already have lost me." I revealed. "A heart can only take so much and you've put me through some hard times."

He instantly interjected, "I'm not the bad guy in this story Elisabeth. I never meant to hurt you. Quite the contrary, I've only ever wanted to keep you safe. Don't turn me into the villain."

And I'm aware of the good he has done for me. I'm not ungrateful to forget that he helped my mother, she is free from prison because of James. I got out of that strip club because of James. He cleaned my wounds both times. But I've been hurt more by him than been saved. He might not be the bad guy in this story, but he is not the good either.

I've been abandoned often than not by so many people and I can't keep exposing myself to heart break. And With James, everything is a risk.

"I feel like in this life my heart has cared so much about others but it has been less cared about. Enos has been my remedy and I owe him more than you think. Sure, perhaps there's still some part of me that might actually still love you, but Enos deserves my love. You wasted what we could've been."

He held my wrist before I could even stop him and pulled me closer, I couldn't help but look up at his face, he even smelled the same. I was getting nostalgic. He spoke above my lips softly, "If you had told me that you felt that way for me from the very beginning, Betty, then..."

I stared at him, "Then what James? You made it clear from the start that love wasn't in your vocabulary. What else was I to do?"

He held my cheek with his other hand. "We can have a future."

"But not with each other." I corrected. The hand he wrapped on my wrist was holding me much strongly. "Please don't say that. We still have a chance." He was pleading now, something I never thought he'd do.

"Your grip is too tight." I alerted him. James was practically squeezing my wrist and he wasn't letting go.

"Come with me." He pulled on it.

My skin paled, worry closing in. I tried to remain by the door knowing that if James wanted to carry me out of here, I wasn't as strong. "James stop.." I warned. "I'm not going anywhere with you." I drew his hand from my cheek.

He didn't back down. "What kind of life do you even have here? You'll eventually need to return."

"But not with you." I affirmed. "Let me go." I was beginning to panic. "You can't just drag me with you this way."

James furrowed his brows, almost as though confused. He let my hand go immediately. Taking a step back. Did something get over him?

"Sorry, that wasn't what I intended to do."

I looked down on my wrist, rubbing it with my palm.

"Did I hurt you?" He sounded weary.

"I'm fine."

"My relationship with Merissa was never serious and she knew that. It wasn't even a relationship to begin with. And when you came along I rarely thought of her. I was going to end it eventually but I guess the timing wasn't right and you were already with Callum when I ended it."

I wasn't sure on what to say to that confession. "It's in the past. I don't really care about any of that now." I told him.

James wasn't happy to hear that. "I just want you to know that all the days I spent with her, I though of you all night long. You meant something to me, and you still mean more to me." He assured.

I can't keep hearing this. Not after having wanted to hear him say those words for so long.

"I never felt anything for Merissa or any other woman. It was an arrangement."

"It was an arrangement with me too, or did you forget?" I questioned seriously.

"What we had wasn't the same and you know it." He insisted. "C'mon, would I be here in Tennessee searching for you if what we had was just a fling? Would I be flying across the country waiting to lay eyes on that beautiful face if you didn't mean anything to me?"

I needed to be strong. I couldn't afford to make the same mistake twice.

"I don't know anymore. All I know is that we can't be together."

May be what I said triggered James, or he finally realised that he couldn't have me, but he turned around, stepped on the roses along the way, went to his Maserati in a rush, looked at me for one last time with hurt in his ever green eyes as I stared back at him with confusion, and then he just drove off, accepting defeat.

It was as though everything happened in a flash. James was right there in front of me and then he wasn't. Just like that the page was turned. Did I even get my closure?! Was it finally over? Was I never ever going to see him again? I held my chest. Wondering why it hurt that way. I took a deep breath, shutting my eyes. Then I open them again and they fell on the roses shuttered on the door step. I reached to pick them up but then a voice studdled me and they fell back on the ground.

"So I'm figuring that was James,"

I quickly turned to face Enos who stood a few feet from the door, his eyes gazing outside the empty space James left. How long was he standing there? How much did he hear and see?

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