Alayna's POV:
*1 day later*

“Who’s here?!” Iris’ voice echoed through my ear as she shouted through the phone. “Calm down. No need to be super excited there.” My frustration might have come clear when she finally stopped squealing.

“But, OH MY GOSH! He came here for you and oh, that’s so romantic and sweet and—” I love Iris to death but sometimes she’s quite irritating and right now is one of those times. “You’re not helping at all, you know? And besides, how can you be so supportive of him when you were just all over Jared a few months ago?”

Iris was one of the few people who knew about Jared and mine’s relationship before and she was pretty ecstatic when I told her that we were in touch and talking. She would practically sponsor the relationship if she could.

“Yeah, but Jared is Jared. He’s bleeehhh.” I laughed at the noise she made. Whenever we hated someone, we would make that sound. We would make it sound as disgusting as possible to show how much we hated that person.

“Hey! We’re talking about my boyfriend here. He’s not bleeehh. He’s nice.” There was silence in the other end of the line and I wasn’t sure if the call was cut off. “You still there?” When she heard my confusion, she finally sighed.

“Nice? Is that all you could say about your boyfriend? How about dreamy, angelic, someone you would never ever forget?” I rolled my eyes as if she would have seen it. “Those were the words you used when you first described your Brit boy.”

I felt guilt stir up in my chest and I didn’t know what to say. “I was drowning with feelings back then.” She sighed at the sudden change of tone in our conversation. “But aren’t you suppose to be drowning with feelings for Jared right now?” She left me speechless with that question and I couldn’t conjure anything up.

“Look, if you truly love Jared then there really isn’t anything to be worried about. I know that what you had with Harry was something different but by now, you should show him that you have moved on. Accept his friendship with joy instead of bitterness and if he offers more, see where your heart stands then.” I lingered on her words and thought about it real hard.

“I’ll message you later. Mom’s here.” She hung up the phone and I was left with my thoughts. “Accept his friendship? Has he even offered that?” I was confused on what to do. I know that I can’t just keep pushing him away; I should know by now that he’s too stubborn for that. But I couldn’t just accept him whole-heartedly, right? Could we really be friends?

Harry’s POV:
“Have you seen her yet?” I nodded my head then frowned. “Why the long face then?” I exhaled the heavy air that I was breathing. “What’s the problem now?”

“Louis, you all forgot to tell me that she has a boyfriend already.” I brushed my hair out of my face and sighed once more. “She does? Well, her records seem to be missing that information.” Louis tried to laugh it off but he knew he failed when he saw the desperation in my face.

“You know we’ll all be glad to help you if we could but even with Skype, we can’t give you a hug right now.” I smiled at their concern for me. I am happy that I have this kind of support coming from my friends even across the pond.

“Thanks for the offer though. Should I just go back then? I mean, there’s no point in staying here.” I buried my face in my pillow and closed my eyes. “Did you just go there to be in a relationship with her or to be with her?” I tilted my head in confusion at what he just said and I guess it was pretty obvious that I didn’t get what he meant.

“Harry, you liked her ‘cause you were intrigued by her. You liked her ‘cause you loved spending time with her. You always wanted to be there for her, and now’s your time to do just that. You don’t need to be her boyfriend to do that. Why don’t you try being her friend at first? You two haven’t tried that yet anyways.”

I looked up at my laptop screen and showed a faint smile. “I’ll try.” Those were the only words I could say out of hopelessness and even I wasn’t convinced by it. “You should. You only have one chance at this. Better make it a good one.” He waved goodbye and I did the same.

“Friends? Could I just really pretend that I don’t have these strong feelings for her? Could I really hide behind the ‘friendship’ that I’ll try to propose? Could I?”

Notes