I was the textbook definition of a Velcro girlfriend. If I could have spent 24 hours a day physically fused to my boyfriend’s side, I would have.
I was in the middle of my nightly routine, clinging to his neck and begging for one more goodnight kiss, when a flicker of strange, translucent text drifted across my vision like a livestream comment section.
Is this side character actually brain-dead? Can’t she see the male lead is leaning back on purpose? He doesn’t even want to touch her.
He only dated her to keep the crazy fans away. She really thinks she’s the love of his life. Delusional.
Almost there, guys. The real heroine is about to make her entrance. Our little stage-five clinger is getting dumped any minute now.
I stared at the floating words, my stomach dropping.
My fingers, which had been laced tightly behind Kyle’s neck, slowly began to loosen.
The next second, Kyle lifted his head.
There was a shadow of irritation in his eyes, the kind that came from being interrupted. His voice was low and rough, still warm from the almost-kiss.
“Why’d you stop?”
My heart gave a violent squeeze.
I tightened my grip on the blanket instead of looking at him. “I’m tired.”
He stared at me for two long seconds, as if trying to read something in my face. Apparently he found nothing, because he finally turned over and said in a flat voice, “Then sleep.”
I looked at his back in the dark and felt a dull ache spread through my chest.
When I lay down again, I thought about the comments. About the way they said he hated closeness. About the way they mocked me for always throwing myself at him.
So this time, I pressed myself all the way to the edge of the bed, leaving as much distance between us as I could.
Maybe if I stopped sticking to him so much, he’d dislike me a little less.
The room was quiet except for the steady sound of his breathing behind me.
And the more I thought about it, the more I realized the comments weren’t completely wrong.
I had always known, in some small hidden corner of my heart, that Kyle didn’t love me the way I loved him.
From the beginning of our relationship, he had always been warm enough to keep me close, but never warm enough to let me forget there was a line. He tolerated my affection more than he welcomed it. Even when I curled up against him, even when I wrapped myself around him like a vine, there was always a faint stiffness in his shoulders, a tiny furrow in his brow, a tension that said he was enduring me, not enjoying me.
I just hadn’t wanted to see it.
I was clingy to an almost embarrassing degree. I wanted to be with him every second of every day. I’d even lied and said I was terrified of living alone just so I could move into his place. Then I had pushed further, inch by inch, until I’d taken over his bedroom too.
Every night, I slept like an octopus, arms and legs wrapped around him.
He had allowed it.
But thinking back now, his first instinct had almost always been refusal. I was the one who never took no seriously. I wanted him so badly that I pretended not to notice the details.
So the floating comments were probably telling the truth.
That thought sat like a stone in my chest.
It kept getting heavier and heavier until sometime past midnight, when I finally drifted off.