Late Sunday Afternoon, Terry/Bobby

[x-siryn.livejournal.com]

After weeks of avoiding him, Terry finally gets in touch with Bobby to apologise. Bobby, however, isn't feeling forgiving and Terry's not doing a very good job of making him want to.



Terry fidgeted with her phone then set it down and went back to doing her homework. For about thirty seconds. Then her phone was in her hands again, thumbs tapping out a text message...and deleting it. She set it down and looked back at her math homework... Then she looked up at the clock. Two hours. Two problems solved--math problems, that is. And ten times that many aborted phone calls and text messages. Terry took a deep breath and looked back her phone. Slowly, she carefully tapped out the message again and hit send.

Bobby's phone chirped and he dug it out of his pocket, glancing at the message. He froze, staring at it for a minute, then got up and went outside before punching speed dial 3. He hit send before he could chicken out, and held his breath as he listened to it click, then start ringing.

Terry jumped a mile when the phone began to play Bobby's ring tone. Why had she thought that she wouldn't get an instant call back? What was she going to say? She stared at the phone for a moment like it was going to bite then slowly lifted it and flipped it open. "Hello?"

Bobby's mouth went dry. There was a few seconds' silence, then he licked his lips and said hoarsely, "...Hey." Nice, Drake. Good start. "...What's up?" Oh, even better.

Terry tried not to whimper at just hearing his voice. It wasn't fair that she missed him this much. "I thought we should talk. It's been a while and the last time we did it was..." horrible and angry and wrong and, it seemed, the end of their relationship, "unproductive."

"...Yeah." Bobby sighed, running his fingers through his hair, and peeked through the kitchen window. His parents were still watching TV, and god only knew where Ronnie was. Off with his stupid new friends, probably. Bitching about him. He leaned against the side of the house and closed his eyes. "So...talk."

Terry sighed and got up from her desk to flop on her bed instead. "Kyle emailed me the other day." She didn't know why she was starting with this. She really just wanted to apologize not fight more. "He told me to make you stay away from Jay."

Bobby didn't reply, the silence stretching out longer and longer. ...Kyle's got a big mouth. He felt bad about kissing Jay--had felt bad about it the moment he'd stopped doing it, even--and hadn't ever meant for Terry to find out about it. It wasn't even enough of a kiss to mention, after all. Except that Jay clearly had, and then Kyle'd told Terry, and now...

"Bobby?" Had he hung up? She pulled the phone away from her ear. No, still ticking away the seconds. "Are you still there?"

"Yeah. I'll stay away from him," Bobby mumbled, wondering what she wanted. An apology? He wasn't going to apologise. It had been a mistake, and if she was going to get hung up on it...

Terry didn't know until her heart hit her stomach that she'd been hoping he would tell her it wasn't true. "I didn't, I mean, that's not why I told you. Um. I just wanted to tell you that...that's why I went out with Marius. Because of Kyle. I was mad at you. And...it's not like we're dating." Mother of God, Terry, shut UP! "Um, but...I wanted to say that I wish I hadn't."

"...You what?" Bobby asked quietly, straightening. Oh, so she didn't want him to touch her. But going out on dates with cute, flirtatious Australians that already were far too familiar with her for his taste, that was perfectly hunky-dory. His voice took on a strange, flat tone. "Hope you had fun."

He hadn't known? How had he not known? Terry nearly dropped the phone in horrified realization. Why was this going so wrong? "I...it was okay. He's not you." Her voice was soft, barely hinting at how much she really missed him. "We're just friends is all."

"Uh huh. So you went out as friends...because you were mad at me?" The logic didn't play out, and Bobby wasn't stupid. "Nice try."

"No, we went out because I'd volunteered to donate marrow for him and he was paying me back for the favour. I accepted because I was mad at you and I thought it would make you jealous." Which is also why she'd flirted and kissed him...but there was no power on earth that could make her tell him about that.

Mission accomplished, but he wasn't about to tell her that. "...Whatever. So did you call to rub it in my face, then? Thanks." This day wasn't crappy enough, after all.

"No! I..." This was all wrong! "Bobby, no! I miss you! I wanted to know when you were coming home!"

Bobby'd waited to hear those words from her for weeks, but now all he could think of was Marius--and it hurt worse that he, Bobby, had been rejected by him. "...I don't know. Not before Thursday," he told her coldly, his mind playing out possible 'date' scenarios, each one worse than the last, and most of them probably a gross exaggeration of actual events, he knew.

"Why Thursday? I...I really would like to see you." Oh, God, did she sound like she was begging? Did she really care if she did? Terry swallowed hard. "If it's because of me, I just want you to know that I'm sorry. I know I screwed up a lot and I made this really hard on you and...well, Jean helped me see that I was carrying around a lot of guilt about the baby that wasn't true but I shouldn't have taken it out on you." She stopped, out of breath.

Bobby's stomach knotted at the mention of the baby, but he shoved the emotions it stirred firmly down. "Because we're having dinner with some old friends of the family Wednesday night." He knew what it was really about, and of course it would do no good, but he'd given his word that he'd stay that long. "--Did you kiss him?" he asked abruptly. He had to know how far it'd gone, this revenge date of hers.

"What?" Terry sat up abruptly, praying that she'd heard him wrong. Maybe he'd said...kick. Kick him. Oh God.

Bobby rolled his eyes. "Marius. What happened on your little 'date'?" he almost spat into the phone. If they were just friends, if she really couldn't stop thinking about him, there shouldn't be anything to worry about, to evade. Right?

She could lie to him. Easily even. If she asked Marius, he would never tell. Terry bit her lip, hesitating. "We went out to dinner. I looked at his hand because I've never seen it up close. Um, then we went for a walk and..." Now or never, Terry, "yeah. I kissed him. And I wished I was with you."

"...Oh." Bobby swallowed, his chest constricting. "Yeah. That's usually what you do when you want to be with someone. Kiss other people." The moment the words left his mouth, he winced. Pot, meet the kettle. Maybe she'd miss it, at least...

"After I'd heard from Kyle, I didn't think that I wanted to be with you." That had the benefit of being both true and an excellent defense. Terry bit her lip anyway, since she wasn't trying to win anything here except her boyfriend back. "After I kissed Marius, I found out that I was wrong. And after I saw Jean, I knew that I needed to apologise to you. But you were gone."

"You're doing a bang-up job of it, so far," Bobby answered glibly. Part of him wanted to hang up, throw the phone across the yard, kick something. Another part wanted him to just shut up, tell her it was all okay, whatever it took to get them back together. And then there was his injured pride, getting in the way of all of it. "Great technique."

"I'm sorry! I just, I've messed this up from the beginning." Terry ran her hand through her hair, trying to collect herself. "I just...when I asked you for time, it wasn't that I wanted you to go away. I was just having a hard time. I felt like I'd killed something, Bobby. And I needed to try and figure that out."

"It wasn't easy for me, either," Bobby muttered. That was an understatement. There was more he wanted to say, but sudden resentment clogged his throat, choking off the words. He'd needed her, and she'd pushed him away. What else was he supposed to do, but try to find someone to ease the hole in him that her news had opened up?

Terry was quiet, curling up on her bed. "Why didn't you tell me that?" she asked softly after a while. She'd thought he'd be relieved. Certainly never thought he'd understand.

"Because you pushed me away, Terry!" Bobby yelled into the phone, then stopped and took a deep breath. "Look, I--I have to go. I can't do this." Not right now. Not over the phone.

"Bobby, wait!" Why couldn't anything go right? Why did this just keep becoming a worse mess? "Please don't do this. I want to fix things. Look, can't you please just come home and you can drive back on Wednesday for your dinner? Please? I need to see you!" Her voice thickened with impending tears as she begged.

"No." Bobby's reply was immediate and angry. "I'm spending some time with my family." He couldn't stand to think about seeing her right now, couldn't deal with this, and his parents were going to be wondering where he was. "I'll try to come back on Thursday."

"I...fine. Okay. I get it." Terry rubbed at her chest, wondering if this is what they meant by feeling your heart break. "I...I'm sorry. I'll stop. I didn't know that... I thought I'd get another chance." Tears slipped down her cheek and she closed her eyes, hating the weakness. "Goodbye, Bobby."

"I'll talk to you later," Bobby replied curtly, not even hearing half of what she said. He pulled the phone away from his ear and hit 'end', shoving it into his pocket as he headed back into the house to tell his parents he was going for a walk. He couldn't pretend everything was okay just now.