We knew each other long before anything happened. Before I woke up, squinting at the light and pulling the sheets over my head. Before we instantaneously decided that we were into each other. Before we planned to make things official, before I was driving down to his house every weekend, before I ran away to the city for a night and found tender comfort in his arms. Everything between us was simple. I wish it had stayed simple.

But that's what a broken heart hands you when it's too heavy to heal. Whatever strength it can give you is spared for finding the next target in a sweet state of intoxication, turning you into a leech that's willing to suck dry the emotional satisfaction someone else can give you. Some call this a rebound. Some call it simply 'moving on'. Normal people would question why you would potentially hurt someone else for the sake of your own selfish pleasures. In this moment, I don't think I'm being selfish for spending time with someone I love, but I know I'm going the wrong way about it all the same.

Miles had his arm around my stomach, his chest up against my back, shallow breaths airing on the back of my neck. While I stir awake, and my eyes twitch open to peek out at the sunlight invading into the room. My head stings at the sight of sun rays, blinding me after a night of dim darkness had embedded itself into my senses. Or it could have easily been the alcohol I consumed. That was also a possibility.

In the moment of squinting through the bright light, adjusting to the new day that was opening up and making its presence known through the cracks in the blinds, detail made itself evidently clear, and I looked upon Miles' room from my side-on angle. The wood of his desk stared right into my face, shining a newly painted gloss white, as it pushed up against his bed. I always had to be careful that I didn't slide out and hit a limb on my way out from under the covers, especially in the early peaks of the morning when all I would want to do is climb back into bed and curl up against his warm body. But on the top of the surface, connected by a white cord trailing down towards the ground and possibly disappearing into an outlet, my phone bounced off a trail of light from its silvered edges, and vibrated to attain my attention.

I suppose some could say I was attached to my phone, maybe even addicted. It was the cornerstone for everything I did, every interaction I made, every connection I had with another human being. It was my tool for the outside world without needing to step outside of my house, especially for cases where meeting someone new was about as terrifying as a fox was to a rabbit. But, for the most part, I always had it on me, and every so often I would get a notification for something new, whether it be Facebook, or Tumblr, or, in the rare cases, a response to my blog posts.

I try to keep up every time I have a new interaction to unfold. Most of the time, it's a message from the group chat, whinging on about someone else and how badly they're doing as person, and sometimes I can gather the occasional tag comment from someone in my friend circle, or even see their response to a comment I made myself. But it's becoming a mundane process. I'm not even sure I like Facebook anymore.

The phone vibrates again, and I reach up to take a hold of it, dragging my right arm out from underneath the pillow and unplugging it from its life juice. But my movement disturbs the body lying beside me, and as I pull my phone down I feel the arm tighten around my middle and warmth recollecting on my back. I turn over, looking back just in time to spot a yawn escape from Miles' mouth, and his arms stretch out for his body to shake free his sleepy form. His eyes peek open, peering into mine with a drowning chocolate brown and a sleepy smile appears as he croaks, "Morning."

I whisper back, "Morning."

His arm collapses back onto my middle, this time over the duvet instead of under.

"Did you sleep well?"

I nod, peering down at him behind hooded eyes.

He pulls out his arm from underneath my neck, propping himself on it against his pillow, his eyes barely open. There's still a smile on his lips, but a thinking gaze focused on my face, like the next words to come from his mouth needed to be thought with care.

"What?" I ask, letting a sleepy smile creep onto my face.

He doesn't answer right away. His head shakes lightly, his arm pull me closer, and his face is shadowed with a look of adoration.

"Nothing," he says. "I'm just really glad you're here."

Warmth spreads throughout my body with no rise in temperature, but I can feel the heat escalating in my cheeks. Those words. Those simple, carefully picked, heart-beating words were why I still wanted to try and make things work between us. I had never felt more like I was on top of the world than when I was with Miles. Everything he did, everything he said, he just fed my longing desire to be wanted and to want someone with just as much equal intent. Even as he folded his arm back down and rested his head on my chest, his arm tightened around me and I couldn't stop myself from instinctively reaching up and running my fingers through his knotted locks, and letting my free arm graze over his soft, light brown skin. My heart pounded and I could hear it gaining traction. What Miles gave me was the feeling of importance and security that everything was going to be okay. And that everything would stay okay.

And he sighed as he laid there, letting me touch him as gently as I would to a newborn kitten. "Did you mean what you said last night?"

I could have been wearing a bullet-proof vest and three jackets, and even then would you be able to hear pounding of my heart against my chest. It sped up once the question was asked, once the thought had been brought out into the world, and even though I knew what I said was the truth, it didn't stop me from wondering if he didn't believe me.

"Yeah," I confessed, sounding forceful, like I needed him to believe it.

His face turned, picking itself up from my chest and looking down onto my face, doubt coating the fine structure of his jawline into a straight line where a smile should be, and his glittering eyes study me through dark stray strands of hair, shooting a worried gaze instead of something of longing and appreciation.

"I don't want to see you in pain," he says, carefulness lacing his voice. "But I don't wanna be just another side piece."

"You're not," I assured, raising my hand to cup his cheek. His soft, smooth cheek, lightly prickled with morning stubble. "You mean so much more to me than just sex."

"Then why don't we make something of it?" He asks, eyebrows beginning to knot together. "Why do we have to wait?"

I felt the draw of a sigh escape through my lips, my eyes trailing from his gaze to a shelf behind him, one that rested figurines of anime girls and boxes for collector's editions of games, surrounded by posters of bands I've barely heard of and mangas I've never read. But even with my lack of knowledge towards what Miles loved, I knew I didn't need to have everything in common with him to love him. You could both argue that the earth was flat over being round, and you could still love them. You just needed to have an appreciation for the love they had for it.

And as I looked back at Miles' face, I looked deep into his eyes, the ones that had me drowning within, and I spoke a truth I didn't want to say, "You know why."

And even though it wasn't an answer he wanted to hear, nor the truth he wanted to acknowledge, he nodded like he understood, and a light smile replaced the daunting expression he tried to hide.

"As long as you're still my girl, and no one else's, I don't care," he said. "I'll wait as long as it takes for you to be ready..."

His face closes in on mine, his lips closer enough to feel his shallow breaths. "As long as I get to call you mine at the end of it all."

And he closes in, soft lips pressing on mine, glittering my head with restless emotion, and for a moment I feel guilty. It hurts knowing that I'm betraying someone I love for cheap thrills and the small amount of freedom I didn't have before. So I focus on the now. I focus on the way he tastes and feels, and on the fluttering butterflies that overtake the ones nesting with guilt. And as we break, my lips linger in the air for more of his touch. My eyes open to see him pulling away, and his body begins to sit up on the mattress, suddenly on his knees as he stretches towards the sky again; a v-line peeking out from under his white shirt.

"You hungry?" He asks, falling back, swinging his legs over mine, preparing to jump off the bed.

I nod. "Yeah, I could go for something to eat."

"Alright," he says, getting to his feet, grabbing onto the loose waistband of his sweatpants. "Pancakes okay again?"

"Sure."

He leaves the room, tying the oversized sweatpants as best he can as he leaves through the door, and I hear the soft thuds of his feet as he walks away. My hand goes to reach for my phone, instead patting the place on his desk where I know it should be, and when I look to see if maybe I had misplaced it, it shines out from the corner of my eye hanging half out from under the pillow where I had mindlessly placed it.