Breanna Michelle Santana

"Brea?" Grayson called out. When he saw it was really me, Grayson put his phone down. He strolled over and took a seat without removing his jacket like he didn't plan on staying long.

"I can't say I expected you to reach out and ask to talk. Why here, you trying to get one last free meal out of me?" He tried joking about the public spot I chose to have our reunion but my stone face let him know I wasn't in the mood.

I sniffed and relaxed my arms and legs that were before folded and crossed tensely. It gave off negative body language, and while I wasn't exactly enthusiastic about meeting up with him, I didn't want to look bitchy. It was bad enough I wore flared yoga pants and one of Dad's faded Champion crewnecks that was too big for me.

The waiter attempted approaching us but I put my hand up to let him know to give us time. I didn't plan on eating and sure hoped neither did Grayson.

It was weird seeing him. So many emotions arose. Unlike what I thought would happen, I didn't give in and want to jump his bones. No, all I wanted was to talk like adults once and for all. I demanded answers to the thousands of questions that flooded my brain.

"You okay, you don't look so good-" I cut Grayson off before he got too concerned about my well-being.

My tired eyes were low and carried deep, dark bags from the lack of sleep before. The cheekbones that I usually praised were now sunken in and my once admirable skin lost it's glow. I broke out on my forehead and even my hair lacked luster. So it was obvious that I seriously needed to invest in some self-care but that was the last of my worries. And what would be the use in getting dolled up when I felt dead on the inside?

I inhaled with a popped eyebrow and sat up, having no patience. "Let's just get right to it, Grayson. Shit went down and I need closure."

He nodded stiffly and sat back, cracking his knuckles. Looking like he was trying to keep his cool in an interrogation, he stared right in my eyes. "Where do you want to start?"

"The beginning."

"Do you have all night," Grayson cracked a joke but managed to laugh through a straight face.

"You have an hour of my time."

"So talk, Brea," he breathed out. "you obviously have something to say. Say it."

I felt like he was testing me and it's true that that would've set me off in the past, I kept my anger down to get through this.

"Okay, we can start with why you cheated," I said surely.

Grayson removed his fingers from the salt and pepper shakers he played with and glared at me. "That's not the beginning," he countered with furrowed eyebrows. "Nah, you said the beginning so let's go there. Back in college - freshman year."

== FLASHBACK ==

"Pair up, and for the last thirty minutes of class, discuss your assignment amongst each other and be prepared to present tomorrow," our professor said.

I wasn't the type to ever approach people first and ask them to be my partner. I usually sat there and let anyone come up to me, that's how I made my friends before. Except, my two real friends — Nicole and Ella — were in another class together.

It seemed as if everyone already knew who they wanted to work with and it was only the end of the second week of the course.

I sighed and started tapping my pencil against my cheek filled with air. Suddenly, I just felt a presence behind me. I stopped blowing bubbles childishly and turned to see who was there. It was a boy. A cute boy — err, a MAN — No, that's an understatement. He looked as if God hand-crafted him and took his time.

Before he said anything, though, this other boy in front of me spun with a grin on his porcelain face. Without knowing him much, I could just tell he was full of himself.

"Hey, Brea. You want to work with me?" His name was Kaign. We met at orientation and he was awfully pushy but I never really gave him the time of the day. He seemed a bit off to me, I couldn't explain it. Still, Kaign was handsome, well-organized, and seemed smart enough.

"She's good, actually," the first guy let him know. They stared each other down as he took the seat beside me. Once Kaign turned around going "humph" me and my apparent parter laughed.

"I can speak for myself," I let the stranger know.

"I'm sure you can, I just wanted to mess with him."

I admired his side profile and caught the smile he flashed, his pearly white canines perfectly sharp like he could bite into me and I wouldn't mind.

As nervous as I thought I'd be around someone so perfect, I wasn't.

I leaned forward and cross my arms like my legs.

"I'm Brea," I introduced myself first.

"Grayson," he returned kindly. When I stuck my hand out for him to shake, he hesitated. Unlike what I expected, he kissed the back of my hand. Girls behind me who watched our interaction went "aww" while a couple others rolled their eyes.

I took my hand back, unsure of what to think about the gesture.

"Are you always such a gentleman?" I asked, never having had that done before. I didn't even realize I was using my other hand to caress the exact spot his lips were on my other under the table.

He just shrugged with this straight face. "What's your name short for, Brionna?"

I let out a chuckle. That was a pet peeve of mine, being called Brionna instead of my real name. My head shook, letting strands of hair fall into my face. I tucked them behind my ear and kept talking. "It's Breanna."

"Even better. My full name's Grayson Reid Jansen... if it matters."

"Breanna Michelle Santana... if it matters," we both laughed. "Jansen. Is that German?"

He bobbed his head. "Dutch." I went "ah" and sat back.

Grayson spoke up. "Santana. Hm, Cuban?"

"Close. Argentinian," I answered, smiling with confidence.

He looked as if he was thinking of what to say next. "Te ves hermosa hoy," he said to me in Spanish.
[Translation: you look beautiful today.]

Impressed, I wrote on my empty sheet of paper:

9/10

I knew what it meant but I wasn't fluent, only my parents. Well, really my father but he didn't use it with me since my mother was so colonized (I mean, westernized) when they met so that's how they raised me.

"Thanks." I caught myself blushing. The ego boost really did a lot for me, I started to feel more confident with him.

"So," I let out cheerfully, "are we gonna work on this assignment?"

"Doubt it," he said, shutting the notebook as I opened it. His hand rested on mine and I had no complaints. "I'm much more interested in getting to know you."

Sure of myself, I leaned in towards him, our hands still delicately placed.
"I've seen you looking at me before." I don't know why I said that but I did and it was true.

"So that means you were looking at me, too."

"What do you want from me?"

"I just think you're beautiful-"

"Yeah, you said that." My tone remained light and sensual, I was flirting and he could tell. He liked it and gave me back the same energy.

"Let me finish," he wet his lips. I narrowed my eyes on him and melted on the inside from his voice to his demeanor. "I just think you're beautiful. I usually get what I want but I think it's gonna be a little more complicated than that with you."

I didn't say anything, only created space between us and smiled warmly. When his eyes scanned me, I couldn't help but giggle and blush more.

====

"—I remember that like it was yesterday, how we met," Grayson concluded after I described it from my perspective. He agreed that I had every detail correct and left nothing out. How could I, it was so sweet?

"I gotta admit, it's hard seeing you like this, B," he lamented, trying to put his hand on mine but I pulled away.

"What happened?" his voice sounded so desperate I almost cried.

Having to look away from him, I blinked until the tears went back into my eyes.

"Sex complicated everything," I shared my theory. "With you, me, Kaign, and all the girls you fucked."

"Definitely Kaign," Grayson said, only owning up to that part. "I tried to tell you he was gay. He was just using you as a coverup and you fell for it just to get away from me-"

I had to stop Grayson before bad-mouthing my friend. Kaign helped me a lot through all this, I felt like I owed him (and Dylan) a lot. "Okay, he's not here, let's not talk about him."

It got quiet between us two and the waiter, Jack, came to offer us water. Grayson took some and just stared at me until the boy excused himself.

"We can blame whoever all day, but one of us has to take some responsibility," I proclaimed, my leg shaking under the table.

"And I'm willing to do that, if you can, too," Grayson declared, grabbing his glass to drink from it.

My eyebrows carved in my forehead. "Excuse me?" I quipped, taken aback.

He scoffed. "Breanna, unlike what you've probably cemented in your fucking brain, this isn't all just my fault. Let's talk about it, yeah? You say I cheated. When? When we weren't even a fucking couple?"

"Okay, Grayson," I mumbled, feeling small.

He put his fist to the table and started to get serious as I sunk in my seat. "No, don't do that. Don't act like the victim now. You said you wanted to talk about it, now I'm hitting you with facts and you act like you don't want to hear it?"

"I get it, okay! Damn. We weren't a couple, so you didn't cheat, but it still hurt."

"Oh, I'm sure — and for that, I'm sorry — but weren't you the one saying 'I'm not ready.' 'I don't want to be in a relationship with you, Grayson.' 'I think I want Kaign'," he mocked me.

I was left speechless. What he said was true and I slowly started seeing things his way which made me feel even more like shit.

What did I expect, hm? For him to open up and give me a well-needed, far overdue emotional apology? For us to get back together?

Okay, so, we met in the middle. He was wrong for sleeping with other girls and I shouldn't have pushed him away when I knew for a fact we were into each other. However, that just leads to the discussion of: do you need a title? Is a bond better than a title? Or was it simply a case of us just having fun?
See, because I acted like I needed him to explicitly say I was his girlfriend, but when you sleep together every night, fight and get jealous, and say you love each other, aren't you a couple - or at least in (some sort of) a relationship?

"Right or wrong?" Grayson asked, talking to me in this tone like he was my father.

"Don't talk to me like that," I barked.

He clenched his jaw and rubbed his forehead. "And then I lost you. You went with him over me, how do you think that made me feel? I was crushed, but I thought letting you go was being selfless," Grayson paused. "Then you came back. I thought it was finally gonna be our time but you changed, Brea. You were all 'I don't have feelings' 'I don't cuddle' and 'I don't like you'."

"Then the bet," I uttered shakily. Just the thought of something so childish shamed me, I can't believe we ever did something so stupid.

"Then the bet," Grayson repeated solemnly. "As much as I wanna say we shouldn't have done it, I wouldn't take it back. It happened, and you know how we both feel about regrets."

That was true, neither of us ever regretted anything in life. We lived by "whatever happened, happened."

"Fake or not, why would you go and sleep with other women and lie about it? We could've talked about it, o-or ended things. You want to talk about how you felt, what about me? You made me look dumb and feel. so. worthless. Was I not good enough for you?" I'll admit, asking that last question took a lot out of me. What pride I had left was now down the drain. I hated giving him, or any man, that power - seeing me so vulnerable. It was pathetic almost, how I seemed to be begging and so weak.

"Of course you were — are."

I spat, finding that hard to believe. "You sure enough didn't ever express that. I mean, seriously, this whole thing was about sex, Grayson, let's be real. That's all our relationship ever was."

Grayson reacted quickly to that and didn't appreciate it. "Don't say that. Don't fucking say that because you know I loved you-"

Loved? Past tense. As much as I want to act like it didn't, that hurt me more than anything.

"Tuh."

His mouth got tight. "Seriously? When I said I meant it you sure as Hell said it back, if I remember correctly."

"I did, but that's because I loved you. I was blinded." Blinded by dick, lies, and empty promises.

"You know what," Grayson said, clasping his hands together before he stood to leave, "I'm not goin' to sit here and do this with you. You wanted to talk, I hope you got what you wanted."

"Grayson, wait!" I watched him get up and start to walk away. For a second, he stopped and exhaled with frustration.

"What? You want to throw some silverware at me now, too? The menu? A chair?"

I hung my head and put my elbows in my thighs as I let a few tears fall.

Seeing how I was breaking down in public and he was close to walking out on me, I quickly pulled myself together and stormed out so he'd follow. We got to the sidewalk and he just waited for me to spit it out already.

I blinked again to hold off the tears and sucked my lips into my mouth. Finally, I was good to speak. "This isn't what I wanted, Grayson. God! You think I wanted to come back home and have to deal with this shit? No, I'm fucking tired. Everyone thinks I'm depressed a-and crazy, but I won't give you the satisfaction of ever making me feel like that. All I wanted tonight, was for you to take some FUCKING RESPONSIBILITY and apologize for once!"

"Okay, Breanna, people are staring. Let's... let's not do this here," Grayson said trying to pull me with him towards his car. He glanced awkwardly at the bystanders who watched me like I was a carnival attraction.

"No," I exclaimed, my teeth gritted. I panted, staring back at all the eyes on me. They made me feel like I was crazy.

Collecting myself, I yanked the fabric back up on my exposed shoulder and cleared my throat as I swept my disheveled hair out of my red face.

Feeling embarrassed and like there was no longer a point in any of this, I waved Grayson off and stumbled down the sidewalk.