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J U L Y    2 0 1 8

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I open the door and hear the music; a smile instantly hits my face as I take my shoes off.

'I just wanna tell you how I'm feeling, gotta make you understand, never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down, never gonna run around and desert you...'

"Matty!" I laugh. He appears in the doorway, mouthing along to our song. I meet him as he lifts his arm up to spin me around.

'Never gonna make you cry, never gonna say goodbye, never gonna tell a lie and hurt you...'

I remember how this became 'our' song when we first started dating. It came on the radio while we drove to the beach. He told me how it reminded him of us because he was never going to give me up, despite me being technically engaged to someone else. He's always sung it to me since, despite it potentially being the cheesiest song ever.

I giggle as he twirls me around, the entire room spinning with me, whipping my hair around my face. I find myself spinning into his chest as the song ends and silence engulfs the room. Our lips meet and I find myself home. The taste of coffee, the faintest strawberry where he's, yet again, been putting my lip balm on and the hypnotizing smell of his fresh aftershave.

"I love you," he whispers against my mouth when I take a pause, trying to remember how to breathe.

"I love you too." I gasp as my breath returns to normal. "What's with all the... dancing?"

"Well, I thought I'd welcome you home by playing our song, and I love dancing with you," he laughs, taking my hand and leading me into the lounge. I see two mugs of tea already steaming on the coffee table with a plate full of angel cake slices. I smile to myself as I sit beside him on the sofa. He knows me too well. That's why my heart sings as I look at him, but it's also why it breaks after it calms down.

"What happened?" he asks, taking his tea in his hands. I watch his concern grow as his eyebrows knit together, his fingers going white with the force of holding his mug. I don't want to tell him, but I also do because I never want to lie to him.

"September twentieth," is all I say. I watch him take it in, do the calculation in his mind and then nod in response.

Silence fills the room. Our eyes dart between each other and the mugs in our hands. My breath speeds up, my chest heaving with the snap of a guitar string. We don't want to talk about it, but we need to. The knowledge swishes and flies between us. I watch the steam rise from each angle of my tea, it converges into one strand where it swirls and dances toward the ceiling. It reminds me of Matty and I: we were so far apart, now we've come together, and now we have to find our way out to the sky together, or risk dissipating to nothing.

"That gives us... two months, right, to try and make this go away," Matt says slowly. I take a sip of my tea. The hamster in his brain is doing overtime, I can see it in the way his eyes read the space in front of him like a book.

"I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I don't think we can make this go away," I state.

"Ells, honestly, is your family's wealth and status worth more than us?" he demands.

"That's not fair," I argue. "It's not just the wealth. I've always thought there was more to it than their money and lifestyle. I know there is, but no one will tell me."

"I don't doubt there is, but it's clear you're scared of whatever it is, and of what your dad will do." He arches an eyebrow at me over the rim of his mug.

I look down into my tea and sigh. "It's difficult, Matty. I'm not scared, I'm just... pressured. I have literally been put in a position where I have to choose between what I want and my family. If I follow them, I give them, and to an extent, myself, everything in terms of securing their future and mine, but I lose you. If I refuse, then I make sure they lose everything and I have a less secure future, but I have you. It's not as simple as you think, and I want everything, but I can't have it."

He takes a slice of cake from the plate and bites into it. As he chews, he looks out of the window in front of us. I finish my tea off and stare out of the same window. Maybe if we look out at the same point, an answer will manifest. I look at the small collection of yachts gathered in the marina, slowly moving with the lap of the water. I suppose Matt and I have been like the yachts: constantly having the tide gently lapping at us for three years. But now, after so long,the wave has to come crashing in because it always does. Now it's finally here, we're still not prepared even though it's been at the back of our minds the whole time.

"I've been thinking about it, and I think I've said it a few times over the years, but now I really mean it. We can run away," he announces suddenly.

"Where to? When and how?" I question.

"Anywhere. You name it, Ells Bells, and we'll go. We just up and leave, together. I've had the idea for a while, but not contemplated it until now. We just... go and don't look back," he says and faces me, his dark eyes firing with determination.

"You do know my dad will go to any length to find me, right? He's rich, as is Dean's dad. They will find me, and let's be honest here, they will probably kill you to make this deal happen," I admit. "I will not put you in any danger, I won't let you die for me."

He scoffs. "Kill me? Come on, Ells, this isn't a film."

I roll my eyes. He might think it's dramatic, but something about Anthony has always given me the creeps. There's no length he wouldn't go to for himself. It might sound dramatic, but it wouldn't surprise me.

I remember once, when Anthony was so hell-bent on Dean doing science A-Levels instead of English like he wanted, Dean told me he was threatened with severe punishment. He got various people involved to convince Dean to do science. I remember cleaning the bruises for him after. He did science in the end, along with business or something.

That was only about education, if this is more important – they would say it is – I dread to think what they would do to Matt.

He sighs again and shifts on the sofa so we're facing each other head-on. "I don't care. I would rather spend one small lifetime with you and die in my twenties than be apart for another eighty."

I place my hand on his cheek, feeling the warm comfort he provides. "Matty—"

"What is it that is so important to them that we can't just tell them 'no' and that I'll marry you instead?" he ponders. "I have money stashed away. We can run away to, I don't know, the United States, or whatever. Wherever you want, we can get married. I want to marry you, have kids with you, the whole thing. You know I do. That way you couldn't marry him, even if they dragged you back kicking and screaming. I'll buy them out, whatever it takes."

I laugh sadly as he sits back, the seriousness in his face radiating frustration. "Matt, you wouldn't have enough to buy either set of parents out, as much as I wish it would work. Dean and I spoke earlier. I think he now finally gets how loveless this farce is going to be. So, it could be a matter of time before he could be on board with us being together," I explain. He doesn't look convinced. "Matty, if we tell Dean the truth, we could be together, properly. This could be a way forward for us."

He stands from the sofa and stares out of the window, looking out over the marina of the city. My dad bought me the penthouse when I started university as a bribe to not move into student accommodation. It has far too many windows for my liking and that shows as I leave the curtains closed during the day. Though when Matt stays, they remain open, and he reminds me that no one can see us from twenty-six floors below. Matt loves this place, though I can see by the way he bites his already short nails that right now, he feels claustrophobic.

"What will happen to this place, when you marry him?" he demands. What a strange question to ask.

"I don't know, it's not been mentioned. I suppose I could keep it, my dad took it out in my name when he bought it, so I guess it's up to me to decide what to do with it," I say.

"That's one thing at least," Matt retorts.

"I suppose there'll be the expectation for me to do something with it, though. Whether I sell it, rent it out, or whatever," I add.

"We could keep it, hell, rent it out to me if you need things to be official. I'll live here, I'll get a proper full-time job, pay you rent. Then we can be together, here. You can come by, whenever you like. We can be together."

I don't say anything to him. It could work. No one knows about us, so if we played things right, he could just be a tenant in my flat. We could use this as our usual place to meet up.

I watch him suddenly turn angry, his ears turning red at the tips.

"Why are you now talking about me going through with this?" I ask, confused by his turn of decision.

"Because you're determined to do this. I don't know which way to think, I don't know what is going to happen. But I need you, I need to be with you. I would be with you whether you were married, divorced, widowed... I don't care. I don't know why, but you are so – you will go through with this to secure your dad's finances even though you know it's wrong."

"It's not just that, and you know it," I say.

"Can you not see how... how wrong this is?" he snaps, his anger becoming apparent.

"Of course, I can! I don't want this on my shoulders – they've put their whole lives in my hands, and it's not fair." I'm practically whining like a child. "But I have to."

"That's the thing, that is what I'm saying. You don't have to! I will not see you going into this marriage out of convenience for your family. You should go into marriage for love, and you don't love him," Matt growls. "I will take them on if that's what it takes. I love you, Ells. I want to marry you, we belong together."

He finally turns to face me, and we glower at each other, the intensity of the two-month countdown looming between us like a fire.

"We both knew what this was from the beginning," I remind him. "I want nothing more than to run away with you, and marry you, have your children with curly hair and live peacefully. But they have money, and in their world, money is power. They would find us, and they would kill you if that's what it took. Don't be naïve as to think we could skip off into the sunset. I will not lose you."

"They wouldn't kill me."

I give him a side-eye. "Dean's dad is... intense. I remember once I spilled a drink on these brand-new carpets in their house. I was twelve and he smacked me and threatened to strangle me if I did it again. My dad's anger issues can be the same; he treats my mum like shit, Matty. I dread to think what will happen if they find out about us. Why do think I've been so careful all these years?"

He strides over toward me, his eyes glowering into mine still and everything lights up around us as if we were the finale of a firework show in November. "They can do what they want to me, I won't let you marry him."

The whole room spins when our lips crash together in pure desperation. The way his tongue dances with mine and how he nips at my bottom lip shows me everything.

Matt's nothing if not passionate, and it's his downfall in many ways. He gets angry quickly, falls deep, and lets his emotions act for him. Though it's worked in his favor for so long, right now it's working against him.

This is why I wanted to stop this before it even began, but like Matt, my emotions speak for me in a lot of ways. Something not even my parents do, and it scares me. It has for three years.

I gasp, almost forcing myself away before I allow myself to go too far. "We need to stop and accept this."

"I'm not giving up on us," he warns me. "But it sounds like you are." The glower comes back, and I know he's going to kiss me again, but I take a step back – the hardest step of my life.

"I'm not giving up, I just – I need us to both be on the same page here," I argue. "I... I'm scared for your life."

"If that page is giving into this... disgusting farce, then I will never be on it, Ells," he snaps back. "I will not see you marry someone you don't love. I won't see you marry someone that's not me."

"I have to, I have no choice!" I yell back, tears forcing their way out of my eyes. He doesn't say anything back, just sighs. "There's more to this than just money, I know there is. I just... I don't know what it is."

"Take a chance on me, Ella," he pleads, the way he uses my name and not my nickname fills my heart with a black sorrow I don't know how to handle. I find myself falling on the sofa, the air in my throat gone. We both knew this day would come, we knew it would come to this, so why does it hurt so much now it's here?

"I... I... Matty, I can't," I stammer. "I have to do this. I'd rather see you live than die."

"No, you don't have to do anything," he mutters.

"We could do this properly," I argue back, my voice barely audible, even to me.

"Unless that means you running away with me, Ella, then there is nothing else to talk about," he announces before marching out of the flat, the door slamming behind him.

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