Chapter 37: I Almost Gave You Every Piece of Me

~“Some days, it's hard to seeIf I was a fool or you a thief / Made it through the maze to find my one in a million / And now you're just a page torn from the story I'm living...~”

~—MIIA~

Chapter Theme Song: “Dynasty” by MIIA.

HARMONY

Blaze turns to me, his face serious. “Harmony, I can’t do this. I can’t sleep with you.”

“Why?” I ask, confused.

He runs a hand through his hair, a look of deep concern on his face. It’s a look I’m not used to seeing on him.

I slide down to where he’s sitting, dropping to my knees. “Why, Blaze?”

“This...this guilt, it’s just...”

“Guilt?” I squint at him, trying to understand. “What are you feeling guilty about?”

~What is he talking about?~

He hides his face in his hands. “You don’t want to know, Harmony.”

My heart feels like it’s breaking.

~I don’t want to know?~ That phrase alone is so terrifying that I question whether I really want to know. But I decide to take the risk. If it hurts, I’ll cry and then try to move on.

“I do,” I say firmly. “I want to know.”

He doesn’t respond, so I push him. “What’s the real reason?”

“Fuck.” He drops his hands from his face, and I brace myself for whatever he’s about to say.

“I can’t sleep with you...because I was just playing with you this whole time. Well, not the whole time, but for more than half of it.”

I stare at him, stunned. “W-what?”

“I... When I first met you... I wanted...I wanted to sleep with you. Because you were so, well you still are, innocent and quiet. So, I made it a personal mission to break you out of your shell and ruin you.”

I blink, trying to process his words. “Ruin me as in…?”

“Sleep with you. I wanted to have sex with you and take away your innocence. It was a game, something I do. And you’re not the first girl I’ve done it to...”

So this whole time, he was just trying to ~ruin~ me? I was just another name on his list.

Tears prick at my eyes. I’d been warned about him, but I guess I wanted to prove everyone wrong.

I wanted to form my own opinion of him. I wanted to show everyone that he wasn’t the person they thought he was. Because I’m the kind of person who always wants to see the good in people, no matter how foolish that might be.

“And...I don’t know...I was only nice to you then because I wanted to sleep with you, so I just stuck around you and pretended to like your company for a while...”

~He should stop talking. I can’t hear anything else. My mind is spinning. All this time, he was only trying to sleep with me. Just like everyone said.~

“But now...now I genuinely do enjoy your company, Harmony. And it’s like, if I sleep with you now, I’d feel so guilty...”

I drop my gaze to the floor. Tears blur my vision as I try to make sense of what he’s saying.

Blaze thought I was easy, and I let him believe it. I let him ~ruin~ me, just like he said.

He was my first kiss, the first guy to touch me intimately—he took a piece of my innocence that I can never get back.

A piece that I’d promised myself would be for my future husband.

“So...” My voice breaks and I bite my lip. “Even at the party, what happened in your room...was it all part of your plan?”

He swallows hard. “Yeah... I told James to lock us in my room so we could...do that...”

~I can’t believe this. He lied to me.~

“When I asked him for my room key, it was a code. It meant he should close the door after we went up.”

My breathing is getting heavier, and I feel like I’m about to fall apart. The alcohol in my system isn’t helping.

I’m humiliated that I almost stripped in front of him, only to be rejected. I’m angry that he probably doesn’t feel the same way about me, considering how hesitant he was when I confessed.

I’m disappointed in myself for ignoring all the warnings, just because ~I wanted to see the good in him~. It’s clear he doesn’t feel the same way about me.

Then why did he keep kissing me, touching me, saying all those sweet things? Oh, right. To ~ruin~ me.

And suddenly, I understand something I was too naive to see before.

When someone shows you who they are, believe them. Don’t make excuses for them, because you’ll only end up getting hurt.

“I’m sorry, Harmony. That’s not what I want anymore, okay? I promise that—”

“When...” A sob escapes me and I cover my eyes. “When did you stop playing with me?”

His eyes soften. “Harmony…”

“Tell me!”

He takes a deep breath. “I’d say it was after what happened at the beach.”

~Oh, God~. I remember that day at the beach. The way we kissed, the way I moaned his name, and suddenly I feel so ashamed.

I barely knew him, and I let him take advantage of me so easily. What have I done?

I gasp and stand up, and Blaze rises with me.

“Harmony. Look, I don’t want that anymore. I genuinely feel something and—”

I whirl around to face him, tears streaming down my face. “You were doing exactly what everyone said you were doing to me. It was all a game, Blaze. Why did you lie to me? Why did you do that to me?

“You didn’t know me, and I never did anything to you to deserve being targeted like that!”

“Harmony.”

“Why’d you stop? Why did you stop?! You could have gotten what you wanted because there I was, lying beneath you, taking off my clothes like an idiot!”

He steps toward me. “Harmony, listen. I don’t want that anymore, okay? I...I don’t need that anymore.”

~Can I really trust him? When he’s such a master at deception?~

“You claimed James locked us in your room that night, but it was you who instructed him to do it, and you lied to me. I must have seemed so gullible to you!

“You probably found amusement in my innocence and foolishness. How many other lies have you fed me? Huh? How many?!”

A flicker of what appears to be regret crosses his eyes, and if he wasn’t such a skilled actor, I might have believed it.

“I’m sorry that—”

“That what? That I danced provocatively with you and allowed you to touch me when it was all part of your grand scheme to ~destroy~ me?”

He lets out a sigh. “Please don’t say that. It...it wasn’t all a scheme. Not all of it was a scheme, okay? I was feeling something...”

~Master of deception~.

“Really? You weren’t feeling anything!” I sobbed. “You’re cold and you’re heartless! What’s stopping you, huh? What stopped you just now from taking what you’ve been wanting from me?!”

He lets out a breath. “I don’t know.”

“What held you back?” I push, tears streaming down my face. “Do...you... Do you like me?”

His gaze softens and he remains silent, running a hand through his hair instead. His silence speaks volumes but I need to hear the answer from him.

“Do you?”

“I don’t know,” he whispers. “I mean, I can’t love anyone.”

~That stings.~

~No. It’s not that he can’t love anyone, he just doesn’t want to love me. He’s just not feeling anything for me.~

“The thing is, with you, I feel something, there is something there. But I don’t know what it is, okay? I have never felt like this before so I can’t explain it...”

“No, you have,” I respond softly. “You have, Blaze! You have felt this way with all the other girls you deceived. I ignored everyone!” My eyes are red from crying, my lips trembling uncontrollably.

“And you...you made a fool out of me.”

I turn to leave when he grabs my arm.

“Harmony. Wait.”

“Stay away from me please.” I yank my arm away as I open the door and storm out of his room.

I manage to reach my dorm while crying my eyes out. I slide onto the floor, my back against the door as I bury my head between my knees.

~“He’s just using you to get what he wants.”~

~“Be careful, he only wants one thing.”~

~“Blaze doesn’t befriend a girl unless he wants to sleep with her.”~

~“He only wants to take you to bed, honey.”~

~“Harmony, I am just worried for you. Stay away from him.”~

Everyone warned me, so I shouldn’t be this shocked. But it still hurts to realize that all this time I was just ~another girl~ on his list, and the fact that I made myself seem so available makes me even more heartbroken.

The main pain stems from the fact that I gave so much, and yet receive nothing in return but rejection and a confession that all he wanted was to take my innocence.

~I have fallen for him, and he clearly doesn’t feel the same. To him, I was only a diversion~.

My phone buzzes with a notification, and through my choked sobs, I pull it from my pocket to see a text from an unknown number.

Unknown

Hey, it’s Kite. I got your number from April. Did you get back safely?

I am too shattered to respond, so I hold my phone tightly in my hands and rest my head on my knees while the tears continue to flow down my face.

~“A scar I can’t reverse, and the more it heals, the worse it hurts. Gave you every piece of me no wonder it’s missin’. Don’t know how to be so close to someone so distant.” —MIIA.~