Perfect Match (48 page)

Just after I closed the door, I felt so relieved. I sighed and smiled to myself and wondered where I should go. Maybe I should see Matt and tell him… something. But then when I was on the street and the cab stopped so quickly, there was only one place where I wanted to go.

The ride to Gabrielle’s apartment wasn’t too long, about 15 minutes where I could happily smile and express my happiness and then I jumped on the stairs until I reached her apartment.

“Hey!” she said opening the door quicker than usual. “Come in. What do you mean Matt and Monica broke up?” she asked getting right to the point.

“I don’t- I don’t know, it’s just I feel so…”

“Happy? In love? Happy?” Gabrielle asked with a laugh.

“Yeah. But a little sad, too. You should’ve seen her, and man she looked awful. I mean not awful-awful, because she is still Monica, but…”

“Look, I love Monica, but I’ve seen you that way and trust me, it’s not nice. Obviously, right now I should be a good friend to you and express my reticence about the fact that you and Matt could actually be together right now since there’s nothing stopping you, but, Emma… He has hurt you before and what he has done was really, really bad. And you know, once a cheater…”

“Gabrielle!” I complained as I sat on her couch and took a bite from one of the cookies standing on the coffee tables. “These are good.”

“Yeah, I made them for Jensen. Hey, do you know I ended things with Shia? It wasn’t working anymore.”

“What?” I asked totally caught off guard. “I’m so happy!” I said as I jumped and hugged her. “Now you’re gonna date Jensen Ackles and make super cute babies!”

“If you say so…” Gabrielle replied and for once I was surprised by the fact that she wasn’t saying ‘no’ anymore. “I know you love Matt and in a weird, but very, very weird way he loves you, too, but he’s a douche bag and a jerk and a…”

“Okay, skip to the good part,” I told her with a smile.

“But… I don’t know I’m not sure about this. What’s gonna happen to Monica now? Or… Alex? What would you do about Alex?”

“I don’t know I didn’t even talk to Matt yet…”

“You didn’t?” she asked completely surprised. “Then what are you doing here, woman? Go talk to him.”

“I don’t know,” I repeated and ran a hand through my hair. “You should’ve seen Monica, so sad and…”

I wanted to say more, but the knock on the door stopped me. I looked at Gabrielle with a raised eyebrow, thinking that it was obviously Jensen and she gave me a smile as she walked towards the door.

“Matt!” Gabrielle exclaimed and I froze. Matt? Here?

“Hey, Gabs,” he said as he entered the room and stopped when he saw me on the couch. “Oh. Bad time?” he asked as he looked at Gabrielle, and she and I exchanged confused looks.

“No, of course not, come in,” Gaby said as she closed the door behind him.

For a moment I could actually feel the tension in the air, you could’ve cut it with a steak knife, and I never felt more uncomfortable in my life.

“Anything to drink, Matt?” Gaby asked as he sat on the couch a little too far from me.

“Oh yeah, anything would be great,” he said and Gabrielle turned on her high heels and left the room.

“Hey,” I said as I gave him a little smile and he smiled back.

“Hey, Ems. So, I was actually… Looking for you,” he said as he shoved his hands into his pockets.

“Oh. Okay. What happened?”

“I don’t know. Monica and I had this big fight last night… At the Christmas party, except I… can’t remember why and… what the hell I did last night.”

No. This
can’t
be happening.

I looked at him, completely off guard and opened my mouth to say something, but nothing came out. Was he sorry about his break up with Monica? Did he remember telling
me
that he loved me? Why was he even here anyway?

“I’m sorry, I… I don’t know what to do.”

“About?”

“About the fact that Monica and I broke up and I know she… must really hate me, considering I had to sleep at a hotel last night and she isn’t answering my calls and… Have you seen her?”

“Yes… She came to my place, but I left her with Rick.”

“Oh. Good. The same Rick who’s in love with my girlfriend,” he said sarcastically.

“What… Do you… No, forget it.”

“Forget what?” he asked harshly and I felt how my whole world was falling down. “Look, I can’t do that to her! I promised her I won’t hurt her!”

“What? Really? You promised
her
? But what about me, Matthew? What about hurting me? You really don’t care about that, right?”

“It’s not that, it’s just the fact that I want to…”

“No, save it. I understand. Go talk to Monica, kiss her, marry her, whatever. I don’t care!” I said as I got up from the couch and ran a hand through my hair and sighed.

Why did I even think he’d break up with her for me? That he’d come to me and tell me that we can finally be together now? I wanted to kill him right now, for always giving me hopes and after breaking them like they didn’t matter. They mattered to
me
.

There was another knock on the door and Gabrielle popped out of nowhere and in the door was none other than Jensen.

“Hey, beautiful,” he said as he kissed her before noticing we were there. In a normal moment, Matt and I would’ve made fun of it, but right now it was just really uncomfortable. “Oh! The kid’s here!” Jensen exclaimed as he noticed me there and came to hug me like we were old friends. “Don’t tell me. I wanna guess. So…” he took a few steps closer and looked at Matt. “With my personal experience, I’d say you are… Matthew?”

“Personal experience?” Gabrielle laughed as she took his arm and laughed.

“Yep. So are you Matt?” Jensen asked looking at him.

“Yes. Nice to meet you, Jensen. I was really glad to hear you’re dating Gabrielle.”

“But I never said…”

“I might have,” I said and Jensen laughed as he came to sit on the couch, right between me and Matt and placed his arm around my shoulders.

“So, kid… What’s new? Matt? What’s with this tension around here?”

“Um… Maybe we should just-“Gabrielle started, but Jensen stopped her.

“No, I wanna know. So what’s it about this time?” the actor asked looking from Matt to me.

“Nothing,” Matt replied with a harsh tone.

“Oh, okay, someone’s mad. Cookies! Don’t you have some pie, sweetheart?” Jensen asked as he took a cookie.

“No, I don’t have pie,” Gabrielle replied as she rolled her eyes. “But could you please, come for a second?”

“It takes more than a second, sweetheart,” Jensen replied and winked at her in a very sexy way. “And I’d love to, but I wanna know what’s happening here,” he said as he pointed at Matt and me.

Okay, this was rather uncomfortable. Obviously, Jensen knew about us, considering when Matt and Monica got engaged I came here and he had to listen to all my complaining and everything, but Matt doesn’t know that Jensen knows and it suddenly turned into something really awkward.

“Monica and I broke up,” Matt said and I was really surprised he said that.

“Oh, I like that, keep going!”

“And I need to talk to Emma. In private,” Matt continued as he looked at me.

“See? You like gossips more than a girl. You really should stop watching
Real Housewives
, Jensen,” Gabrielle pointed and I laughed.

“Okay, okay,” Jensen agreed. “But quickly, let me tell you my opinion. You, kid, didn’t do what I said and I’m a little mad at you, but it’s okay, I still like you. Now, Matt, I think it’s awesome that you broke up with Monica because you didn’t love her and eventually it would all come out and someone would’ve suffered more. That would be Monica, I think. Or Emma, and I don’t enjoy that possibility. So, now stop being a stupid prick as you are, and just take advantage and cherish what you have. That is Emma. Okay, Gabrielle, I’ll stop now,” he said as he followed her out of the room. “Oh, that would be 100 bucks for couple therapy,” Jensen joked and I couldn’t hide my smile.

After they left there was again an awful silence and all I could think was how great things seemed when Monica came to my place and told me she and Matt broke up, but now Matt didn’t remember the fact that he told me he’d broke up with Monica for
me
.

“Let’s take a walk, shall we?” Matt asked as he got up from the couch and stretched his hand out for me.

I nodded and we silently exited Gabrielle’s apartment and walked in silence for a few minutes. But right now, holding his hand didn’t feel as awkward or uncomfortable. It was the good kind of silence I always had with Matt and I wondered if he felt that, too. I remember a particular line from
Pulp Fiction
, a movie I didn’t enjoy at all, but Matt made me watch it because it was “bad ass”, where Mia says “
That's when you know you've found somebody special. When you can just shut the fuck up for a minute and comfortably enjoy the silence.
” And the most annoying part is that I understood that.

Gabrielle’s apartment wasn’t too far from the beach so we were there in no time, walking in silence like we did in our best times. It was a sunny day, and the beach wasn’t crowded so we could walk on the warm sand until we decided to stop.

“So… What will we do now?” Matt asked as he looked at me with a smirk on his lips.

“What do you mean?”

“C’mon, am I such a good actor?” he asked before he started laughing.

I looked at him and tried to understand why was he laughing, but it was just too hard to focus with the sun shines in his hair and his beautiful smile and the fact that now, after nearly ten months he was single again and we were sitting together on a beach. I wasn’t single, but I didn’t bother thinking about Alex too much.

“I do remember what I told you last night, Ems,” he said as he took my hand in his. “I mean, I don’t remember everything, but it’s just… It’s not something you say just because you’re drunk as hell, although I was and let me tell you it’s awful, considering my huge headache, but I’d say that drunk or sober, because that’s what I feel. I love you.”

I sighed and tried to remember how to breathe correctly, since my heart was already pounding in my chest. I felt tears in my eyes and I had no idea why, but all I know was that I was so happy I couldn’t even describe it in words. There were no words for what I felt.

“I feel bad about Monica,” I burst out and he frowned for a moment then placed his arm on my shoulders and I smiled as I inhaled his manly perfume, the scent that would always drive me crazy.

“I know, me too.”

For a while we didn’t say anything, I was just sitting there with my head on his shoulder and his arm around me and everything felt better. Safe.

“So what now, Ems?” he finally asked after a few minutes of silence.

“I don’t know,” I replied sincerely and turned to look at him. “We could just…”

“Take it slow,” he completed my sentence and I nodded, a little bit uncomfortable by the fact that he was reading my mind, but also happy because he understood me so well.

“So you’re not going back to Monica, are you?” I asked as I grabbed his hand.

“Do you want me to?”

“No! Obviously not,” I hurried to say and he smiled and ran his hand through my hair. “I just… want to know what will happen. With Monica, Alex…
us
.”

“What I’m gonna say… is gonna sound really selfish, but you know me, Ems, and you know I’m arrogant and selfish, obviously not when it comes to you, but… I really don’t care what happens to Monica and Alex right now,” he whispered as he leaned and kissed my cheek. “As for us… We’re taking it slow. Even though I’m not really excited about that.”

“Why not?”

“Because. Plus I have to make sure everything will go right this time. And that you don’t hate me anymore for what happened to Monica. Because…”

“I never hated you,” I said and he smiled.

“That’s good. It’s actually… Good,” he said and I nodded. “I love Christmases,” he finally said and slowly ran his hand down my back. “You always make my Christmas perfect, Ems.”

“Yeah, I know, I’m awesome,” I said and he started laughing.

“Don’t take too much credit for that, you learned from the best.”

“Who, Alex?” I asked laughing and his expression changed completely, which made it even funnier. “I was kidding, Nicholls,” I said still laughing.

“That’s not a good joke. You know what, that’s not even a joke!” he said as he released my arm and took his hand from my shoulders. “It’s just mean, because that stupid-“

“I love you,” I said and he stopped for a second then leaned on me and kissed me softly, my heart stopping for a second.

I immediately kissed him back, placing my hand around his neck and his hand resting on my back while the other one slowly caressed my cheek. It felt just perfect and as our kiss deepened I felt like I really couldn’t be happier.

“Still not a good joke, love,” Matt said as he pulled away and I just laughed and rested my head on his shoulder.

*

Matt walked me home after we watched the sunset together and talked the whole day and laughed and everything couldn’t have been more perfect. We had dinner at a little restaurant near the beach and he held my hand on the way home and basically, I was happy.

I didn’t even think about Monica or Alex or anyone else for that matter, because I think I was as selfish as Matt and all that mattered then was that he was here now and that’s it. I avoided Alex’s phone calls, but Matt said I will eventually have to talk to him, and I knew that. It was just too hard, considering he knew from the start I was attracted to Matt and I denied that fiercely and now we were kind of dating? While I was still dating Alex? Yeah, Matt and I were definitely alike.

“Don’t worry about it,” Matt said as we reached my apartment. “Alec will understand.”

“It’s Alex,” I said laughing and he shrugged his shoulders. “But maybe he won’t. And he’ll hate me. And we work together and it would be so awful…”

“No, it won’t. You work with
me
.
Alec
is unimportant,” he said as he leaned and kissed me. “So talk to him.”

“I can’t break up with him on the phone, Nicholls, it wouldn’t be nice.”