No velvety, warm skin pressed against my back. No dainty hand curled around my chest, palm laid flat against my heart. No silky, smooth legs entwined with mine. Reaching a hand across the bed, my bleary mind barely registered the absence. My eyelids were slow to open, my brain slow to wake up. Jaunty rays of sunshine bounced erratically around the room, promising a false warmth as I clutched the cold pillow to my face, grim reality catching up. Waking up alone never felt good, not since I’d been sharing a bed with Taylor.

She’d said she was going, made it clear the night before. The stark truth of an empty bed was still not enough to convince me she’d left. She was making coffee, that was all, my groggy head lied. Dejected, I laid for a few more seconds to delay the inevitable.

Despite the sun shining through the slatted blinds, the morning chill snaked across the room when I pulled the duvet down and swung to sit on the edge of the bed. I was thankful for the plush carpet underfoot when my feet touched the floor.

No coffee aroma proved my lies to be the truth.

Taylor was gone.

Tucking my chin to my chest, I let out a ragged sigh, rubbing sleep from my eyes and thinking back to the night before and our terse conversation. There was far more to Taylor leaving than wanting to spend time with her parents. She wasn’t letting me in on it, it was all guessing games this morning. All except the glaring reality of chilly sheets.

What had happened to her sister, Laura, had freaked her out, freaked us all out, and it was understandable she’d need time to come to terms with the events of last week. I still struggled at the sight of a terrified Laura, and dragging her and Lucca from a burning house. I’d figured she’d want to deal with her sister close by, not at her Dad’s three hundred miles away. I’d been too pussy to ask her what was going on, not wanting to hear her say she was leaving me, that she’d finally got sick of my blasé attitude and childish ways once and for all. I was a self-confessed man boy and often being with Taylor brought out my inner child, I was hard to take seriously at times. I’d nodded along, agreed it would be good for her to get away and recharge her batteries or whatever, only going a little nuts when she mentioned she wanted to drive up the next day. Her urgency to leave left me confused. Bitterness tinged the confusion.

I sat and indulged in a two-minute pity party, kicking myself for being a fucking twat then let the supressed anger seep through. She’d left me in a goddamned cold bed without so much as a ‘see you soon.’

Classy, Taylor. Fucking classy.

Yeah, I was pissed off now I’d turned my mind to how I was really feeling over being abandoned. See - man boy. I should have been sporting a petty lip and screaming ‘it’s not fair!’

What a low, cowardly blow, Taylor.

Bending forward, I tugged my jeans toward me. Why Taylor hadn’t reamed me a new one over leaving them on the floor suddenly became clear. Guilty, she’d been feeling guilty for what she was about to do. She’d planned it that way. Searching my jeans pocket, I fished out my phone and called her.

“Nice wake up, sweetheart.” I said sarcastically when she answered several rings later.

“I told you I was going up today.”

“What? In the middle of the fucking night? It’s barely 8 o’clock in the morning, Taylor.”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

The background noise was too quiet, no cars rushing by, no hum of an engine, no music. She wasn’t in the car, I could tell that much. “Where are you?”

“At my dad’s.”

I pulled the phone from my ear and simply stared at the thing. I wasn’t stupid. If she was there already, she’d left at silly o’clock in the morning. “You couldn’t wake me?” I shouted at the phone as I held it in front of me.

“Don’t yell at me.”

“Excuse me! Sorry for being upset my girlfriend snuck out of our bed in the middle of the night and fucked off!”

Yeah, I was shouting all right and I wasn’t going to apologise for it. Taylor had royally pissed me the fuck off. Her lame arsed excuse she needed a time out didn’t wash with me in the slightest, I should have listened to my gut the night before.

“What the fuck’s gotten into you?” I asked as sedately as I could. Slumping down on the bed, I pulled my legs under the duvet and thumped my head back on the pillows.

“I told you, I had things to sort out.”

The hitch in her voice meant she was close to tears and all of a sudden, I felt like a prick for shouting at her. I’d never want to make her cry, but this was some weird shit and she’d lied about her reasoning to leave. “What did I do?”

“Nothing!” This time, Taylor shouted. I wasn’t buying her crock of shit although I supposed there wasn’t much I could do about it on the other end of the phone.

“Right. When will you be home?” Silence met the perfectly reasonable question and I waited with baited breath for her answer. It wasn’t coming quick enough for me. “Taylor...” The plea was there, insecurity blanketing her name from my lips. “What did I do, baby?” I whispered.

She wouldn’t leave me on a whim, or off the back of some silly half argument we’d had the night before surely? There was more, far more, but Taylor wasn’t forthcoming.

“I have to go. Dad’s got breakfast.”

Not even time for goodbye, she hung up and left me hanging in the air again, no clearer about her intentions than when I’d woken in an empty bed.

Taylor Hamilton walked back into my life a year ago. It had been a year since my heart had found its rhythm again. A year since my breaths had come easier. I missed her already.

Yet, it had only been a few hours. Mere hours since my life had ground to a halt. Since we’d stalled. Was that the right word?

To stall was to stop or delay - said so right there in the dictionary.

Stop or delay.

Whichever - they hurt my heart and stifled my breath. Taylor captured both the first time we’d met, stolen them the second time. I could only dream there would be a third.

Stop or delay.

She’d done neither when she’d walked out the door. No whispered words. No sweet, I’ll hurry home, kisses. No saccharine love-note.

I launched my phone across the room and burrowed back under the duvet. The world could go fuck itself today. I had nothing to say to anyone anyway.