Too late - Eris
Eris hasn’t been himself since you left him 6 years ago
You had big dreams of going to college and making something of yourself, dreams you’d only whisper to him under the soft glow of your phone flashlight under pillow forts
He lost touch with you sometime during college, you left him behind to inherent his family’s business and you barely came back to visit after graduating college
He still follows you on all of your socials and he’ll be the first person to like all of your drunken, blurry shenanigans, all of your coastal pictures with bright waves and sunshine, all of your new friends and new boyfriends
Sometimes he feels like he doesn’t even recognize the person you’ve become when scrolling through your profiles, remembering how you said you hated snow and yet he sees you in ski gear, or how you were one for a small, close knit group and yet you posted a picture from a large friend group a bright side smile on your face
You’re unrecognizable in your pictures yet you look like you haven’t changed at all, your smile is still so wide your cheeks must hurt, and you still wear those dirty now-brown white converse and that vintage band t-shirt, your hair is still messy and you still make that goofy face in almost every photo; eyes crossed and cheeks puffed out
It’s easy to tell that he regrets not leaving with you
It’s not like you didn’t offer, in fact you almost begged him
He remembers that day in vivid detail, right down to the shadows dancing in your eyes, begging him to ditch his no good family behind and start over
“Come with me” you had whispered, his hands on your waist, you were watching him so intently and he wanted nothing than to run away with you, but deep down he knew he couldn’t just leave
He couldn’t leave his brothers even if they were beyond help at this point and he couldn’t do that to his mother, leave with no explanation
So when you were biting your lip, making promises of how it’s you and him against the world, of never looking back and headed towards a bigger and brighter future, he found himself taking a step away from you
The next morning, he wanted to call you, to drive over, to beg to take it all back, he’d go anywhere with you if you’d let him. But he didn’t know what to say, so instead he kept silent
If someone were to ask him about that night, how you left soon after, he’d say he didn’t regret it but the truth was that he did. He regretted it deeply, but the truth was that he didn’t let himself feel the regret
It was too late for him to do anything about it anyway
He hated seeing your face when he said he couldn’t go with you, how he said he had to stay here, and you both knew it was an empty promise that you two would stay in touch, make long distance work
Long distance didn’t last long, he didn’t even drive you up to college like he promised he would
He couldn’t say goodbye to you, he didn’t know how to say goodbye
So he sent a text to you the morning of, knowing you’d be packing up your blue Toyota, a quick ‘drive safe. I’ll miss you. See you soon’
Sometimes, after he’s had a few and feeling like talking a walk down memory lane he’ll pull up the text conversation between you and him. That morning he could feel the anger and hurt through the simple ‘thanks.’
To your credit, you tried to do the long distance, tried the phone calls and text messages but Eris had already let you go at that point, and when you had texted ‘coming home for thanksgiving. want to do something?’ He didn’t even let himself feel happiness at the prospect of seeing you again, he didn’t even answer
By that point he has forced himself to move on with some girl who’s father his own father was close to, and so when you stumbled into him while grocery shopping, he watched your face harden and your eyes turn to ice
He could tell how much you hated him, and that was the end of it, maybe before that but when asked when it was officially over, he’d point to that moment
He never heard from you ever again
And like those months before, he felt like he should’ve reached out to you, to apologize and take everything back
But like before, he didn’t know how, didn’t know what to say, so he left it go
So now he does what he has to do, he learns the family business, prepares to take over the business and watches you from a distance
He isn’t himself, his father and brothers may not notice as much, but his mother can see and can see the hurt and sadness he carries with him
He drives around at night, through the surrounding town and areas, reliving every aspect of your relationship, of happier and simpler times, back when he drive a 10-year old Chevy and you liked blasting the radio way too loud
He doesn’t let himself hope for a happy ending with you, he knows that time has passed, but he hopes that you are happy, he hopes that with every one of his likes on your photos and with every unsent text message he types out to you
He knows he won’t be happy without you, but he hopes you are, because you deserve to be happy, even if you can’t be that with him, here
Knows it’s too late, no matter what his mother might try to tell him, telling him he’ll regret it all if he doesn’t at least try
He hasn’t had the words for 6 years and he’s unsure if he’ll ever find them
But if he ever does, if he ever lets himself be somewhat hopeful, he knows you’ll be the first person he’ll text
But for now, he just drives and wonders what you’re doing now, what you’re thinking about, and if you’re okay











