Do you have to let it linger? part 3
A/N: LFG ok this chapter is shorter because next chapter ya’ll… home stretch also I’m changing my formatting some I’m sorry I’m new to this yall.
CW: yearning, angst, arguing
Schlaggot answer me bitch
You startle out of your dream from your phone hitting the floor and buzzing. You stir and try to slow your heart, blinding yourself with the phone screen.
“You gotta tell me what happened,” a serious voice responds.
“4 am,” Ted responds plainly.
“Can it wait like 4 more hours?” You say putting it on speaker and laying the phone next to your pillow.
“No. Not a chance. I just got off the phone with a one Jonathan Schlatt, and I need to know now.”
“No man, I want to ask YOU.”
“Why though? you were just talking to him?”
“He was in a mood. I don’t like to pry when he gets like that, it just drives him away more.”
You could understand that. You knew what kind of mood he was referring to. When schlatt gets burnt out or depressed it’s totally shut off mode. When he’s done with something he’s DONE. He’s pretty candid with his surface feelings but there were deeper thoughts you knew he didn’t share with anyone.
“I don’t know what you want me to do.”
“Look y/n I know it’s not my business- no fuck that! These are my best friends, this is my business. Why haven’t you been answering calls or texts? total silence from you. Not just to schlatt but all of us,” as he points out the obvious, your tears break free towards your pillow. “What. Happened.” Ted demands now very sternly.
You explain to Ted how you and schlatt got hot and heavy too fast and you stopped him. How caring schlatt was, how understanding and supportive. How you’ve been trying to push your feelings for him away but you liked him more than he pretended to like you online to the audience. You realized you weren’t joking anymore and when schlatt said he wanted to remain friends you needed to put some distance. That meant total radio silence for a while to get over your feelings.
“I really do like him. And he just doesn’t feel the same. And I was stupid for thinking the joke could be real. I thought I was invincible to it and like I couldn’t fall for someone again but no. Here I am. I have feelings for a guy with fucking mutton chops,” you borderline yell at the end. You sigh after a couple beats of silence, “I’m glad we didn’t go further though cuz then I’d really feel like a fucking fool.” You weren’t crying anymore, just mad.
“Well, maybe you can explain this to Schlatt, so he doesn’t think you’re mad at him,” Ted says after a while.
“I am mad at him!” You pause hearing Ted’s confusion, “He just doesn’t know why… and I’m not really mad at him. Just upset? Ugh dude I don’t fucking know.” You shove your face in your pillow and scream.
“Well feel the feelings you need to, but I think if you care about schlatt you’ll tell him you just need space or like your goldfish died or something I don’t know, man. Just communicate.”
“I love you buddy. It’s gonna be alright.”
“Yeah I know, just sucks.”
“For what it’s worth, I do think Schlatt cares about you. I don’t know why he decided to friendzone you-“
“Ew don’t say that word.”
“Whatever. Come over this weekend let’s go do some shit and get you out of this funk,” He says wrapping up the call. Agreeing with Ted you hang up and pass out again.
You get up later in the morning and decide to stream today. You hadn’t streamed since the schlatt stream because you didn’t want to endure the bombardment of chat. It figures that you did an in person stream with Schlatt right before you guys established your relationship as friends so now the whole community thinks you guys are a thing. Of fucking course.
The week had been full of working out and going into the dance studio to work on dancing videos. you distracted yourself with coming up with new video ideas and choreo to do. You focused on the work that didn’t involve schlatt at all to help your creative flow.
You set up your piano, your computer, microphone, etc. putting your lights on and getting into the headspace. You hadn’t decided if you were going to do an album breakdown, just play some covers, or watch videos. You knew at the very least you could give them an update of upcoming projects.
As you set up the tweet, the “stream starting” screen, and messaged a couple mods, you grabbed your guitar and held it idly. You could feel the hesitation in your body. You felt heavy now trying to work up the courage and energy to turn the camera on. You hadn’t been particularly depressed about the whole situation, just numb. Seeing the chats roll through however started to form a brick in your throat. You finally sighed and pulled the trigger.
“Chat,” you started immediately, “no schlatt today. Let’s get that out of the way,” you gesture around the room. “So, I’ve been busy this week in the studio, I haven’t had a second to breathe.” (Lie) “and I want to give you guys 10 minutes to ask schlatt questions then we’re gonna move on,” you continue.
You start reading chat as you speak, “and after the ten minutes is up if you mention Schlatt you’re gonna be in a timeout the rest of the stream.”
Omfg you and schlatt are so cute
Hey y/n! where’s Schlatt?
Do you live with him now?
Omg did something happen?
“Ok, Schlatt went home that same day we streamed, so no we don’t live together and no we aren’t dating. I don’t know what to tell you guys other than that Schlatt and I really are just friends,” you finish as the chats keep coming.
You feel your phone vibrate next to you and subtly look to see who it is.
Of course. Schlatt. calling again.
You put your phone on DND and keep reading the chats. As you read you get a couple TTS.
“Hey y/n, you and schlatt have great chemistry, do you have a crush on him? All the love!”
“Hey thanks oopygoopy, no I don’t have a crush on Schlatt.”
“Answer your phone bitch.”
Schlatt again. This time he donated to the stream.
You ignore him and message a mod to tell them to put him in time out for the rest of the stream while chat freaks out.
“Alright chat we’re gonna get started. I want to do an album review today…” you ignore chat and start up a new album to listen to with chat and discuss the themes and harmonies. You really just needed a couple more hours to figure out what to say to schlatt.
After 3 hours, an album review, and some keyboard breakdowns of the harmonies, you decide to wrap up the stream, “guys, I’m done. I’ll be on tomorrow with some covers and requests! Thank you for all the love, bye!”
You make sure the stream is shut down and pick up your phone.
You click it to call schlatt back.
Schlatt’s ceiling pops up on screen.
“Hey.” You say after a couple moments of silence.
“Really?” You hear from off screen. “A week of nothing and you say hey?” You can hear him chewing on something.
Awkward silence, followed by rustling and chewing.
“JAMBO STOP,” more rustling. “JAMBOOOO”
The camera shifts, you can’t help but laugh. You stop yourself by leaning your mouth in your hand.
“So what’d I do?” He asks casually, his eyebrows come into frame.
“Nothing. It’s not you,” you start before he interrupts.
“No don’t fucking start with me. What did I do? You’re ignoring me.”
“To be fair I’ve been ignoring everyone.”
“Yeah but you’ve been ignoring me.”
“You’re not special,” you say, rolling your eyes.
“Yes I am. Don’t fuck with me y/n.” He was joking around a little but you could tell he was genuinely hurt and pissed.
“I just needed some space. I think I've been a little burnt out is all.”
Silence. You shift uncomfortably as he continues to chew on the invisible food.
“Is it because I kissed you?” Schlatt says bluntly.
“No, just forget it dude.” you sigh and shake your head. It was hard to come up with an excuse other than just telling him about your feelings.
“Well everything was fine until after the wedding so-“
“Dude fucking drop it ok? I just need some space.”
“I’m sorry that I did that,” he says.
Silence this time with no chewing.
“It’s not about the kiss, schlatt.” You sighed, “I’m not sorry it happened. I wanted it to happen.” Your stomach churned and you felt your heart pumping in your ears.
“It was pretty hot,” schlatt finally scoffs.
“That’s not what I mean!”
“Spit it out then, toots.”
“I liked it, I've wanted you to kiss me for years. Because I have a big fat crush on you,” you spit out.
Silence, schlatt’s face mostly on screen at this point. He had a look of disbelief spread across it, his eyes darting all over the screen.
“You’re fucking with me?” He responds.
All you can do is shake your head.
“I didn’t want to say anything because I don’t want this to ruin our friendship because I know you don’t feel the same. And I really care about our friendship more than my stupid crush on you. And I can’t keep enduring your fake flirting it fucking sucks,” your word vomit spilling out now. “And I thought if I put distance between us I could get over it and then we could just go back to being friends again.”
“You decided to ignore me? That’s not distance. You don’t fucking know how I feel, why would you assume-“ he stops himself and throws his phone down, his face disappears from the screen and you two sit in silence for a long time. “God you can be so stupid.” He says exasperated.
“Fucking whatever dude. I just figured I’d tell you the truth so you’d leave me the fuck alone. I gotta go.” You suddenly hang up before he can respond. You throw your phone down in anger. You were done being tortured in this way. It hurt. You didn’t know if it was the right choice to just tell him but it was out there now. You didn’t know how you wanted him to respond, but it wasn’t like that. He didn’t have to be such an asshole.
He doesn’t text, he doesn’t call. You text Ted and tell him what happened and when he tries to call you don’t answer. It’s hard enough not to cry as it is, if you talk to Ted right now there’s no way you won’t.
You sit down with your guitar and start to idly play without thinking, you play linger by the cranberries. As you play your chest gets tight and your tears break free.
Oh, I thought the world of you
I thought nothing could go wrong
But I was wrong, I was wrong
If you, if you could get by
Things wouldn't be so confused
And I wouldn't feel so used
But you always really knew
I just want to be with you
You feel it all finally. You worked so hard to resist feeling feelings for someone for so long. Scared of what happened before. Having feelings for someone makes you weak and easier to break. You used music to express your feelings and tried to seal them off the rest of the time. This time they seeped out after the end of the song as you cried openly.
For the past two weeks you streamed yourself doing covers, learning songs, or in the dance studio coming up with choreo. The feelings coming out in the art. You played covers of songs you and schlatt listened to on streams trying not to tear up. You let yourself feel a little more openly in front of the audience. They may have been catching on, but if they were you were good at ignoring them. In between streams you worked on recording videos, wrote lyrics and worked on some songs you had been working on for a while. It was a creatively productive time.
You had put schlatt’s messages and calls on silence, but it didn’t matter because he didn’t try to message you. You tried not to notice. Of course you noticed. You hoped maybe he would call and try to say sorry or fix what he had done but he hadn’t. It made you mad to be honest. You tried not to stalk his profiles to see what he was doing but he was silent for the most part on that end too.
Ted on the other hand was messaging constantly. Well as much as he could, he was working on a video and was distracted. Every night he would call though and chat even if he was just on call while editing. He was trying to be supportive. You appreciated how much Ted cared but didn’t overstep. When you initially told Ted what happened after the call he was confused. He didn’t understand why Schlatt reacted the way he did. You didn’t either to be fair. You did feel bad for ignoring him instead of communicating, but because of the way he reacted you felt justified in a way.
As Friday rolled around, and your stream was done for the day, you drove home from the dance studio to shower. You were feeling in high spirits for a change and stopped for food on your way home. When you got home you decided you were going to relax, watch tv, and just do some self care. You hadn’t been taking very good care of yourself and felt like doing your brows and a face mask might help. Maybe even do your nails. The night was young. You even decided to drink a little. As you bundled up under your blankets on the couch watching some comedy you heard a knock on your door.
You got off your couch and set down your drink. Before you walked to the door you inspected yourself. You had sweatpants and a tank top on, hair up and glasses on. You grab a zip up hoodie near the door and throw it on. Nothing fancy, but you figured you should cover up a little more.
As you made your way to the door you put your ear up to see if you could hear who it was, silence on the other end refused to betray the visitor so you slowly opened the door.
Schlatt standing in the hall looked at you sheepishly as you peered out. You suddenly swung the door open all the way to stare at the tall man in shock. He was wearing a crewneck, dark pants, and the classic cap. He had a duffel over his arm and headphones around his neck. Despite his towering height he was cowering.
“Hey?” You questioned. “What are you doing here?” You asked plainly. Your heart speeding up nevertheless, you could feel the words getting caught in your throat as you spoke.
“Came to see you. Can I come in?”
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