julien :
In all their years of knowing each other, Julien had never seen Ivy this mad. Or maybe he had but it was always at Eli or something…he’d never seen her this mad at him. He didn’t know what to do. He was hearing her words and he was feeling her wrath but he was still at a loss. What did she want from him? Julien’s eyes followed Ivy as she turned around and steadied herself against the piano, but she quickly whipped back around when he vocalized that she as making him feel worse. Just like that she was back to yelling at him and he was back to staring at her in a wrecked disbelief as his face got hot. “Okay, fine—” he started to shout back, frustrated, but he was cut off once again. At some point in Ivy’s rant, she lost him, and he looked at her with his mouth hung open and brows knitted together. “What are you even talking about? That’s not how I see you,” he interrupted, rubbing his face furiously as if that would somehow help alleviate the immense stress he was under. As she continued to yell, Julien dropped his hands to his sides with a loud clap and groaned, “I am listening to you.” Well, wasn’t he? Wasn’t he taking all of the vicious words being hurled at him? Julien hated being in the hot seat like this. He really tried to be a good person, to do the right thing, and yet here he still was. Couldn’t Ivy see that he was trying and that he didn’t mean any harm? His inner monologue came to a screeching halt when he thought he heard Ivy say she wasn’t giving him any more time. “What?” he asked as he was violently brought back down to earth. He wanted to ask more questions and explain himself, but he couldn’t out talk her. Every time he opened his mouth to speak, she was already getting her next thought out. A different kind of panic started to settle in around him. The warmth was gone from Ivy’s eyes and her words were merciless. “Ivy, please,” he started, but he faltered. There were so many things he could say: Ivy, please, calm down. Ivy, please, just give me some time. Ivy, please, let me fix this. But his thoughts ceased to exist when she said she hated him. A suffocating silence enveloped them slowly and with each second that passed, Julien had a harder and harder time breathing. “You don’t,” he countered, but his voice came out small. This was Julien’s worst nightmare. One hour ago, if someone asked him what the worst thing he’d ever done was, he would’ve said breaking Rory’s heart. But now, standing here with crying, broken down and furious Ivy, he knew this was it. She never even got mad at him and now here she was hating him. “You don’t mean that,” he said quickly once she reiterated her point, unwilling to accept that this was now their reality. Julien felt nauseous. What had he done? What was he doing? Why was it still so hard for him to say the right thing? But then when he thought about it, he realized that words weren’t what Ivy needed to feel better. He instinctively opened his arms and stepped towards her, eyes pleading, wanting nothing more than to just hold her until all the bad feelings disappeared. “Just…” Julien cautiously and slowly started to close his arms around her, “let me.”
IF IT WASN’T ALREADY OBVIOUS, THERE WAS NO GOAL IN MIND AS IVY CONTINUED ON HER RAMPAGE. she had thought she was hurt when she had broken up with leo and he was initially non-responsive, but it was different with julien. leo had frequently been unemotional, but julien was nothing of the sort and apart from the initial incidents it hurt that any remorse or regret he showed had only come after ivy started tearing into him. it only added kindling to the steadily growing fire beneath her heart that caused it to jerk in a million different directions. it was easy to succumb to the anger, there had been a new anger birthed in her weeks ago when she found she had been pregnant, since then it had only gradually built and built and now julien was on it’s receiving end. this was the turning point, julien’s actions had tipped the scales, and that landed him directly in the line of fire spurned from weeks of accumulated pain. she just wanted him to believe he had hurt her. no asking for time, or pleading with her, or contradicting her. but at this point she wasn’t sure if she got all three of those things and had them charted out for her she’d stop chugging along her furious path. despite a wild and icy look glazed over her gaze, the sorrow in her expression slipped through that defense and down her cheeks with a burning warmth. her rage had settled from screaming and pointing fingers into a quiet and arguably more powerful one. “i do mean it.” she whispered, her voice wavering as she stared up at him. ivy didn’t move a muscle to speak, but as her teary blues locked onto julien’s own gaze it was a powerful and silent action that communicated, ‘open your eyes and look at us.’. ivy wanted to be adored, she wanted validation, she wanted to be loved. these were things she knew, but didn’t often reflect upon. she also knew julien was similar in the way he craved being liked and accepted, with all the time she had spent with him she had figured that much. and because of this? well it hurt all the more when someone like julien, someone who deep down understood that desperation of being liked, never seemed to be able to choose her, or consider her feelings which he should be naturally on beat with like she was his. on a deeper level, beyond what she’d already yelled about for the past ten minutes, it cut into her that julien couldn’t see why this was so painful when in theory he should perfectly understand her. this quiet stare and acknowledgement propelled her forward to repeat, “i hate you, julien.” just saying the words felt bad, but she wasn’t sure how else to get this conglomerate of emotion across. ivy wiped her tears quickly and with both hands, looking at the clock to see how much time she’d have to fix her make up before she needed to get back as julien moved in to hold her. the closer he drew, the nearer a reprieve from all these feelings felt. she couldn’t. she hadn’t stood up for herself like this just to foolishly hand her heart back over to julien. “no, i can’t. stop!” ivy said, firmly planting her hands on his chest and pushing him off, which, only made her want to cry more, “i don’t want you to hold me julien, did you like not hear a word i said? i hate you.” she drove the point home with a sniffle. a quick look at the clock told her she only had about five minutes and a face that would probably take ten to fix. there was no time for this. “i just. . . i have to like get ready to go on.” she murmured, desperately swiping away at the tears she wished had never even come. ivy nodded a little at him,to reiterate she meant it. even if she wasn’t positive she had, she wanted him to think she was certain. then, her cruel glance turned away from julien and into the hallway as she made her final exit.
END.

















