The door led into a room with cleaning supplies and from it to the kitchen. It had white floors and walls with silver workspaces running along it except for where an oven, sinks, frying table, and the likes had been slotted in.

"Don't," someone said and Errol halted our steps. He also let go of my hand. I wanted to reach out to him. Hold him somehow to ground myself. But I didn't.

"Only the floor left?" Errol asked, and I looked over his shoulder to see the kitchen clearer. All surfaces I saw looked spotless. Except the floor, which a man was currently scrubbing.

"Aye, ye're it for the floor tomorrow," the man answered. He wore a chef's jacket like Errol and had blond hair long enough it was in a ponytail. "Hang on an' I'll make a path for ye. Mary got the others started already."

The man pushed water out of the way to make a semi-dry path across the kitchen.

"This is Cameron," Errol introduced the man when we were halfway through the room. "An' Cameron, this is Alasdair."

The man raised his eyebrows before narrowing his eyes at me. His scrutiny made me want to use Errol as a shield. I didn't, though. Errol was there next to me, after all. If I needed any type of help, he'd give me some. So I straightened my back and held my hand forwards. The man, Cameron, dried his hand off on a towel hanging at his waist before shaking my hand.

"Well, I've heard a lot about ye," he said, and I wanted to hide again.

There was just something about him which irked me. Got under my skin and crawled there. In so many other situations in my life, I would have ignored that feeling. Would have written it off as just some random feeling without substance. Or my own insecurity playing with me. The latter could still be the case. But the way his blue eyes looked at me with ice made me certain the insecurity I felt in front of him wasn't completely unfounded.

He did not like me.

"I'll join as soon as I'm done with the scrubbin'," Cameron told Errol.

"Ye said ye were beat an' needed sleep," Errol pointed out in... Was he teasing Cameron? Why was he doing that? What was there even to tease him about?

"Can sleep in tomorrow," Cameron shrugged, then his eyes travelled back to me for a moment again. "Gotta learn all the embarrassin' stories from yer childhood as well."

Cameron laughed. Errol rolled his eyes. I shuffled my feet a bit, so I ended up closer to Errol.

Cameron was acting all friendly. There had been absolutely nothing wrong with what he had said. But why did it feel like there was? Why did I feel like he was being hostile towards me? And how was his and Errol's relationship? Friends definitely. More than friends? If they were more than friends, that was a good thing. That meant Errol was over me in that way and we really and truly could be friends again. And if Cameron was making him happy, then I should be happy for Errol.

Didn't mean I liked the way Cameron looked at me one bit. What did that look even mean? He had said he had heard a lot about me. Could that be the reason? But what had Errol told him?

And just like that, my mind was all over the place, but mainly just falling down a waterfall of insecurity.

It was no wonder Cameron didn't like me. I was an oblivious fool, after all. Someone who had hurt Errol time and time again. Someone who definitely hadn't deserved to be comforted the way Errol had comforted me just moments ago in the alley.

Errol should rather want revenge on me. Just like Edmund Dantés, the Count of Monte Cristo, had sought vengeance on all those who had betrayed him.

Of course, Errol would never do that. He wasn't that type of person.

Didn't mean I deserved anger any less. If anything, it meant I deserved anger even more for having hurt someone who was so pure.

Errol took me out of the kitchen, through the door I had seen him disappear behind before. The blinds were drawn over the restaurant's windows. All the chairs were on the tables, except from around one of the bigger ones were seven people sat with pitchers of beer.

Errol made his way to them, and I followed, but with each step everything felt heavier.

I shouldn't be there.

I didn't belong there.

Not in any way.

I wasn't one of them. I was barely Errol's friend again, and even if he counted me as a friend once more, I didn't deserve that friendship.

Going to the restaurant had been one big mistake. Airlia had given me his home address as well. I should have just gone there. Though at the time, that had felt intrusive. It had somehow felt safer to go here. If he hadn't wanted to talk to me, he could have easily blamed work. If I had gone to his apartment, then he couldn't have used any excuse to get rid of me.

Maybe my choice had been more about sparing my own feelings. It would have been so clear if he didn't want to talk to me if I had gone to his apartment. And it would have taken me a lot more courage.

Courage I wasn't sure I had.

The one who had been my waitress was the first one to notice us.

"There ye are! Thought ye had sneaked off," she exclaimed and caused everyone else to turn towards us.

All eyes landed on me. Raised eyebrows. Some shared looks. I really shouldn't be there.

Errol introduced me to all of them. Gave all of their names and what they did within the restaurant. When he introduced me, he simply told them my name. No explanation of who I was or why I was there. As if a name was enough for them to know all of those things.

How much had Errol talked about me? Or was I just overthinking? I had to be overthinking it. I wasn't important enough for him to talk about me. Sure, I had been a major part of his life. But that was his life before he knew them.

When we sat, a few of them fell back into whatever conversation they had been having. The waitress, who I now knew was named Alexandra, Mary, who was a manager of some sort, and another chef named Fred all turned to talk to me, though.

"Are ye just here visitin'?" Alexandra started the conversation.

"Na, livin' here since a month back," I answered and took a sip of the beer and thanked everything good in this world I knew how to keep my insecurities in check to not let them bleed into conversations.

"Moved here for somethin' particular?" Mary asked.

"Got into a writin' programme."

"Oh, ye're a writer? That's so cool!" Alexandra exclaimed.

"Are ye any good?" Fred asked, and my defences began to crumble.

I wasn't, after all. Being at the writing programme, though I enjoyed it, made me even surer I wasn't. Everyone else seemed so intellectual and deep. Had long conversations about themes and motifs of Shakespeare's sonnets and plays. Filled their writing with metaphors and symbolism to the point that I didn't understand what was going on. Were the texts about love? Hate? Childhood or parenthood? Or were they about small gremlins living under the ground? I couldn't tell.

"He's amazin'," Errol said next to me. I turned to face him, and my thoughts were snow melting beneath the spring sun.

"I'm not," I answered, still with my eyes resting on him. Heat crawled up my face.

"Think I'm a more objective judge of that than ye."

I scoffed. "Ye are hardly objective."

A chair dragged across the floor. The scraping sound grated my mind. Turning, I noticed Cameron had joined us.

"What have I missed?" he asked while pouring himself some beer. "We haven't got to the embarrassin' stories yet, right?"

Mary's eyes brightened. "No, but now we gotta! An' since ye're a writer, Alasdair, ye can probably do it with a flair. So tell us the most embarrassin' thin' Errol did as a kid!"

Even the ones who hadn't been a part of our conversation went silent to listen in on my answer.

"There is none," I answered, though, which earned me several eye rolls. But a glance at Errol told me he was content with my answer, and he was who mattered. Not these strangers.

Even if I would have an embarrassing story to tell, there was no way I'd tell without getting his approval first.

"Bullocks," Cameron said. "There gotta be some. Or are ye tellin' me he's always been as proper as he is now?"

"Aye, I am."

"Good thin' ye moved here then, Errol, so ye can learn to live a little," Cameron laughed. A few followed with a snigger. Errol gave him an exasperated look.

And me... I hated all of this. Hated how I was feeling and that I thought Cameron was right. Hated sitting next to Errol, but still feeling like we were worlds apart. We were planets in neighbouring universes, but on opposite ends, light-years away from one another.

I hated feeling like Errol was better off without me and like I was just an intruder in his life.

"I'm goin' smokin'," I told him in a low voice.

"I'll join," he answered.

"Room for me to join as well?" Cameron asked and stood before receiving an answer.

I wanted to tell him no. Wanted to swear at him for not understanding he was one of the people I wanted to escape from. Why couldn't he just be rude so I could feel justified in my irritation?

We walked out the side door again.

"Errol's said the first time he cooked was for ye an' yer sister. Was he as natural at it then as now?" Cameron asked while we lit our cigarettes.

The burnt and frozen sausages. The overcooked pasta. Most food was better than that. Definitely the meal I had eaten today. But that meal all those years ago had filled both my stomach and my heart, and wasn't that what a good meal should do?

"Aye, he was," I answered.

"An' here he's been sayin' it was a dreadful meal." Cameron laughed a bit and flung an arm over Errol's shoulders. They looked really close. As close as me and Errol had been, and I wanted to hit Cameron's arm away and take its place. "Always far too modest."

"It's Alasdair who's far too kind in his judgement. Or he has forgotten the first time."

"I'll never forget that meal," I refuted Errol's last words. "What ye cooked today reminded me a bit of it."

His face had been rather neutral since we had stepped outside. But now it turned into something gentle, a look I was used to receiving when he was comforting me. Which was odd, as there was no reason for him to comfort me.

"Damn, that was then an impressive first meal," Cameron said, making Errol break eye contact with me. The two of them then exchanged some words, and I fell to the background. There, but unseen and intruding. Like dead skin cells. Something you should get rid of.

That Cameron continued to have his arm around Errol during the whole conversation did nothing to elevate my mood. They had to be dating, or it at least looked like that to me. Which wasn't really any of my concern. Errol could date whoever he wanted.

So why did the thought irritate me like a mosquito bite you know you can't scratch? It was childish of me to be. Errol wasn't even really my friend anymore, so I had zero rights to feel one way or another about anything, or anyone, he did.

I really wanted to rip Cameron's arm off, though.

"Will ye give us a few?" Errol asked. I had been looking off to the side, so my first thought was that he wanted to be alone with Cameron. That he was asking me to leave.

But as I turned my head, Cameron's arm finally left Errol's shoulders.

"Alright. Don't take too long, though. We'll probably leave soon," Cameron said before disappearing inside again.

Errol walked over so he was right in front of me. If it would have been anyone else, it would have felt like they invaded my personal space, but Errol could never do that. He tapped on my forehead.

"What thoughts are runnin' through that mind of yers?"

A million of them. But each was unfairer than the previous one, and therefore nothing to voice out loud. "Just getting a bit tired. Should be heading home," I said instead.

"Ye're welcome to stay."

"I know. I just... Tired."

Errol nodded. "Thank ye for stoppin' by, Alasdair. It was good to see ye again."

"I'm glad I did," I told him before he disappeared inside.

As soon as I got to my rented studio apartment, I curled up in bed and wept like a woman in some old period piece. Tension was released, but new tension had taken its place. He hadn't said any type of see you around. No indication he wanted to meet up again for anything. Just a "good to see ye" as parting words. What did that even mean? Good to see me just that once? Or good to see me so we can reconnect? And as overwhelming as all of those thoughts were, another made it even worse. Was he out drinking and enjoying himself with Cameron? Had Cameron replaced me?

And it all boiled down to one question, the most important question. Did I have a shot at getting my best friend back, or was it futile to try?