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Marianne squinted to focus her eyes enough to be able to check the time on her phone screen: 12:04am. Steadying herself as she became aware of just how much alcohol she'd consumed, she slipped her phone into the back pocket of her jeans and turned around to find that Connell had disappeared.
It was a Saturday evening, now Sunday morning in the middle of July and they'd been out since around 8:30pm. It was incredibly rare for the two of them to go out to a nightclub together without anybody else tagging along. Most of the drunken club nights they'd spent together when in a relationship were with Marianne's college friends, a group which had shrunken in size dramatically since she had broken up with Jamie. If they were alone, it was always a quiet night in: reading, listening to music and talking until they could barely keep their eyes open any longer.
They weren't together, now. Marianne wondered if Connell felt the same way she did about their relationship, about how inevitable it always felt. At this point Marianne was almost certain that she and Connell would be orbiting one another forever, weaving in and out of each other's lives year after year. It was the 'and out' part that troubled her, though. Neither of them were sure why their relationship kept restarting and breaking down, with different excuses and ridiculous reasons it wasn't working each time it halted. This summer had been the most time they had spent around each other since school and, although nothing romantic had happened yet, Marianne felt almost certain that it was about to. Tonight.
But he'd gone.
After checking the bar, every corner of the dancefloor and waiting to see if he'd emerge from the bathroom, Marianne pushed her way through the crowds of people to the smoking area. After a few minutes of searching and passive smoking passed, Marianne walked from the patio space around the side of the building, where she found Connell slumped against the brick wall, holding his head in his hands.
"Hey..." Marianne spoke as softly as she could, trying to be heard over the music but not wanting to make him jump.
"I'm really sorry, I didn't, I -" Connell looked up at her with bloodshot eyes, running out of breath before he could get his words out and inhaling shakily.
"It's okay, you're okay." Marianne sat down next to him, moving her hand behind his head and running it through his hair hesitantly, "Is this alright?"
"Mmm, yeah. I didn't mean to just leave like that, you know it's-"
"It's absolutely fine, Connell. Now take some deep breaths, yeah?" Marianne had quickly realised he was in the midst of a panic attack. He'd told her he'd been having them a lot when she was abroad in Sweden and she'd felt completely helpless, with no idea what to do or how to help from so far away. She'd never mentioned it to him, but she had spent some of her final few weeks in Sweden reading up on how to help someone with anxiety and depression, not that she felt much use right at that particular moment, slightly drunk and devastated from watching the person she loved the most in the world look at her with the most heartbroken expression she'd ever seen.
"Do you want to go home?" Marianne asked once a few minutes had passed and she'd noticed Connell's breathing had evened out.
"Yeah I think so, do you mind?"
"Of course not" she smiled, taking hold of his hand and pulling him to stand up. "Let's go."
*******
"It was erm, I was thinking about Rob. When we were on the dancefloor." Connell whispered as he lay in bed an hour later, watching Marianne remove her makeup in front of the mirror.
"Oh?" she replied, looking at him through the reflection.
"The last time I was in there, he was with me and it just felt, I don't know, odd."
Marianne turned off the light and walked over to the bed, prompting Connell to move closer to the wall to make room as she got in next to him. All of a sudden, she didn't feel drunk at all anymore, just exhausted. She turned over to Connell, cupping his face with both of her hands. The glimmer of moonlight peeking in from the curtains made his eyes look more of a vivid blue than ever before as she stared into them.
"I'm really proud of you, you know."
Connell chuckled, immediately breaking eye contact and running a hand through his own hair. It was too dark to see but he was definitely blushing, Marianne knew that.
"Ha, why d'you say that like? I haven't done anything, except embarrass myself tonight."
"No, Connell. You're so brave, and kind and loving and - Rob was so lucky to have a friend like you. He really was. You went to counselling when you needed it and I know you don't want me to dwell on that too much but, honestly, you made me so proud. Look how far you've come, Connell."
Connell thought seriously for a second about what Marianne had just said. Maybe he wasn't too bad a person. His grieving process was still something he was trying to navigate and the events of that night had proved to him that there was no point in fighting it, trying to keep it separate from his everyday life. He was a good friend to Rob, in a way. As was Rob to him. He thought about what Rob would have to say about what had happened tonight and let out a quiet laugh. He owed it to his friend to speak without holding back what he was really thinking, something Rob did each and every day, often to his detriment.
"Thank you. For everything. For tracking me down when I bolted tonight," he chuckled, "and for helping me with all of this. I couldn't do any of it without you, I hope you know that, Marianne."
Marianne felt like she was about to burst into tears, happy ones, the way she always felt on those rare occasions they shared an honest, open conversation.
"Do you want to know something?" she whispered in his ear, tracing her fingertips over his eyebrow as delicately as she possibly could.
"Aye, go on then"
Marianne moved further towards him, "I really wanted you to kiss me tonight. Is that a really insensitive thing to say? After what happened?"
"Mm no, I don't think so. It's just how you felt at the time, isn't it?" Connell smiled sleepily,
"I suppose so." Marianne closed her eyes, reopening them seconds later to see Connell's silhouette hovering above her and smiling as he kissed her lips softly.
It wasn't a long kiss, nothing especially passionate about it but both Marianne and Connell felt it was one of the most intimate ones they had ever shared. Neither of them felt particularly keen to talk about where their relationship was heading next, that could wait until the morning. For now, they were both entirely content to fall into a deep sleep, wondering if this new level of maturity they'd suddenly reached meant they were about to rekindle their romance for the final time and break the seemingly endless cycle by staying together.
Only time would tell.