Writing Prompt Wednesday #116

The person whom you have been trying to talk to for ages finally answers the phone. Who is this person? How does the phone conversation progress?
https://www.writersdigest.com/prompts/writing-prompt-im-glad-you-called

​TW: Cheating

    “Hey.”
    His voice was as rich as I’d remembered it to be. Deep and full, warm enough to heat you head to toe. It sounded groggy, as if he’d just woken up. 
    “Hey Harley,” I replied, painfully aware that my own voice squeaked as I said the word. “Um, I’ve been trying to get a hold of you.”
    “I know.” A sigh from the other end. The tug of a lamp cord. Shuffling, as I assumed he was sitting up. Was he in bed? In his living room? At someone else’s place? I didn’t dare to ask. “So what did you want to talk about?”
    I sighed. “I just…I don’t…” I guessed months and months to think about this conversation hadn’t made me as smooth as I’d hoped. “I miss you.”
    The end of the line was silent. I tried not to make myself sick over the tension coursing through my body. Finally, he said, “I miss you too.”
    My heart soared. “Really?” I asked, unable to keep the shock completely out of my voice.
    “Yeah, I do.” A pause, more shuffling. “So what do you want to do about it?”
    “Well, I’ve been doing the things we talked about. Managing expectations and demands and such.” I knew that I sounded over-eager, but I couldn’t stop the words from tumbling out of my mouth. “I know that I wasn’t treating you fairly. I get how you felt judged and stifled. I know things aren’t going to be perfect, and I don’t expect them to be.”
    “Not anymore?”
    “Not anymore,” I confirmed. “I just…I really need you to listen to me—”
    “Here we go again,” came his sigh. I flinched. “Listen, Vic, I want this as much as you do. If not more. But I can’t go on and on with all of this ‘you need to listen to me’ bullshit. I’m not your pet.”
    “I…I know you’re not,” I said, stricken. “I just…communication is really important….”
    “I know it is to you,” he said. “But that’s just not the way that I roll. I need some space. Some privacy. I can’t just share every little detail of my life with you, you know that.”
    “And I don’t expect you to!” The right thing to do would be to shut up. To stop talking. To agree to his demands, to apologize, and to move on. But I couldn’t stop myself. My big mouth had always gotten me into trouble. “But if we’re going to share a life I want you to trust me. Trust is so important and I know that you have your issues with everything but I don’t think I’ve done anything to make you think that you can’t trust me. And if I have I can work on it, but I just really want us to—”
    “Who’re you talking to?” said a groggy voice on the other end of the line, a man’s voice that I didn’t recognize.
    “No one,” Harley said. “Listen Vic, I’ve got to go. I—”
    “Who’s that?”
    “Who?”
    “The other person you’re talking to. Who is he?”
    I could feel the tension rippling from the other end of the line. Harley swallowed, hard. “Someone.”
    “Someone…?”
    A sigh. Then, “My boyfriend.”
    Everything inside of me froze. The whirling waves of anxiety that had been grappling my chest stopped. It gave me whiplash. The whole of my insides clenched as my brain tried to process the words. “Your….”
    “Boyfriend,” Harley repeated. “I didn’t want you to find out this way.”
    “I—I thought—”
    “I know what you thought,” he said. “And I want to work things out too. It’s just—”
    “So you found someone else?!” I asked. “Seems like a pretty great way to work things out.”
    “Victor—”
    “No, I’m done.” The whirling waves of anxiety were back, and they were threatening to make me sick. It was high time to get out of here, before any of that happened. “Goodbye Harley.”