#the wrong path

“You’re not supposed to be doing this.”

Your hands roamed hungrily over Colin Ritman’s chest, searching for shirt buttons with your eyes closed and your lips forming paths of kisses up his neck and towards his jaw. The words he’d mumbled sounded merely like background noise. In the air hung the smell of weed smoke and incense, mingling lightly with the scent of Colin: a warm and deep cologne with natural undertones that instantly reminded you of him each time you smelled it.

You pressed your lips quickly onto his, forgetting he ever said a word.

He kissed you back gently yet urgently before pushing you off, leaving you straddling his lap, hands on his shoulders, clad in only a bra and underwear.

“What?” You softly questioned, adjusting your hips against his, pressing your chest against his once more, sliding your arms around his neck.

“I’ve realized it. You’re not supposed to be doing this. This isn’t the right path.” He breathlessly announced.

His words were confusing enough to keep you from leaning in and silencing him with a kiss, at least momentarily. You stared at him through tousled hair, which you brushed back, sitting up.

“Huh? What do you mean?”

His hands nonetheless roved from your hips up to your waist, caressing you with a muted desire.

“You’re not supposed to be with me. You’re supposed to be with Stefan. I can’t have you.” His words were straightforward, barely a tinge of melancholy to signify his disapproval. He was avoiding direct eye contact.

You immediately giggled. The shy little newbie? He was sweet, but how could he ever shine a candle to Colin?

“Some joke, Colin. You’re so weird.”

He seemed lost, staring through you, deep in thought. “I thought it was his dad, bugging the shit out of him and all, or the pressure of the deadline, but no. It has to be you. Since we got involved, he never had the chance to ask you out. His morale is out of whack, all cuz of me. I made him lovesick for you. And because I distract you from your game, even your game tanks...”

The weed you’d smoked numbed half his words, until you took a moment to decipher his ranting. You took his face gently in your hands. Colin stared back at you, and you could finally sense some dejection behind his eyes.

“Colin, there’s no one else I’d rather be with. I…”

You hadn’t said you loved him yet, and at this rate, you weren’t sure you would.

He blinked twice. “You’ll see what I mean. You’re on the wrong path.”

Deciding this was some of his classic paranoid-on-drugs speak, wanting to pretend you made the past few minutes up, you tentatively ground your hips against his, resulting in an involuntary moan from his throat that only drove you more crazy for him. You grabbed the back of his neck, your hot breath tickling his ear.

“Babe, if loving you is wrong, I don’t wanna be-”

“Oh, don’t be a clown.”

You kissed him again, and this time he reciprocated, mouth moving hard against yours, and he flipped you onto the couch, climbing on top of you, pulling his shirt off in the process. He took off his glasses, throwing them onto the coffee table.

“There’s a chance I’m wrong, but if I’m not-”

“Oh, piss off.” You laughed before kissing him once more, and this time he unbuttoned and started slipping off his Levis, unsuccessfully, to the point where he leaned so far to one side that the two of you spun and tumbled off the couch, the laughter bubbling from your throat the final sound that hung in the air before suddenly waking up in bed, sitting up with wide and tired eyes.

New Order was playing on the radio, the means of a daily alarm.

It was as if you’d just woken out of an odd dream, with that groggy morning feeling, paired with the slowness that typically accompanied it.

You turned to look at the clock beside you. It was eight o’clock in the morning.

What happened?

“This is Colin Ritman. He’s a bit of a celebrity in the gaming world, you may have heard of him.”

You had heard the name before; somewhere in the depths of past memories his name conjured up the ring of a bell, yet nothing more. Looking into his face, you very vaguely recognized him - merely examining the smile before you, the dark blue eyes, the bleach-blonde hair all coming together into one handsome stranger - you knew, somehow, that he couldn’t be a stranger at all.

You felt you had to know him, especially if he was so famous. You were always playing video games.

“Hello.” You said, an instant yet nervous response.

“Very nice to meet you.” He said, in an accent reminiscent of boys at school and old neighbor kids. The voice was recognizable. You’ve heard it somewhere before.

“Have we… Met before?” You coyly questioned, wondering if he’d possibly understand. You felt awfully dumb asking, knowing he’d probably say no. If you were lucky, he’d bring up some obvious encounter that you’d somehow lost over time; sharing a high school calculus class, having some old mutual friend, maybe even frequenting the same restaurant or cafe.

“I don’t believe so. I’d certainly remember meeting you.” He replied, flirtatious words undermined by a monotone voice, grabbing your extended hand and holding it momentarily before beginning to shake it. You grabbed back, feeling flushed out of nowhere.

You just couldn’t place where you’d seen him - but felt you couldn’t stir on it for too long. You had a few games you’d been working on, one particularly promising. You and Mr. Thakur had been discussing it for weeks after you’d sent in an application, and apparently he’d already spoke to Colin before your arrival for the interview.

You tried to read Colin’s face, try to dissect his expression, but it seemed impossible. The smile he wore was now a near grimace as he turned away from you, sucking on some sort of blunt - homemade cigarette perhaps? You weren’t sure.

“Y/N created Time Swipe, that game I was telling you about at lunch. You have it with you?” Mahon asked, looking enthusiastic.

“Yeah.” You were jolted from your mess of thoughts about Colin, quickly rummaging through your bag to find the cartridge. Fishing it out, you handed it to Mahon with a smile.

“I really hope you guys like it. Took me eons.”

Mahon chuckled almost nervously. Colin looked totally unbothered. Even his stature you could hazily recognize, as if he’d stood beside you with his hands in his pockets just as cooly before.

“So we still need the score behind it, yeah? Is it completed on the visual front?” Mahon enthusiastically asked.

You thought back to all the hard work you’d put into it, the grating hours behind a computer, the time spent forgetting to eat or sleep for days on end.

“Should be. I’ve tied up all the loose ends, flattened out the glitches. I’ve run the finished product about fifty times now without any problems, it should be perfect.”

“Forty times?” Mohan asked under his breath, in somewhat disbelief. Colin was still turned towards you, and you could feel his stare boring into you.

“Forty-eight.” Colin added, in his sharp accent. Your eyes met his immediately.

“What?”

“You could round it up to fifty times, having booted it up forty-eight. It sounds better, anyway.”

Heat surrounded your face and stained your cheeks as you looked down in thought. It had been forty-eight startups, hadn’t it? A part of you was so tired and annoyed after launching the game so many times, essentially obsessively - that you’d lost count.

Was it somewhere printed on the screen how many times it’d been used?

How could he know?

“How…” You began, but Mohan continued speaking, leaving a soon-fleeting stare Colin’s only response.

“I’ve loved the idea since you first mentioned it, it’s very marketable.” Mohan pushed the game inside the VCR, and the three of you surrounded the screen as the intro flashed to life - Time Switch was glowing in bright neon letters, with a monochromatic grid background. There it was: your pride and joy. However badly that intro made you want to puke just days ago, it appeared new and fresh staring back at you now.

Mohan pressed the start button without a word, and despite needing to restart multiple times after losing lives, he was completely immersed, laughing to himself or groaning sadly with every little success or failure.

“What say you, Colin?” He asked, without bothering to turn around, eyes glued to the screen. The little green character continued stealing wall clocks from the cubicles he entered.

Colin shrugged. “It works.”

The answer was somewhat insulting - not that you thought he’d be jumping for joy about it - but something better than ‘it works’. How could your game be that promising when an apparent video game genius didn’t like it?

“It’s wonderful. I knew we had something good going. How would you like to work on a game with Colin, after this is released? You mentioned you have other ideas, and Colin is eager for a partner.”

Working on a project with a big name in the video game world would be an incredible opportunity; much too good to turn down.

However, Colin was certainly some partner.

As you debated how to reply, from the corner of your eye you could see Colin smile and shake his head in possible disapproval, turning to look out the window.

“I’d… I’d love to. Really?” 

“I know Colin’s got some tricks up his sleeve. We have a new sound team, new design team… And a few other plans in mind.

“You wanna work for Tuckersoft?”

You were overwhelmed with excitement. How could you possibly say no?

“Yes!”

Quickly you grabbed his hand, and he maneuvered the shake into a hug, warmly patting you on the back. “Can’t wait to have you here with us, Y/N! You’ll be set up beside Colin, you’ll start work next week. Oh hey, Steven!”

Exiting Mahon’s embrace, you turned to see a brown-haired boy in a tan jacket who must’ve been around your age, bag slung over his shoulder, looking nervously at you through eyes darkened by what you assumed was a lack of sleep.

“Stefan.”

“Stefan, sorry-”

“That’s, sorry, I get it all the time.”

Mohan started ranting at the boy about how proud he was of the company, a spiel you had already listened to, while you couldn’t help but gravitate towards them. Stefan was just as oddly familiar as the rest of the place.

You didn’t listen to a word that Mohan was saying, apart from the random “expanding” and “demo” crossing your mind as you stared. Finally, Mohan addressed you.

“This is Y/N. She’s a newbie, just like you.”

You felt a mix of happiness and discomfort in your heart, just looking at him. Something was drawing you closer, but simultaneously deterring you. You couldn’t keep Colin Ritman or his words out of your head.

“Nice to meet you, Stefan.” You bid.

He looked down before looking back up to meet your gaze, eyes momentarily hesitating at your lips.

“You as well. I’ve never met a female programmer. It’s… it’s really cool that… sorry, that sounds weird…”

You couldn’t help but laugh as he ran a hand anxiously through his hair, a boyish smile growing on his face.

“No, no, don’t worry.” You assured him. “I get that a lot.”

“It’s really cool. Really, really cool.” He looked at you a few seconds too long before blinking and shyly looking down.

“Stefan! Come with me, I wanna talk to you.”

As Mohan pulled him to the side, you felt Colin move closer, smoky exhale surrounding you. 

“Do you remember what I told you?”

You turned to look at him directly, eyebrows furrowed.

“What?”

He took another drag, seemingly unfazed.

“You’ve been here before. Try to remember what I told you.”

Slowly he walked away, entering an adjacent office. You couldn’t help but follow.

“You must be mistaking me for someone, I think...” You continued, suddenly stopped in your tracks by his unexpected closeness - he stood in the doorway, leaning against it, face only inches from you.

“Think back.” He quietly urged, giving you a second round of chills. “I should hope you won’t have to try a third time.”

Suddenly, he shut the door. As it shut, a familiar scent wafted out with the rushed air - a smell so familiar, so warm, so caring, it was clear as day what he meant. 

You must have been here before. You wouldn’t remember him otherwise. Everything wouldn’t be so familiar otherwise. 

Colin knew you. You knew Colin. But how?

You must’ve been lovers. Very, very drunk lovers. For a split second, you vividly imagined the two of you in bed, rolling around, falling on the floor laughing.

“Y/N, you and Stefan have so much to talk about!”

Feeling hazy, lost in thoughts simultaneously generated by the blonde, four-eyed weirdo just beyond the door - you weren’t sure what to say to this boy who apparently had so much to converse with you about.

Mohan gently grabbed your shoulder and turned you to look at the boy, who seemed uneasy once acknowledging your out-of-sorts expression.

“Something wrong, Y/N? It’s just Stefan, he doesn’t bite!”

“No, no, I’m fine. I thought I… Nevermind. You’re working on a new game, too? Bandersnatch, right?”

Mohan laughed, louder than you anticipated.

“Wow! How did you know that? Has he already bragged to you about it?”

Stefan appeared excited, yet confused. “How did you know that?”

He seriously hadn’t mentioned it already?

“Oh, well, I mean, you two were talking about it, weren’t you? Over there?”

Mohan laughed once more. “What a set of ears! Yeah, we were about to demo it. You wanna watch?”

The day continued the way you suspected it would, except mostly without the presence of Colin, which kept your stress levels within a healthy level. You couldn’t stop thinking about what he meant - you did your best to remember exactly what he allegedly told you - but nothing came through.

The next day, Mohan sat you directly beside him, as he clicked away on a computer, busy making his own game, ‘Nosedive’ with wacky spelling - a calling card of his, you supposed.

You didn’t want to interrupt him - Mohan expressed that Colin was a ‘baby’ and would frequently ‘bitch and moan’ if you interrupted him too many times in one day.

He’d have to deal with it.

He’d taken off his headphones for the first time since your arrival to say something to a passing assistant, and as you ran Time Switch for the 78th time, more a chore than a game at this point - you said it.

“We’ve met before. You lied.”

The moment went almost unacknowledged, until Colin cleared his throat.

“I didn’t lie. We met yesterday.”

You didn’t bother turning to look at him.

“No. We met before that. We were in love before that.”

Colin turned to face you, giving you a surprised stare before turning back to look at his screen. He sighed gently, as if dealing with a minor inconvenience.

“Come on.” He said, suddenly standing up and walking away from the monitor. You slowly rose from your seat and followed him into the same adjacent, empty office, where he waited until you’d entered to shut the two of you in.

Colin stared at you, vaguely annoyed.

“You remember that we were in love, but you can’t remember one important thing I told you? You’re just destined to fail, aren’t you?”

You scoffed in shock, yesterday’s waves of confusion washing over you once again.

“So you did love me? And why don’t you just tell me what I’m supposed to remember, rather than being cryptic and creepy?”

Colin scoffed back, leaning back against the door.

“Why don’t I just live your life for you? Y/N, there’s something wrong with the sequence of events here, and the constant within all of this is us being together. That’s the problem. I’ve seen it a few times now. You have to be with Stefan. I’ve invited him to my flat tonight, and I was hoping to invite you, but... I’m not sure you’ll be able to keep your hands off me if you get high.”

With a sarcastic smile, you began giggling to yourself, making him smile and turn away from your attempts to mock him.

“Oh, you don’t think I’ll be able to contain myself? You’re just too sexy, Colin, women can’t keep their fookin’ hands off you!”

Turning back to face you, he grew increasingly serious. “Look, I thought you’d remember what happened, but it makes sense now. It was a decision made for you, to go back. Not your own. From what I can see, your actions are conflicting with your destiny. If it was your own choice, I bet you’d be progressing much faster. You’re being controlled. But from what I gather, you’re not too far gone.”

You stared at the man in front of you, wondering how he seemed to know so much; how you felt so clueless in turn.

“What do you mean, a decision made for me?”

Colin began slowly moving closer to you, and his hesitation made you fear the answer, instinctively backing up towards the desk behind you. You hit the desk after a few more paces, and he only moved nearer once you’d been cornered.

“I know this is confusing for you. No one’s set you free yet. You’ve been controlled your whole life, just like everyone else. You’re in the hole, and you know there must be a way out... You’ve just started testing the limits. But you can’t climb that high on your own. You need me to help you out. Or else, you’re going to be controlled for the rest of your life, never knowing which path is right or wrong.”

Colin was dangerously close to you, and you could sense that old familiar passion in his stare. You could feel his breath, smell his cologne. You wanted so desperately to kiss him, to touch him, to be with him. The eye contact felt unbreakable.

“You can choose your own destiny. Just let me help you do it.” He spoke, in a tone low and genuine.

A moment of silence fell between you, in which you looked down at his chest, slowly mustering up the courage to meet his tender gaze once more before speaking.

“Is this what it looks like when you try to keep a girl from falling in love with you?” You slowly asked, almost unable to finish the sentence, lost in his eyes and in all the confusion.

Something clicked, as if he’d forgot that he was heading down that same wrong path right alongside you.

“Eh… Yeah. Um... Stefan will meet us at my place at six. I’ll walk you there.”

He started walking out of the room before turning around, hand on the doorknob.

“I’m serious, Y/N. You have to be there tonight. It’s important.”

You smiled, crossing your arms, leaning on the desk behind you.