Yin & Yang

"Seen more ceiling than Michelangelo"

Annette P.O.V.

Looking back at my life now I can’t pinpoint a single event that caused my life to spin into turmoil before Charlie’s death. But, rather it was a slow progression; a domino effect.

            It could have started the moment when my dad left us for his lover. My mom was never really the same after that; she became cold and strict. And I developed the need to feel loved and wanted by any man that would have me.

            It might have begun from the moment that my mother started to take down my drawings from the fridge to showcase Charlie’s report cards and awards. That whenever we went to events as a family she never even mentioned me at all; like I wasn’t even her kid.

            Maybe it was the first sip of alcohol I tasted or the first joint I hit. The mind numbing feeling and the escape from the world I got from immersing myself into the party scene. And then I became dependent on those things until they ended up taking over my life.

            The thing that I like to blame the most is Adam. How he broke down my walls and opened up my sheltered life to things I had never experienced. How happy I was with him and how he made me feel like I was the best goddamn thing to ever happen to him.

            But, over the years I had come to realize that none of these things were to blame for the hurricane that became my life.

            I chose not to trust men because of my father’s abandonment. He didn’t force me to become dependent on men that I could eventually trust. I never confronted my mom about my feeling of neglect and loneliness; nor did I try harder to have my accomplishments bragged about. I could have stopped drinking or doing drugs anytime. I chose not to. I chose to make people constantly worry over me. I stopped trying in school and even my once perfect grades suffered. Those were all my doings.

            I didn’t even notice the obvious signs that Adam had stopped loving me. Thinking back now, I wonder how I couldn’t have. His actions may have seemed subtle to others, but they should have been blindingly obvious to me.

            Like, how he stopped holding my hand in public. When our relationship began that’s all he ever did; hold my hand. Whether we were in class, at church, or at a party his warm hand would be tightly clasped into my freezing one. He used to tell me that he did it because he wanted everyone to know that I was his.

            But, during the last few months of freshman year there was an absence of his warmth. He stopped holding hands with me all together. Even when I tried to reach for his he would find some way to get out of my touch. It would seem childish to some, but to me it felt like he was stabbing me in the heart.

            A bigger sign was that he stopped asking me if I was okay. It was the first thing he said to me after my dad left and he didn’t stop asking since. From that day on, he always made sure I was okay. It was something a person would say off-handedly like, “hello” or “how are you?” It was like second nature to him.

            Just after he stopped holding my hand he began to stop asking me this. At first he would ask every day, even multiple times a day. That was a time when we were still happy. But, as my partying grew worse and the pressure from his friends increased, along with the distance between us, the question became less frequent. Then he only asked it was once a week, then once every few weeks, and then I was lucky if he said it at all.

            And I just kept pretending that everything was fine between us, so that I didn’t have to say goodbye. And all of my efforts eventually blew up in my face.