Letters From The Dead

Chapter 10

This chapter is definitely dedicated to Snoopy_Beagle who kept badgering me for updates. Also, please forgive the spacing, if nothing else. I'm trying, and I know it doesn't seem that way, but I really am. Sorry.

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"You're such a bastard!" I exploded, exactly one minute after the final bell rang. Eric paused in his conversation with another boy who was in our last class and turned to look at me, raising an eyebrow smoothly. I was suddenly struck with how much he didn’t look like my best-guy friend and I wondered if this was really such a good idea after all.

"I'm sorry," he replied shortly, "I wasn't aware we were speaking. I don’t have anything tos ay to you."

"Too-fucking-bad." I hissed, grabbing his arm and attempting to pull him away from the other boy. Eric glanced down at my hand, my nails freshly bitten down to the stub and very jagged, my standard indigo polish chipped in many places, as per usual. I almost thought he would just concur and come with me, but then, in a rather sudden move, he yanked his arm away from me. I tried not to let the hurt show on my face, but if I didn’t succeed, he either didn’t notice or didn’t care.

"No, Halley," he retorted, "it's too bad for you."

And then he started walking away.

"Don't walk away from me, Eric!" I yelled when the shock finally wore off and he was half way down the hallway. I looked down at the pen in my hand and hurled it with all of my might, leaning back with crossed arms and a smug smirk when it hit him in the middle of his back. "Don't you dare walk away from me."

"You're insane, Halley. You're mad at me? Are you being serious right now?" I pulled my lips up in a rather bitchy looking lip-purse as he continued to speak to me, his voice loud in the silent hallway, he still so far away. "You didn't even bother to tell me our friend fucking died and you're mad at me?!"

I sucked in another hurt breath, but held strong, determined to argue with him. "It wasn't like you bothered to ask. I know you noticed me acting different but you left it alone. You probably chalked it up to damn girl-hormones and left it at that!" I made a triumphant noise when Eric wrinkled his nose, glancing away for a minute in a manner that told me I'd hit the nail on the head.

Or whatever that expression was.

"And how could you have not noticed that Deidre stopped responding to your texts? She's not me, she always responds to you, even if she were in the middle of sky-diving, she'd probably have replied."

Eric flinched, but I hadn't picked him as a friend because he backed down easily. "That's because she's a good friend, Halley. That's what good friends do, they communicate with one another."

"I bet you didn't even know she was suicidal,” I snapped, already knowing the truth in my words. Deidre hadn’t told anyone but me exactly how bad she was. She didn’t want to put that on Eric or anyone else.

And suddenly, it wasn’t worth the yelling anymore. I should’ve known really. When Eric and I argued—and I mean really argued— we liked to hurt each other. It was part of our friendship. He was always the one to back down first, even when I was in the wrong, but somehow I knew that he wouldn’t be doing that this time around. He wasn’t angry, he was furious, and he wasn’t hurt, he was in agony. And I could have prevented just a little bit of that if I’d done what normal people would have done and told him what was going on as it went on.

“Never mind,” I said at last in a tone much more subdued as I stepped back involuntarily and pulling my shoulders forward in a defensive position that immediately told him I’d admitted defeat.

“I’ll…text me whenever you want.” I mumbled, my eyes on my shoes as I turned on my heel and hurried away through the halls in the direction of my locker.

I stared at the lock for a moment before quickly opening it and stuffing my face inside the narrow enclosure, pressing it into my sweatshirt that I left in there even though I was rarely cold. I let out a scream of frustration, mostly at myself, and then my dry-heaving sobs started. Tears never escaped my eyes, but I sounded a bit like I was having an asthma attack.

Finally, I drew in a long, shuddering breath and fell silent, keeping my face pressed into my sweatshirt.

“Hey,” a voice said from somewhere behind me and I made a noise of acknowledgement.

“Are you okay?” the same voice asked after a beat of silence and I slowly pulled my head from my locker and stared incredulously at Tyler.

I wanted to ask him what the crap he thought—that people who were all fine and dandy just stuffed their heads in their lockers for kicks and giggles?

But in a weird way, I appreciated him asking, even if it was by far the stupidest question I’d heard in a while.

He shifted under my gaze and I slowly closed my half-unhinged mouth, dragging my hand through my hair and shaking my head, a faint smile pulling at my lips.

“No,” I said finally, “No, I’m not okay.”

He blinked, clearly having expected me to lie and I shrugged at him, pulling my sweatshirt out of my locker and hugging it close to my chest. It looked like it was going to rain today, and my mother had told me to walk home this morning.

“But I’m used to it,” I told him before turning away and starting down the hallway, leaving him behind.

I made it out of the school, breathing deeply so I didn’t have another panic attack. There was a slight bounce in my step at the thought of visiting Deidre even though I still had no idea what her most recent email said.

The desperation to know was overwhelming, but I could wait just the twenty minutes more that it would take to get to her headstone and sit there for a while. Talk to her, tell her that Eric and I were fighting—as usual—and that Tyler was once again forcing himself into my mind. I didn’t like him again, but I’d always been the sort of person who fell too easily.

Usually, I’d be strong enough to pull through and move on—after many rants and tears—but I seriously doubted I’d come out scratch-free this time ‘round.

I was too messed up now.