Saving Sawyer | ✓

Chapter 21 | Three Strikes And He Is Out

Chapter 21 | Three Strikes And He Is Out

“Damaged people are dangerous because they know how to survive.” — Damaged

The next morning, I wake up hearing birds outside of Graham’s bedroom window, happily chirping as if everything is just okay and good in the world, when in fact, not a single thing is okay or good in the world right now.

I try to block out the chirping so that I can fall back asleep—not because I’m still sleepy, but because I know that if I’m awake, I’ll have to deal with all that happened last night. My brain has other ideas though, because no matter how hard I try, I just can’t get myself to fall asleep.

After a whole five minutes of trying to no avail to fall back asleep, I give up with a small sigh. Then I roll over in Graham’s bed and blindly reach over to him, trying to find him so that I can cuddle up to him and hopefully fall back asleep.

I don’t feel him beside me though, which is weird, because he’s a pretty late sleeper, Graham is. I peel my eyes open then and groan quietly as the terribly bright and bothersome sunlight floods in the room through the slightly parted curtains, shining right on me.

With a tired sigh, I sit up in Graham’s king-sized bed and run my fingers through my messy hair, wincing as a sharp pain sears through my cranium and I feel a major migraine coming on. Glancing over at the digital clock on Graham’s bedside table, I see that it’s already 11:00, and that’s when it dawns on me that today is Tuesday, and that I’m supposed to be at school right now, not in boyfriend’s bed.

I guess that’s where Graham could have gone, to school, but I don’t really think that he’d just leave me here all day and go to school. Especially not after I came over to his last night, a panicked, bawling, and hyperventilating mess. Wherever Graham is though, I hope that he comes back soon because I know that if I’m alone for too long, my mind is going to start wandering. More specifically, it’ll start wandering to last night.

I guess my mind takes that a sign though, because just at the thought of last night, the painful flashbacks start plaguing my brain, without my consent. Flynn kissing me. Flynn basically trying to force me into having sex with him again. The disgustingly pungent smell of the alcohol on his breath. Everything. It all starts flooding my head and because I’m such an overdramatic crybaby, I just can’t handle it. My breath starts to quicken and my pulse beings to race as I feel a panic attack on the rise.

I curl myself up in a little ball, and wrap my arms around my knees, trying to calm down. I rest my chin on top of my knees and slowly start rocking back and forth. I probably look like a crazy person right now, but I don’t care because Dr. Fontana told me that this is one thing that I should do if I feel like I’m about to have a panic attack and I don’t have my medicine with me.

Ever since my little overdose episode though, my mom doesn’t trust me to keep my medicine. She keeps it like, in her purse or something, and whenever I need them, she just gives them to me. She literally watches me swallow them and it’s incredibly weird and awkward, but oh well.

Dr. Fontana’s other advice to me was to try and go to my happy place—like, placing myself in a mentally happier situation. I don’t really have too many happy places though. The rocking back and forth thing works for the first couple of seconds, but just as I feel myself starting to relax a little bit, Flynn’s words from last night flood my memory, effectively exacerbating my panic attack.

“You’re even prettier now than you were at that party.”

“Why do you have to act like you don’t want it?”

“We had fun that night; we can have fun again.”

I hear the bedroom door open then, but I’m too busy freaking out and hysterically crying to look up and see who it is. But seeing as how this is Graham’s bedroom, I think it’s pretty safe to assume that it’s him. I seriously hate it when Graham sees me crying, because it’s just so terrible and embarrassing, and it kind of just makes me feel like a weak, little baby. And I really, really hate that feeling, but I can’t help but cry right now.