92 days

twenty-nine

Hi! There was a double update so make sure to read Chapter 28 before this one!

—

Annie

"Do you ever wish you could be someone else? Live a life you weren't meant to live?" His voice cracks through the silence, my eyes flutter open.

I knew my answer. My answer was yes, all the time, every second. I've just never admitted to it out loud.

Wishing you were someone other than yourself is painful. It feels so painful.

Depending on your broad imagination to live a million different lives in your head—lives you know you'll never even scratch the surface of.

It feels suffocating.

So, I nodded. Swallowing words in the process.

My phone was going off entirely too much—minutes after arriving, so I shut it off completely. I want to learn to no longer depend on affection that should already be given.

I felt embarrassed. It was embarrassing.

Though I stepped out of my usual comfort zone. No staying silent, not letting my mother drag me around like a ragdoll.

It felt good, but there's still a feeling of dread.

I have the taste of blood on my tongue as a reminder.

A reminder of what it felt like to be stabbed in the back, stitched up, then stabbed again.

"That's why we have books, and movies, and people." I say. "Things we find ourselves in so we aren't thinking about those lives that we could never live."

His eyes dropped down to mine, then to my lips, then back up, still in laying my head in his lap. "Yeah." He slowly nods.

The smell of his cigarette blowing through the air above me is an oddly alluring smell. Maybe it's the mix with saltwater.

"This isn't bothering you?" His eyebrow raises as he blows the smoke in the opposite direction.

"The cigarette? No." I say.

"You sure?"

"Mhm." I smiled faintly. "I kinda like the smell."

"Yeah?" He questioned.

"Yes."

I could feel the low vibration of his chuckle, then watched as he lifted the hand that was resting on my body—using it to grab my jaw and tilt my head so that I was looking directly up at him.

He blew the last bit of smoke down to me as it trailed smoothly through his parted lips and down to mine. The scent now laced with mint.

His grip lowered off of my jaw and he proceed to trace his finger over my jawline.

"What about you?" I asked. "You also wish to live a life you know you aren't meant to live?"

He nods stiffly.

We both made the mutual decision not to speak about the state we were in coming here, our reason for sitting here in the first place. It was more like an agreeing silence, but we both understood.

"But I don't read books, or watch movies." He adds on.

He flicks away the cigarette and runs his hand over his hair-staring ahead.

"Well then...there's also music." I suggested. "Music is the best way to drown unwanted thoughts and emotions."

He nods.