Words Unsaid || on hold

Chapter 3

I padded down the hallway, still in the same sweats and top I was wearing yesterday.  The bedroom door was left ajar.  I pulled out clothes, placing them on the bed to change into.  I shimmied into the skinny jeans and put on the tight purple tee I had pulled out.  I stepped in front of the full length mirror we had in the corner of the room.  I checked my hair and untouched face, looking over my outfit.  My tummy wasn’t flat, and my thighs touched when I put my feet together.  I peered closer into the mirror, noticing how my nose was too big and my mouth was too small.  My cheeks were a bit rounded.  Turning, I noticing how my butt was a bit pudgy, and not perfectly toned.

“Maybe he is right.” I muttered to myself, “I am fat.”

I walked down the hallway, making my way into the kitchen.  Rummaging through the fridge, I pulled out ingredients for dinner.  Pots banged against eachother, and the sound of knife against chopping board echoed in the room until the food sat simmering on the stove.  Taking it off the heat, I placed a lid on the pot and turned back to the fridge, looking around for something to eat.  Noah’s comment repeated in my head, and my own body analysis flashed through my mind.  I didn’t need the food.  Closing the fridge, I moved towards the living and dining rooms, cleaning as I hummed to a tune in my head.  

* * *

Pulling off my jeans, I slipped on running shorts.  I left my purple tee on, grabbing my iPhone and earphones from the bedside table drawers.  I quietly shut the door of the apartment, and jogged down the stairway into the lobby.  I made a sharp left, and inched the door of the gym open.  I quickly walked to one of the treadmills lined up against the glass walls.  Some of the people turned their heads, nodding at me.  I smiled back, plugging in the earphones and shoving the buds in my ears.  After fiddling with the treadmill and turning it on, I reached for my iPhone, hitting shuffle.  I started running, eyes focused on the flashing number showing how many calories I had burnt.  I glanced at the clock hung on the wall.  It hung so still, completely silent.  It just ticked away, doing the same thing everyday, making the same circle and going through the same motions,  just ticking, not feeling.  I used to wish I was like that, just going through life without feeling, but then I met Noah.  I wish that now, I could say that he still lights up my world like he used to.  We had been going out for three years, since I was seventeen.  I was in love with him, and when he asked me to move in with him at twenty, I jumped at the chance.  For the first few months, we were the same.  He went to work, and I took a few university classes.  We weren’t rich, but we were happy.  Then, he started getting into drinking.  He would come home two or three days a week drunk.  He didn’t dare lay a hand on me, he would just stumble around and mumble.  One night, a year after moving in with him, he came home drunk and hit me.  I only remember being shocked.  He wouldn’t let me continue my classes, and I wasn’t allowed to leave the apartment unless it was for groceries.  I loved him -- and I still do -- too much to leave him, and I know deep down he loves me too.  

* * *

I pulled my wet, after shower hair off my shoulder, walking into the kitchen.  Opening the fridge, I pulled out a yogurt, ripping the top open and grabbing a spoon.  I turned it around, glancing at the nutrition facts.  80 calories.  I ate it quickly, a bubbling feeling of guilt rising in my stomach.  I wiped down the counter, then rinsed the spoon and put it in the dishwasher.  Walking down to our bedroom, I pulled the door open carefully.  Opening a hidden cabinet behind the bed, I maneuvered my guitar out, along with notes and lyrics I had scribbled down.  Noah would kill me if he knew. Music and singing used to be one of the things we did together, even though Noah had the worst voice.  But we had stopped doing that, he didn’t like the noise anymore.  I sat on the bed, hoisting the guitar onto my lap and spreading the music sheets out in front of me.  I strummed along to an old song I had written the chords out for, singing quietly.  

I do it for the love,

Waiting on the gold rush,

Keep it on the edge,

Smoking on a roll up.  (Ed Sheeran - Gold Rush)

I moved the sheets around, looking for a certain song.  Pulling out of the pile, a sad smile appeared on my face.  I wrote it when Noah and I were still close, when there was only ever an us, not a you and not a me.  I strummed through it, singing a bit louder this time, a small sob caught in the back of my throat.

You told me I was pretty when I looked like a mess.

And can you feel this magic in the air,

It must have been the way you kissed me.

Fell in love when I saw you standing there,

It must have been the way,

Today was a fairytale.  (Taylor Swift - Today Was A Fairytale)

A small tear trickled down my face, landing on the lyrics and chords scrawled on the page.  Setting the guitar down in front of me, I pulled my knees up to me chest.  I sobbed into my jeans, rocking myself back and forth.  Remembering the smile that I fell in love with, the one that went all the way to his eyes.  He doesn’t smile anymore.  Remembering how he used to wake me up, tickling my sides until I laughed my way out of bed.  He never does that anymore.  

a/n: get to know aria a bit better in this chapter! the next chapter will be up next friday, i can't wait to share it with you all.  thank you for the support, and please vote and comment.  cheers! // l