stutter » a. irwin

chapter 30. ready

❀ J U L I A ❀

I'd like to say that things became easier after the diagnosis, but then I would be lying. However, I had come to accept that anxiety would forever be a constant part of my life. Some days would be awful, and some would be okay, but I tried my best to tell myself that I could survive it.

Rachel helped. That frosty, guarded demeanor from the hospital had mostly melted away, yet I still saw the hurt in her eyes, the pain that, while not obvious to an outsider, made itself known to me everytime I looked into her eyes. And yet, despite it all, she was still a master at pretending. She did her best to act like her normal, sarcastic self, making sure I took my meds and doing whatever she could to ease any anxiety I was feeling. She did so well at hiding her feelings that I wondered if maybe a career in acting would have suited her better than her current one.

"What happened between you two?" I whispered softly, feeling a pang in my stomach as I observed Rachel slam her laptop shut and bury her head in her hands. She'd been distracted a lot lately, and I found her zoning out often before her eyes would focus and harden again. Turning away from the doorway, I adjusted the phone that was pressed to my ear.

"I told you. I fucked up, and that's all you really need to know." Calum's voice was short on the other end of the speaker, and he paused for a few moments. I waited, knowing he had more to say. "How... how is she?"

"She pretends that you don't exist," I answered honestly. "But I can tell that you haven't left her mind since I was in the hospital."

It was apparent that I hadn't imagined hearing Ashton and Calum in my hospital room once I'd woken up and noticed the glint of the gold-lined pages of my songbook on my bedside table. Rachel had glanced at it meaningfully before leaving my room without a word, and I'd flipped open the cover to see that Ashton had scrawled the words "I'm sorry" into the first page.

I'd ripped the page out and hurled it across the room. It had landed at the feet of my little brother, and I remember having glanced up at my family before I burst into tears.

I hadn't wanted them to see me like this, especially Simon. The little boy had run up to me and clutched my hand, babbling so quickly in Polish that I barely understood the clumsy sentences he was stringing together.

A heavy sigh on Calum's end of the receiver broke my thoughts, and I felt a new wave of sympathy rush over me for him. I couldn't imagine it - the girl who had been plaguing his mind for so long, the mystery girl that he was so clearly in love with and writing songs for, was my best friend. Now that I knew, it made all the sense in the world to me, and I vaguely remembered my second time meeting Ashton in the club.

Rachel was terrified when we left, so much so that it looked like she'd seen a ghost. Little did I know that the ghost had been Calum.

There was still an abundance of information I didn't know regarding the duo's past, but the one thing I did know was that they had loved each other, once upon a time. And although I desperately wanted answers, I knew that my two closest friends needed each other to fix what was broken inside of them.

"You've got to make things right." I urged him.

"I'm trying, Julia, I really am. But damn it," He cursed, and I could almost picture him tugging his dark hair in frustration. "You didn't see her while you were in the hospital. I haven't seen her in three, almost four years. She won't even look at me. She hates me."

"No one can hate you with as much intensity as the person who used to love you." I stated quietly.

A head of dark hair poked through the open doorway, and Rachel's eyes quickly flitted around the room before landing on me.