Eight Letters. Three Words.

Eight Letters. Three Words - Ch. 24

Chapter Twenty Four

What Needed to be Said

Relationships cause heart break, your heart shatters into irreparable tiny pieces. But that's not accurate enough for me. Our heart doesn't tear apart. It's still beating. We're still alive.

It's something else, something else which breaks, but we don't know what it is. Or where it is. Therefore we limit ourselves to believe it's our hearts, because the idea of not knowing scares us.

It is not our hearts that break, but ourselves.

                                                                          *

"Coffee is ready," my mother knocked once on my door, and walked down the hall.

To say I hadn't slept well was an understatement. The truth was I hadn't slept at all. Events kept replaying themselves over, and over in my head. And I kept waiting for the moment when my mind would exhaust itself, and I would finally be able to doze off.

I opened my closet, grabbed a pair of black jeans and pulled them on. Not bothering to take off my pajama top. I found a green hoodie then, next to some boots, and right as I was about to pull it on, I froze.

Lemons and spice, I smelled. As if scalded I yanked it off, throwing it to the very end of the room. I hugged myself, suddenly cold and decided it'd be best if I'd changed my entire outfit.

"It's already cold," said Tom as I walked into the kitchen. He stood there, for several long seconds, and not knowing what to do next we awkwardly stared at each other. I had tried staying clear of Tom's path for the past two days, mainly because it seemed that every word that escaped his mouth consisted of, 'How are you s?' and 'Are you okays?'. The questions unnerved me, basically because I wasn't okay, and didn't want people asking about it.

Tom finally nodded; more to himself than to me, and left.

He had been right about the coffee, it was cold. A thin layer of something had formed on the top of the coffee, but despite that I slurped it up, as if my life depended on it.

"That's not Dylan's car in front of the house," stated my Mother as she walked through the door. I stood, and took a peek through the curtain, whatever hope I'd had of her being wrong was crashed in an instance.

"It's Leela."

"You scared the boy away didn't you?" She laughed shaking her head, as if all this was so incredibly amusing. "I'll never understand what he saw in you."

Tom choked on the muffin he'd been eating, his eyes wide like saucers. I poured the contents of my mug into a thermos and turned to face her. "You never try to understand anything concerning me, Mother."

"How I wish you wouldn't say those things to me Chloe."

"Well, my wish is to never turn out to be like you!"

She placed her mug in the sink, "Now honey, lack of sleep is making you be a little over dramatic."

"I'm anything but dramatic mother. God, I can't stand you! How Tom keeps up with you is beyond me, no wonder my father left!"

She froze, her eyes darting between Tom, who was still as a statue, and me. "Chloe-"

I stood, "Forget it."

In her small Audi, Leela was bouncing her head to the song that blasted from her speakers.

"What are you doing here?" I asked as I opened the door. The beat to the Latin music she was listening flooding my ears.