Eyes Bright, Uptight {EDITING}

//i wanna, i gotta be adored//

"I can't do this shit sober, Doc," I said, taking my tea mug into my hands. "Any of it."

Every single time I would shut my eyes, there she would be, her big eyes fluttering and face gorgeous as she tried not to smile at me. I missed her. My heart was so broken, and the only thing that made me want to get out of bed was the rush of life that happened when I did cocaine. It only lasted for a couple hours, tops, but I felt alive in those brief moments. I would write like a madman, profusely, hands shaking and handwriting awful, abbreviated, the letters too large.

I felt alive when I was on drugs. At least a little.

Harper had been visiting a lot, telling me I needed to go out, to try to forget about Claire. The boys all believed that the shit rehab placed had cured me of my woes, my demons. But Harper saw right through it. The little firey-haired demon had lectured me as she forced me to eat. "Matty, you gotta stop doing this shit, you twat," or "Stop feeling so sorry for yourself."

When I had cursed at her for not bringing me any coke, she slapped me across my face so hard my bottom lip had opened at the corner.

She didn't ever pity me. She knew I was doing it to myself. She knew that this, this horror, this endless, mindless trip of drugs and thoughts clashing against each other like swords and cigarettes at 4 am in the rain: this is what I wanted, what I felt I deserved.

"Have you had any closure with Claire? With George?" Dr. Hall asked me.

George and I had barely discussed it at all. He and Claire had previously agreed to some absurd friends-with-benefts arrangment that neither one of them had to stomach to digest. She had fallen in love with him, I'm almost certain. But she hadn't fallen out of love with me, either.

Not kissing her those months ago was the only moment in a very, very long time I had felt proud of myself, like I had done the right thing. I had swallowed how bad I needed her in a hard, dry gulp. Though did need her desperately. I needed her legs parted and me between them, any which way she'd have me. I needed to hear her moan, to say my name, to wince in delight as she made gashes in the flesh of my back. I needed her to fall asleep in my arms, to wake up to her pacing around the room. I was so in love with how in love with life she was.

I wondered how well George had fucked her; which side he had seen of her. Was she a bad girl for him? Did she talk dirty and make him lose his mind with the way she could move her tongue? Was she a sweet, trembling angel, trying to keep quiet as he slowly moved in and out of her?

I knew, without a doubt, that I flooded her thoughts while George flooded her body; that while he touched her, she remembered me, like a forgotten window left open in the rain.

No matter how far she strayed, she would always be my girl. Quite some time ago, I had realized that I did not change Claire McDaniel throughout our relationship; she had just discovered herself. She had discovered the depths of what she could endure, of what she could give and receieve. She would never feel as safe in any other man's arms; she would never come so hard beneath another man; never be so swollen with love as she was with me.

Though I suppose none of that mattered now, because she wasn't speaking to me. She wasn't speaking to George, either, I know, because he had been moping around, listening to "Know Yourself" by Drake over and over, a different girl leaving his apartment every morning.

"No, not exactly," I answred Dr. Hall. "George is distant. He refuses to admit any guilt, and I don't blame him. He's not used to doing bad things so he doesn't know how to accept his resposibility in all of this."

George was not like me, who did bad things all of the time. It was in my nature.

I sipped from my mug and wet my palate. "I used to pretend to sleep sometimes, when Claire and I were dating, just to hear the things she'd say."