Beautiful Mistake | ✓

• 2.6 •

But he was silent.

Wonderful.

I begin to tell him everything that happened once I left the office.

I called Greg to tell him that I would find my own way home and he presumed I had a date. Instead, I used a company car and drove to the most elite bar in the area. If you could call any bar elite and elegant.

It was filled with men in suits and women with pencil skirts and button-up shirts. It was different to the usual plain or too-short clothes that people wore to other bars. It was clear who was there for a casual business meeting or to drown their work problems. Often some of the people were fired and this was their last chance to use the company credit card.

I made my way to the bar and the bartender served me immediately, judging the strength I needed from my facial expression. As my fingers closed around the cold glass, I felt some of the rage leaving me.

"I knew that I was doing the wrong thing. I knew that the moment I took one gulp of that drink I would be there for hours. I knew that I was being reckless and that I may hurt somebody but that did not stop me. I don't think anything could have stopped me," I say and Dr Dufre takes notes at lightning speed.

Whenever I drank alcohol there was something foreign yet familiar to it. No matter how long it was until I drank something, there would always be a lingering taste from when I was younger. It was as if the taste was burned into my tongue.

Nowadays, the drinks come after the anger but, when I first started, the anger came after. I bought my first bottles because of the shock, the denial that she had really left.

That she left me.

I was young: I was not prepared for any of the effects. Instead of feeling abandonment, I felt anger. How could she leave me? How could Dad let her leave?

Why did it have to happen to her?

It did not help that everything seemed to fall apart at the same time. Marco was not there, my father started to become a ghost and my maternal family packed up. I was alone and for some reason the alcohol made me feel less lonely.

I probably would have gone down an endless, vicious cycle if not for Camila. An almost stranger who did whatever she could to ensure I did not throw away my life. I still don't know why I ended up drunk dialling her.

But thank goodness she picked up.

When Marco returned, the two of them hit it off as friends as well and we became a trio. It was different, having a girl in the group, but it worked. We wanted to protect her but she ended up protecting us more.

Which, was not too unbelievable. First, Marco was no fighter. He may swear here and there but that is about as far as he will go. Secondly, I was a piece of fraying thread and was always in need of them to patch me up. And finally, Camila was about as badass as you could get.

"Diego?" Dr Dufre says, interrupting my thoughts. 

"Just thinking about the first time," I tell him. There was no point in even trying to lie to him, and why would I?

"When Camila came to your rescue?" He checks and I nod.

Dr Dufre liked to call her my princess in shining armour.

"Relive it," He instructs.

I groan. We seemed to do this often, if I ever had any temptation to suddenly drink again. I was forced to remember the pain and abandonment I felt when my mother died, the way it felt like glass was slowly cutting my heart in a way that made me feel like I was dying but never killed me.