Hope for Us (NEWT) [COMPLETED]

Ch 19 - Time to Give In

~Newt~

As he lay on his own hammock for the first time in over two weeks, Newt's mind whirled with endless thoughts and doubts.

It'd only been about two weeks.

Two.

That was barely any time ago. Everything went downhill since then. He thought he'd be dead—that it would all be over. The thoughts consumed him day and night, even after he was stuck in that Med-jack hut all those days.

If he wanted to be honest with himself, Newt knew he was angry that he survived the fall. And he hated that Sara was there, watching him go through it all. She had such a particular way of getting inside his head, and he didn't even know if it was a good thing or a bad thing. He blamed her for being the reason—or the distraction—responsible for interrupting his attempt of ending his life.

He regretted it so much now. Enclosed in his own grief, he became blind to everyone else's pain. He didn't want to hear words of encouragement from anybody. It was useless.

How could someone force a person to want to continue living if life was the only reason why they were so broken?

Sara tried to reach out to him, from the moment she first saw him, and all he'd done was push her away. He'd managed to get through two weeks, and really, not all of it had been so terrible. The moments he shared with her, even if they ended up in both of them arguing... he liked them.

He didn't know if he just kept lying to himself whenever he told her to leave, because somehow, he wished she would stay.

And there was the thing with the creators. He didn't know what their plan was, or the whole reason behind him and the Gladers having to go through this. They had families somewhere out there, missing them. They had an entire life stripped away from them.

Maybe Newt was just a crazy slinthead that deserved whatever was happening to him, and maybe that was why he was put in the Glade. Maybe the others were put in there by accident. Or they, too, had a questionable past from which they had to redeem themselves.

But Sara... she hadn't done anything wrong, yet everyone treated her so badly. He treated her terribly. She'd been kind to everyone—in her own way—and she learned not to retaliate against anyone, no matter what they did to her. Not to mention, whenever she pulled a stunt like Minho, it was hilarious. That girl had a talent with words. She could pull a smile out of him when no one else could.

It hadn't been too long since Newt stopped believing there was a way out of the Maze. He didn't know if that had changed, but he did know that one thing was different for sure. He didn't care what could happen to him; he wanted to try his hardest to get Sara out of the Glade. He wanted the Gladers to gather up strength collectively and get themselves out of there too. Sara—

Sara, Sara, Sara.

Every thought that popped into his mind, one way or another, led him back to her. He wasn't sure if the others were right about her hiding something, but that was the last thing he cared about. He realized that in his darkest moments, she was the best thing that showed up. She was like a little lightbulb, constantly illuminating her surroundings, distributing light to whoever the heck wanted it.

It was cliché, and Newt knew it. He hated it but couldn't stop liking it. It was the greatest paradox of his life. Sara symbolized hope—a medicine, remedy, a cure to everything that was happening. Things started changing following her arrival, and Newt had no doubt that more was to come as well.

For the first time, his heart ached for her as she sat alone in the deadheads. He had an impulsive desire of embracing her tightly, trying to reassure her however he could. But how could he possibly help her when he was the one who had the least mental capacity to comfort others? She would've laughed at him. He never showed any appreciation for her anyway. And if he did, it was mere pretense; when he was tired of being rude all the time.

He had to stop lying to himself, and to her. Newt wanted to start over. He wanted to tell her that even though he pushed her away, she was the only person he wished would simply stay. That she would be stubborn enough to stay because she knew he needed help.

That girl, whatever her story, was someone of which Newt wanted to know more. Despite the little memory any of them had of their previous lives, he wanted to discover the story that brought her to the Glade; not even his own story—just hers. He wanted to rewrite a whole new story. Start fresh and just erase anything that started off on the wrong path.

She was an opportunity for him to move on and fight for what he cared about, and he'd been wasting it. Sara was the motivation that everyone needed, and they'd all been wasting it.

No more.

He wanted to make it up to her.

There was plenty of time to make things right now that they both would be working in the gardens. A presumed nightmare turned to a blessing.

He didn't know if she'd let him into her life after he was refusing to let her into his, but he was willing to do it now, wholeheartedly.

It's time to give in.