chapter twenty - inarticulate

3.5K 141 40
                                    

Inarticulate // unable to express one's ideas or feelings clearly or easily.

Inarticulate // unable to express one's ideas or feelings clearly or easily

Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.

I was submerged by feelings. I was drowning in them. I knew it and my lungs that are screaming for a break know it too. My whole body vibrates with feeling but none of them make it up to my brain, which sits numb - not understanding what's happened. Like the moment after you hurt yourself, there's a feeling of dread and numbness where you think uh-oh before the pain hits.

But it's not hitting, instead it's just building and building and building. I can feel it in my chest, in my legs, in my heart. But it hasn't reached where my emotions lie quite yet. With the delay, I'm sitting gaping at the laptop screen, not able to comprehend the words I'm reading. They might as well be in a different language because as far as I know, I'm never going to be able to understand them.

How could they piece everything together so well? How could they put everything together? The cameras follow us everywhere but I mean this article has got every single thing that Alex and I did and said that no-one would ever pick up on it. Brushed it off like it was a minuscule dilemma, but now they've all merged to create a humongous ball of cold hard truth. Truth that's shattering the lens that we seemed to have been wearing this whole time.

Everything seemed perfect, it was perfect. Now in a matter of seconds, it's abysmal. It gone. It's vanished. There's no coming back from this.

I seem to come back to reality, once again aware of my surroundings. Alex hops off of the bed and begins pacing running a hand through her hair, muttering incoherent words that don't match up. I slam the laptop down, unable to look at its truth anymore. Standing up, I run a hand through my hair and turn to see James staring at us, concern etched onto his features.

"But surely you've gone through stuff like this before?" He asks, his words actually making sense in my muddled brain.

"Not like this. This is truth and they've got everything right. If we were to deny it, I bet people would laugh at us. For the first time, it looks properly legit." I groan, running a hand down my face.

"Jesus, okay. Um, is there anything I can do?" He asks.

"Leave it, I'll deal with it." My words coming out harsher than I intended.

James senses the mood and leaves silently, collecting his laptop on the way out. Shutting the door behind him, our room falls into darkness once again so I lean over and turn on my lamp, wanting the light so that I can talk to Alex.

"I knew this was a bad idea," Alex stresses, still pacing.

"What was a bad idea?" I ask, confused.

"Us."

Just like that, the moment of silence before the pain hits ends. The pain hits and it hits hard. Like a punch to the stomach, her words leave me breathless.

Chasing The Stars ✔️ Where stories live. Discover now