Chapter 75
Now that I said the words, I couldn't back down.
I had to fess up.
Part of me just wanted to make a joke out of this, and just act like I'd been messing with her.
Part of me wasn't ready to share this with Lexi, to let her know all of my weaknesses. Part of me wasn't ready... to talk about that night with her.
With anyone really. I never talked about that night. It had been my lowest point.
It wasn't something I enjoyed being reminded of.
But if I wanted to have any kind of relationship with Lexi, she needed to know this.
And if I wanted to heal too, I realized, I needed to be honest.
I needed to open up.
"Just... promise me you won't freak out, alright? Promise me to hear me out, not jump to conclusion and get hysterical, okay? Just let me explain everything," I told her, taking a deep breath.
I didn't want to freak her out. But I didn't want to sugar-coat it either.
"Alright," Lexi replied, looking a little on the fence.
"You did. You do make a difference in my life. I... you know..."
It was kind of unbelievable for me to have to say that, that Lexi Grayson mattered to me. I'd been way smoother that I was given credit for, honestly. This girl didn't think she made a difference in my life?
How ludicrous?
"You wanted to know, with coach the time he didn't want to let me play because I didn't do a test, and why Josh was freaking out the other day after our paint fight," I started to say.
Lexi just looked at me with a confused expression.
I didn't blame her. How could she know? She had no way of knowing about my health issues. Almost no one knew.
We'd come to a stop, facing each other. Lexi was looking at me with her big brown eyes, earnestly and all I wanted was to hug her.
That'd be counterproductive right now though. I wouldn't be able to accomplish anything if I did.
Time to be serious.
Finally, I said, "do you know what AVM is?"
No going back now.
Lexi shook her head, not knowing. It made sense. It wasn't a very known condition.
"It stands for arteriovenous malformation," I explained.
Lexi's eyes widened, panic setting in them. "Please Blake, tell me you didn't lie to me? Tell me you aren't dying?" she asked, her hand grabbing the sleeve of my hoodie.
"I'm not dying Lexi," I told her, trying to be comforting.
This had been... kinda hard to say. Because for so long this had always been a thing. I always saw my end coming faster than normal people. But I was learning to change that mindset.
It was all because I was overly dramatic, really.
And Lexi's eyes were tearing up, which made no fucking sense, while hurting my heart at the same time. "Tell me the truth!" she pressed.
Did she care enough about me to actually be tearing up when she thought I might be really sick?
Caring about me? Sure, I could get it to a point, but she'd only started to put up with me a couple of weeks ago.
It would have made more sense for her to not care about me enough to cry about me.
I should really stop trying to rationalize our feelings. Mine never made sense. Hers shouldn't have to either.
"I'm not dying Pumpkin," I repeated.
"Then what? Do you have it? That?" she asked me, looking like she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
Her grip on the sleeve of my shirt had tightened.
I looked at her hand and then at her eyes. "I told you not to jump to conclusion, didn't I Pumpkin? It's treated."
"I'm really confused right now," she automatically replied, still not satisfied with my answer.
With reason. I wasn't exactly being specific. Or clear.
I looked at her hand again, and sort of turned my arm, slipping it so that I'd be holding her hand. I took a deep breath and started to explain. "After my car accident, after Shawn's birthday, they took CT scans of my head. I had a concussion and they wanted to make sure everything was okay. I had a lot of headaches, but I was used to it so I didn't mention anything. They found the AMV then. It's a bad connection between my artery and my veins. There's a bad circulation of blood in my brain and my veins are messed up and can actually like, pop. Anyway, I'm vulgarizing here. Point is, it was small, they found it and they treated it."
It felt so weird, to actually explain this to someone. I never did before. Everyone that knew about it—my parents, Josh, they were all basically at the hospital with me when it had happened. They got the talk from the doctor.
This felt strange.
"Treated how?" Lexi asked, still not happy with my answer.
Her hand was still in mine. I think she was freaking so much that she hadn't even realized I was holding it.
That was what my hand holding privileges were for.
"With a gamma knife procedure. It's radiations. They don't even open your skull with that. If it hadn't been for the fact, I was pretty messed up because of the other car I could have gotten home within the day. Right after the treatment," I told her, trying to take my time to explain this to her, so she'd stop freaking out and not think I was deflecting or keeping crucial information about my health. She knew as much as I did.
I had no idea if my veins were going to burst again. That was my life's gamble.
"No, but wait, you said headaches. You still have headaches? What's wrong?"
Nothing? Everything? Can we just skip this conversation and start kissing already?
I deserved a slap.
But also, this conversation wasn't about AVM or my head condition at the moment. Not exactly.
This was about the impact Lexi Grayson had on my life.
I definitely was not done rambling. I needed to get to the important part of my speech.
Her hand was still in mine.
"It just takes a while to have a full recovery. Anyway, that was not the point. I'm not telling you this to worry you Pumpkin. My condition doesn't matter. I'm fine now. And I don't want you walking on eggshell around me. Because I really am okay. I'm telling you this because," I took a breath, gazing in her eyes, "the night when I had the accident, I left the party because of what you said. I was so mad because it was true, I am a heartless no good to love stinking dick, and I left. And I got into the accident. If it hadn't been for you, I wouldn't have gone to the hospital. I wouldn't have had my head checked and I would still have my veins threatening to pop in my brain. I could be dead you know, because of a hemorrhage. So, when you say that you aren't making a big difference in my life you couldn't be more wrong Lexi. On so many levels."
It wasn't pleasant to think back about that night. To think about the mean things she said about me, the things I already thought about myself.
I had never loved myself. And having someone I'd focus all my love on throw it back it my face had been... quite the painful experience.
But it was okay now.
Lexi wasn't saying anything, she was just staring at me, so I kept on rambling uselessly, worried I alienated her. "And I know I'm a mess and I act a little unbalanced and I'm a dick and I have so many issues and I'm broken and I have so many demons to deal with, so many things I haven't accepted yet, so many things I'm trying to work on."
I couldn't finish my sentence because Lexi hugged me, effectively shutting me up. "Blake" she whispered, her cheek pressed on my throat, as my arms wrapped around her. "It doesn't matter how hard you try to convince me or people around that you're worthless. I don't believe it and I'll never believe it. Get that through your head buddy."
Her hold on me tightened, as mine did. She moved her head and I swore I could feel her lips on my throat. I was definitely not imagining it.
"Why is it always you? Why are you always the one getting so much crap all the time?" she whispered, and I could definitely feel her lips moving against my neck now.
My cheek was pressed to the top of her head, and I smiled. "I'm too desirable for my own good?" I said teasingly, to lighten the mood, because if things got any more serious, I would kiss her and kiss her for real.
"I'm sorry Blake," she said, still being serious, "Oh and you're not a heartless no good to love dick."
"Stinking dick," I corrected her.
Wait? Did she just smell me? Had she been basically kissing my throat and now she was smelling me? It wasn't the first time she did it too.
"Yeah that. It's not true. I was mad that night more at myself than anyone and those words were not meant for you. If anything, they were meant for me." Or for Alex. They were probably meant for Alex too. "And you definitely don't stink."
Well obviously, I was realizing that now, because apparently, she kept smelling me.
So.
She got distracted by my chest and she liked the way I smelled?
Things were definitely looking up for me.
I sighed, my arms still firmly wrapped around her. She'd have to be the one letting go of me, because I didn't intend on doing it. Ever. "Thank you," I breathed.
Lexi leaned back a little, her arms a still around me, but her lips not against my skin anymore, as she looked in my eyes to ask me, "is it sure though? That you're alright?"
It felt eerie to be the one that needed to convince someone that I wasn't dying and that I was going to be okay.
"Brain is a complicated thing you know. There could always be complications, or neurological damage from the treatment, but so far, I think my brain is okay. There might be some damage in part of my brain that liked science though," I tried to joke.
I was ashamed to admit this, but for a long time, I didn't even care whether I lived or died. I didn't mind not waking up in the morning. It felt like it was the best alternative in a world where my brother was gone and I felt responsible for it.
I didn't think about the way the people around would have felt.
I only thought about myself, and about the easiest way to get rid of my pain.
I'd been so broken for so many years.
It was a good thing Lexi had never liked me before. She'd deserve someone that wasn't this damaged.
Slowly though, I was hoping that I could become that person.
Lexi narrowed her eyes at me. "I don't give you the right to let anything happen to you, understood?"
"Don't worry. You know, the test? With coach. I get regular check ups. I'd been putting off the last one. Anyway, everything was still fine in my last results."
I just had to be more careful. I could be more careful. Especially if it seemed to freak my Pumpkin this much.
"And the Josh thing?" Lexi asked.
I rolled my eyes. Josh was always more worried than he needed to be. "Josh thinks I should have had my skull opened up to have the AVM surgically removed. But I didn't want to have my skull open. Truthfully, any kind of treatment for this is complicated, there's no perfect remedy. I wouldn't have done anything if it hadn't been for everyone freaking out. I figured Gamma treatment was the most reasonable option and the safest one. Anyway, point is Josh is always just waiting for me to have a seizure or a stroke."
Lexi nodded somberly, staring straight at my chest. "I understand him."
I realized I was brushing my fingers against her temple, as I was doing it. I honestly had no control over my body when I was this close to this girl.
"I'm fine. Don't worry. It would be way too predictable for me to die. I'm here to stay," I tried to reassure her with a smile.
Lexi went to hug me tightly again, her face back against my throat. My hand went to the back of her head, keeping her close.
How long had we been hugging?
I shouldn't be thinking about it.
"Thank you... for telling me, for being honest, for trusting me," Lexi whispered, tucked under my chin.
"Thanks for saving me," I replied softly, kissing her temple.
Finally, Lexi dropped her hands, and we started to walk again.
She lent her shoulder for support and I definitely wasn't against walking while basically hugging her.
My knee still hurt but I had kind of forgotten about it. Who cared about their hurt knee when the love of their lives was there?
"So, after this lengthy heart to heart, it's my turn to ask you questions," I told her as we made our way slowly back to my camp.
"What do you want to know?" Lexi asked, smiling back at me.
Everything.
"Do you know what you want to do after school? Do you have big plans?"
"Honestly? No. And I'm kind of worried about it. I kept thinking that I'd know what I wanted to do when I got older, but I still have no clue. I know the things that I like, but I have no idea how that gives me career plans."
"It's fine, I have no idea what I want to do either," I admitted too, smiling back at her.
Her arm was around my waist. She was smiling back at me. I wanted to stop time.
"Did you have pets growing up?" I asked next.
"I had one dog, a black Labrador, when I was really really young, but he was getting pretty old and he needed more care, so my parents sent him to a farm. Same thing with my bunny. The bunny kept trying to jump in our fireplace, so my parents sent him to a farm where he'd be able to run around and be happy," Lexi stopped walking after saying that. "Oh shit."
"What?"
"Now that I'm saying this, I'm totally realizing that my parents never sent anything to the farm. Oh god. They killed my bunny and my dog. Farm is code for dead animal."
I laughed out loud. Was she serious? "What? You never made the connection?"
Lexi laughed too. "Well, I mean, no. Like, saying it out loud made me realize how stupid I was. Oh my god."
I kept laughing. "Yeah, this makes so much sense coming from you. Adorable, adorable Pumpkin."
She nudged my side with her elbow. "Shut it."
I asked my next question, a smile in my voice. "Were you always close with your brother?"
She seemed to think about it for a second. "Yeah, I guess. I was close with my sister too before. My siblings were my best friends for the longest time. But then I guess my sister became a teenager and her kid sister and her kid brother weren't as interesting as her school friends."
"Do you miss your sister?"
"I miss... I don't know. The way it was before. I don't like change." She didn't have to tell me. I definitely knew that. "I miss the way my sister used to be. But I get that we grow up and that sometime people have nothing in common except being in the same family, so that doesn't mean we have to get along. I'm just a little... I don't know, nostalgic about it because things won't ever be the same as when we were younger and were always together and got along."
This was the second time Lexi was mentioning nostalgia. It made sense with her personality, the way she never liked change and was always daydreaming.
"How were you when you were younger? You know, before I moved in town, before school even," I asked her, curious about the days when I didn't know her.
I wondered what it would have been like growing up with her.
"Well, you know at my house, Anna was the playing with doll type, but only to dress them up. She would just change their outfits and their hair. I wanted to make big installations you know? And invent a whole thing where Barbie was a princess and she was sent to the castle with other princesses and then Ken would pick her."
"Bachelorette enactment?" I teased her.
"Shut up!" she said with a laugh, slapping my stomach with the back of her hand. "Anyway, Tyler would just crash into my wanna-be castle with his teddy bear and attack the whole place and tear my Barbies' heads off. You know when you tear a Barbie's head off it's kind of over for her. Even though she's a doll, you can't really glue her head back. And even if you stick it back in place it's always wobbly. It's almost like she's really dead," Lexi admitted a little mournfully and I chuckled at her expression. Gosh, was she being this adorable on purpose? "The only time Anna ever let me use my imagination was when we played dressed up and she would be the princess and I would have to act as her maid, and the prince, and her mother. Sometimes all at once."
"Hard childhood?" I said, with a half smile, teasing her.
With the way she was smiling as she reminisced at the memories, I could tell she loved those days with her sister and brother.
"Very," she agreed.
I was looking at her, my arm still locked around her shoulders. A strand of her hair was escaping from her ponytail so I tucked it back, surprising my own self. Lexi didn't say anything though, or stopped me, so I played it cool, and cleared my throat before asking, my heart beating way too fast in my chest, "First book you ever read?"
Yes, literature was a safe topic. Maybe I wouldn't want to pin her back against a tree and make out with her if we talked about books.
"Tuck Everlasting. If I had to pick a favourite book it would be that one actually. I kinda like the whole fatality in it. I cried a lot at the end. I know it was how things were supposed to be but damn it I wanted Jesse and Winnie to end up together."
So she was a hopeless romantic. I wasn't surprised. It made sense. I was always looking at her. I'd seen the titles of many books she had read. It was almost always romance.
"What about you? Favourite book?" she asked me.
Since we were being this open and I was feeling more and more comfortable with her I started to ramble like an idiot, because I wanted to share this part of me with her.
"It's so difficult to choose because I love so many. I love the way Victor Hugo writes. "Love partakes of the soul itself. It is of the same nature. Like the soul, it is a divine spark; it is incorruptible, indivisible, imperishable. It is a point of fire within us, which is immortal and infinite, which nothing can limit and nothing can extinguish. We feel it burning even in the marrow of our bones, and we see it radiate even to the depths of the sky." I quoted him like some poser. I was slightly ashamed of myself but I wasn't stopping either. "That's one of the main reasons I hate Henry Miller. Sure, Tropic of Cancer is full of freaky sex and what kind of dude wouldn't enjoy that, but he doesn't like Victor Hugo in that book. That's one thing Josh and I don't have in common. Josh could make that book into his personal Bible."
"Josh has issues," Lexi immediately pitched in, making me chuckle.
It was nice to have someone to gang up on Josh with. I always used to be the one Josh and Jay ganged up against.
"Indeed. But you know what? My favourite story might be one of Oscar's Wilde short stories, The Nightingale and the Rose. Bitter, bitter was the pain, and wilder and wilder grew her song, for she sang of the Love that is perfected by Death, of the Love that dies not in the tomb." I quoted and continued rambling, "It's like the story in the preface of the Thorn Birds. The best is only bought at the cost of great pain."
"You know I feel highly stupid when you talk about book and quote like this," Lexi said.
It was kinda nice, to show her that her opinion of me had been wrong before and that I wasn't just a stupid manwhore.
I was just starting.
I grinned. "And you haven't even heard half of it. The Unbearable Lightness of Being, by Kundera is one of my favorites too. I love his way of writing and we stayed in Prague for a few months when I was younger when Jayden was still alive... for some unexplainable reason it's comforting. And it makes you think a lot. I love Kundera's way of writing and I love that he puts so many references to other languages, and he mentions Beethoven's String quartet number 16 in F major, opus 135. "Muß es sein? Es muß sein!", my father loves that piece. I always wished I could play it."
Lexi was looking at me weirdly, and it was a good thing it was dark because I could feel my cheeks heating up a bit. I was like a kid high on sugar.
"Why don't you?" Lexi asked me.
"String? Didn't you hear that?" I said, mimicking playing the violin. "I play the piano," I explained and played air-piano.
"Smartass," Lexi said and slapped my stomach again. I liked teasing her too much. "So should I be guessing that your favourite music is classical?" she asked.
Oh. To chose favorites in music too? I really hated just picking one when it came to literature and music.
I only kept my absolutes when it came to picking the person I was in love with.
"That's a hard one too..." I trailed and tried to think of what I should answer. Lexi pointed her flashlight right in my face, making me jump.
"Fan girl," I teased her and started to talk, "I'm a pretty moody guy so it goes with my mood, I guess. I like Beethoven and Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Debussy, but those are the oldies, I also like Ludovico Einaudi and Yann Tiersen. But aside from instrumental music, I like Frank Sinatra but I also like other stuff, like The Used or all the indie stuff Josh makes me listen to, Black Angels for instance."
"And then I love French singers like Charles Aznavour, oldies, but I can't help myself. You know if I had any experience in that field, I'd say this feels like those speed dating kind of thing," I found myself saying, like we were playing twenty questions, as Lexi stared at me with a smile on her face. Maybe I shouldn't have said dating. Maybe that might scare her off? Oh well, it was too late now to back off.
Lexi was laughing anyway, so I laughed it her. I guessed it was fine.
"Anyway," I continued, "I love French compositors, heck I even listen to Edith Piaf sometimes. You know the French started so many movements with art, with their Montmartre and Montparnasse. With so many poets and painters. Robert Desnos who's one of my favourite poets lived there. He died during the war. I can't translate it the right way, that's why I always use so many foreign languages around you, because there's some things that simply can't be translate, that are beautiful when you read them the original way," I stopped talking because Lexi was staring at me in a peculiar way.
"What?" I asked a little worried. "Why are you smiling like that?"
Was she making fun of me? I wouldn't hold it against her. I was kind of rambling like an idiot.
Lexi really had a talent at bringing out the idiot in me.
My Pumpkin just kept smiling. "Nothing. It's just... why are you not letting him out, the part of you that loves art and that talks about it with so much passion?"
Oh.
"I..." I started to say and then just let out a breath.
How to explain this and make sense?
"You're punishing yourself, aren't you?" Lexi replied for me. "You figured since your brother didn't get to live why allow to yourself the things that make you truly happy. You feel like you didn't deserve being happy, right?"
That was the way to explain this and make sense, apparently.
Here I was always thinking I was the observant one between us two. We were both unobservant and perceptive at the same time.
Perceptive about all the wrong things, perceptive about the way we were hurting and the way we were hurting ourselves.
She was seeing right through me.
Dr Boseman would definitely agree with her.
"You might not want to rule out a future at being a shrink just yet," I just said.
Of course, she was right. I'd stop music and painting for so long because I wanted to punish myself. I'd made myself miserable because I thought it was all I deserved.
I was getting better now, though.
Sounds coming from the camps made me look ahead.
We'd almost reach our destination.
I hadn't realized we were almost done with our walk.
I hated to think that this was it. That the night was ending here.
I was happy that I had finally been able to be honest with Lexi.
But... there was still more to share.
Would it be too much to tell her everything right now?
"Stop punishing yourself, there's no point and you'll miss out on your life," Lexi told me, bringing me back to the present.
I smiled at her fighting every urge in my body to kiss her.
"Need support to walk back to your camp?" she said.
I could stop myself from kissing her because I wanted her to be the one to instigate it this time, I wanted it to be her choice.
But there was no way in hell I was letting her get away.
"What you think you're getting ride of me this early? I hate to break this to you Pumpkin but you're not going just yet," I told her with a laugh, and hugged her more tightly against my side.
My Pumpkin wasn't going anywhere.
Not just yet.
________________
Happy Monday my little Pumpkins! :D
Still no kiss. MOUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
I added a few things at Blake and Lexi conversation, Lexi talking about her childhood. The pet part is inspired by my own experience. My dumbass really thought my parents sent our ill dog, wounded chickens from raccoons' attacks and suicidal bunny to a farm. I thought that until I was fifteen. FIFTEEN! Sometimes I'm quite the dumbass. Speaking of raccoons, they are evil creatures that tear off the head of your chickens at night, and leave the body in your chicken coop, so when little eight years old Kay goes to feed her chickens she can be thoroughly traumatized. And chickens are also evil creatures because they will gang up and start pecking on the wounds of the chickens that survived the attacks until they basically maim them.
Moral of this story? It's no wonder I have so many issues. XD
Alright. I shall go now. I have more writing to do as always. By the way I did a live reading on my instagram today, of Pitiful I Know (I Sold edited version). I'll try to get back to a more regular live reading schedule. It's at instagram.com/kaygiard if you want to listen to me ramble uselessly.
OKAY! Going for real now! See you all next week! I LOVE YOU GUYS! <3