*This chapter involves a conversation about a past suicide attempt and self-harm scars.
It may be emotionally damaging to listen to 'you are in love' by taylor swift repeatedly as you read.
I felt like a child again.
The wind was blowing against my face, smelling like salt and the remnants of a burning bonfire in the distance. It was comfortably warm outside and the sounds that surrounded me were that of pure joy. The ocean waves lapping against the shore, the bicycle wheels turning as they whizzed over the wooden boardwalk, the sound of Harry's laughter as I tried to teach him how to ride with no hands.
We stole the bikes.
We stole them. I don't know why it surprised me so much, but it did. There is a shop in the Wasteland to rent bikes, of course, it's a tourist town. It was closed though, on account of it being the middle of the night. I don't know why I didn't think about where the fuck we were gonna get bicycles from, but I didn't. I didn't worry about things like that when I was with Harry. I just followed him.
He lit a cigarette and put it between his lips as he led me down the boardwalk, all bouncy and giddy. He circled around me and held the cigarette up to my lips, watching me take a drag with a smile. His hand found mine, our fingers intertwining, something we weren't allowed to do in the daylight. Everything felt safer for us when we were in the dark.
We found the bikes fairly fast. It was amazing how many Wastelanders just left their shit laying around, trusting that nobody else would take it. I understood it, growing up in this town... I used to leave my little pink bike out all the time. My dads always told me that someone would steal it, that I should lock it away, but I never worried. And it never got stolen, because Juniper Bay was a good town full of good people.
Except for me and Harry, apparently. The bicycle thieves.
"We're returning these later!" I whispered to him sternly as we both got on our 'borrowed' bicycles, listening to him try to stifle his loud laughter.
"Of course we are. I don't steal." He winked at me, so full of boyish charm that my heart nearly burst.
We laughed and shushed each other as we rode off on the matching blue bicycles that likely belonged to some ridiculously active older couple. I was glad that I decided to wear my chucks tonight and not my usual platforms as I stood up on the pedals, gliding down the street toward the boardwalk.
"You wanna race?" I called back to Harry, admiring him.
He was wearing an old white graphic t-shirt, blue and white checkered vans with high socks and the best part-little cream colored shorts that had stitchings of bunny rabbits eating carrots on them. He showed them to me when he pulled them on, smiling so bright that his eyes squinted and sparkled. I didn't think my heart could soar any more until he yanked a bright pink beanie over his hair. It was warm out. He didn't need it, he wore it just for me.
I looked at him now as he rode his bike behind me, studying him. He smirked when he saw me look back. He looked so yummy, like my dream boy, and I wanted him more than ever. My heart hadn't stopped racing ever since I climbed over the railing and onto his balcony earlier tonight.
"Only if you promise not to cry when I beat you." He replied and I laughed loudly, putting on the brakes so we could start from the same spot.
"I promise, by the end of the night, you'll be the only one who has done any crying." I smirked at him, to which he playfully rolled his eyes, "To the wharf?"
"On the count of three?" He asked, smiling brightly as he put one foot on a pedal, the other on the wood of the boardwalk.
"1..." I said, lifting my eyebrows to him.
"2..." He smiled, his eyes on me as I turned to look at the empty boardwalk ahead.
"3!" I called out and then took off, laughing loudly as we began to pedal faster and faster, each of us trying to get to the wharf first.
I laughed so hard that my stomach hurt. The wind whipped the loose strands of my hair around and I realized I had never felt so free and wild in my life. Everything about this night was perfect and I didn't want to think about it ending. What started as me looking for a distraction from my sadness quickly turned into more. Harry turned into more.
I went to his place tonight with the full intention of sex only. That was it. I decided I'd let myself have him but only if it was sexual and nothing more. And then I saw him through the glass of the balcony door. I watched him for longer than he knew. I watched him try to read a book and try to distract himself. I watched him huff and puff and look over at the balcony for me a million times. I watched his impatience grow as he waited for me to appear and I watched the excitement on his face when he finally saw me.
This was quickly becoming much more than I ever thought it would be. I felt like I was losing control of the situation, but instead of being worried about that-I just felt free.
"You cheated!" Harry called out to me as I reached the wharf first, slamming on the brakes and then riding around in a slow circle to face him.
"Cheated how?! We left at the same time!" I laughed, shaking my head and trying to catch my breath.
"You distracted me! You know I'm obsessed with you. I'm your puppy, you thought I'd be able to focus on a race with you right there in front of me? Never." He huffed out dramatically, also breathing heavily.
I laughed again, eyeing him as I let the bike glide around him in a big circle, "I think you're just a sore loser."
"That, too. But mostly it's just being enthralled with you." He said quietly, smiling brightly at me.
He reached up and pulled the pink beanie off his head, shaking out his sweaty, matted down hair. I couldn't stop staring at him. I had looked at him a thousand times but for some reason, tonight, I felt like I was really seeing him. I felt like he was really seeing me.
"Harry?" I said quietly, swallowing harshly as he looked at me, pulling the beanie back on.
"Yes, petal?" He replied, smiling as his eyes moved over my form, "You look so pretty. Did I tell you that?"
"You did." I laughed again, shaking my head, "Harry..."
His eyes sparkled for me. The words suddenly got lost in my throat, the fear of saying them out loud to him taking over. How could I tell him? How do I say it? I want to be with you. Please leave her for me. We could be so happy.
I couldn't. He wouldn't leave her and I couldn't handle that rejection. This was sex, it was just sex, it didn't matter that his eyes lit up when they saw me. It didn't matter that we knew each other's darkest corners. It didn't matter that my heart burst into flames every time he was near me. We were destined for heartbreak if we both didn't get a grip on our feelings. I had to have self control.
"Arabella? You alright?" He murmured, tilting his head, moving closer to me on his bike.
"Yeah, sorry. Just thinking." I cleared my throat, deciding I needed to change the subject completely, "Let's keep going."
We started to ride at a leisurely pace, staying next to each other, neither of us talking for a moment. I kept stealing glances in his direction and each time, he was looking back at me already. His cheeks were pink from the breeze that was getting cooler off the ocean in the later hour of the night.
"Tell me." He said softly, "What were you going to say?"
I knew he was going to press me. He paid too much attention to me to let any unfinished thoughts pass him by. I wasn't used to it, this feeling of someone giving me all of their undivided attention. To someone wanting to hear the sentences that I decided weren't worthy of being spoken out loud.
I just couldn't tell him the truth because the truth was that I was ready to beg him to leave his girlfriend for me. The connection between us was only growing stronger each day and I had to force the words down now. I wouldn't be that girl. It was too similar to the girl I was with Luca-always reaching my hands out and begging for more. Never receiving it.
"Do you remember what I told you about my ex? What happened between us before I started coming to Apartment X?" I asked him, squeezing the handlebars beneath my sweaty palms.
"Yeah. I remember." He murmured after a long moment of silence.
I didn't look at him as I spoke my next words, "Yesterday marked four years since it happened."
The screech of him hitting the brakes as hard as he could made me turn back to look at him. He had stopped and put his feet firmly on the boardwalk, staring at me. I circled back, letting out a tiny sigh as I rode up next to him.
"Yesterday?" He asked, his voice timid, "I'd ask you why you didn't tell me, but I already know the answer. You were dealing with my bullshit. You always are, aren't you? Dealing with everyone's shit over your own?"
I swallowed harshly, looking down at my fingers around the handlebars, seeing how white my knuckles had turned. I looked over to my right, toward the ocean, just watching the dark waves for a long moment.
"Arabella." Harry prompted, and then his bike was dropping down to the ground and he was in front of mine.
He put his hands over my own and whispered, "Look at me."
I sighed and tilted my head back up to meet his stare, which looked just as soft as it had all night. His eyes were so kind. I couldn't explain it, but looking into them made me feel comforted and warm. Made me feel like I was home, finally.
His eyes trailed down over my face, looking over me. I wondered what he was thinking about, wished I could read his thoughts about me. Wondered if they were all tongues and kissing and fucking or if there were thoughts of the shade of my mouth, the smell of my perfume or the feel of my hair. I wondered if he noticed the basic things that a friend noticed or if he noticed the intimate things a lover did.
"I..." He broke off, his throat working as he swallowed hard.
My heart took a leap as we stared into one another's eyes. He removed one of his hands off mine and lifted it up to my face, rubbing my cheek softly.
"I'm here." He whispered, "You don't need to keep it bottled up with me. Okay? You can explode, if you need to. I'll pick up the pieces and I'll tape them back together."
I bit back my immediate reaction of 'you shouldn't say stuff like that to me', knowing that I had to stop living in the painful reality of our situation if I wanted to keep him. And I did. I wanted to keep him. As long as I could. As close as possible.
Harry leaned forward and nudged his nose over mine, his lips turning up into a smile as mine did at the tips of our noses rubbing together. I thought he was going to kiss me but there must have been some nerves still there about kissing me publicly because he pulled away without his mouth touching my own.
"C'mon. Let's sit on the beach and talk about it." He said, nodding his head toward the dark, empty beach.
I nodded, allowing him to hold my hand as I lifted myself off the bicycle. I waited for him to pick his own up from where he left it and we walked them over toward the wooden railing that bordered the beach. We both kicked our shoes off and stuffed our socks into them, leaving them behind with our bikes so we could enjoy the feel of the cool sand between our toes.
As soon as we were on the beach, he took my hand in his, lifting my fingers up to his mouth. We walked a little further and his arm went around my waist, his comfort growing as we walked further into the dark. When we sat down he pulled me down right next to him-so close that I was practically on top of him. He pulled my bare legs over his lap and wrapped his arm around my back, trailing his fingers along the bare strip of skin there.
I stared at him for a quiet moment, smiling as he stared back. He leaned in and pressed his nose to mine again.
"Hi." He whispered and I smiled.
"Hi." I whispered back with butterflies fluttering around inside of my chest.
"Are you okay?" He asked me, his palm moving up and down my back slowly, the feeling so soothing that I let out a satisfied little humming sound.
"I'm okay. It's just a hard time of the year. I always think about him and... I don't know." I sighed, shaking my head and turning to look out toward the ocean.
"Tell me every thought you're having. I want them all." He tightened his grip around me.
I shut my eyes lightly and took a deep breath as he rubbed my back. Words began to spill from me so easily that it scared me. I both loved and hated the way I felt so comfortable with him. I had felt that way from the first second I met him at Apartment X. There was an ease with us, like we were old friends, like we had known each other for a hundred years. It made me wonder if our souls had been together before. If this was our second or third or fourth time meeting in different bodies.
"I miss him sometimes and it scares me. I always wonder what I would do if he came back one day for me. I worry that I'd go back to him... he's so fucking manipulative that I think he might be able to convince me. He did so many times. Even after the... after the baby." I swallowed harshly, turning to look at him again.
Harry lifted his eyebrows, "You went back to him after Apartment X?"
"Yeah. I did." I said softly, frowning as I saw the sadness on his face at hearing that, "It was stupid. I know. I spiraled a little bit after our encounter. Not because of you, because... well... okay, kind of because of you."
"Arabella." He breathed out, his lips pulling down, "I'm..."
"No, it's good." I said firmly, blinking back the tears that had suddenly sprung to my eyes, "The spiral started because being with you made me realize that I was fucking all these people at Apartment X to hurt myself. You were so kind to me and our connection was... unbearable to walk away from. It was the first real thing that I felt in ages. It woke me up and made me see that I had to stop going there. I went back but only to look for you, so I could tell you that I changed my mind. But you never came back and... and it led me back to Luca for a bit. But that's not on you. That's on me."
"You went back to look for me?" He whispered in disbelief, his eyes slightly wide.
I nodded, frowning, "When I saw you here, in my town, I thought... I thought that maybe you were here for me. For a split second, I thought you couldn't bear it either and you found me. For a second, I let myself believe that you weren't with her still. But you were and you were so angry to see me..."
He huffed out a sigh and shook his head, "Because I wanted to fucking leave with you back then. I would have left if you said yes to me on that street. I was mesmerized by you. You made me feel like I could do anything and then you slapped me with reality and directed me to go home and forget you. And I tried to. I tried to forget you and it took ages to get to a place where I didn't conjure up your face in my head every night when I laid down. It took me so long to move past what happened between us there and when I finally felt like I was getting comfortable in my boring, dreadful life, you showed up in it again and woke all of those feelings up again. I was numb before you showed up. So yeah, I was angry. I was angry because you told me to forget you and then you came back."
"I didn't know you were here." I whispered, sniffling and looking down at my lap, "I had no way of knowing. I didn't come to disrupt your life. I didn't expect to ever see you again."
"I know. I know, petal." He whispered back, kissing the side of my head and pulling me in tighter, "And I wouldn't change it. You are the most perfect disruption. I wouldn't trade this for anything now, even though I..."
"Even though you know it's not going to last?" I asked, hearing a hint of bitterness in my voice.
But of course, at the barest of annoyance from me, Harry nuzzled into my neck and let out a hum that made my entire body vibrate. He was always licking my wounds, soothing me from any wary feelings I had toward him. I didn't know if it was a testament to his charm or to my stupidity.
"Can I tell you something that may be a little insane?" He whispered to me, running his nose along the side of my face lightly until I turned to look at him.
"I think it's karma." He whispered to me, "I think you being brought back to me is karma for all the bad shit I've done. It's the universe's way of punishing me. Because losing you again is going to crush me like a fucking bug, Arabella. And I could walk away, I could protect myself and protect you and save us from the hurt... but I won't. Because I'm selfish. I'm a selfish, horrible, greedy man and I won't let you go."
"You are quite horrible, aren't you?" I asked, breathing out a dramatic sigh, watching his lips pull up into a smile, "The way you tricked me into coming over by lying about my pink lighter."
"It was not a lie!" He argued, his eyes sparkling with mischief as he pulled that very lighter out of his pocket and presented it to me. I smiled and shook my head, accepting it from him, but noticed right away that it had a new addition.
The word petal was engraved into the side of it now. So rough and scratchy that I knew he did it himself. I ran my thumb along the letters, a smile pulling at my mouth as I looked back up at him. He even tried to etch a tiny flower, but god, he was an awful artist. It was the most endearing thing I'd ever seen.
His cheeks flushed with color as he watched me study it, our eyes meeting under the moonlight, both of us glowing. He reached up and brushed a loose strand of hair back from my eyes. He ran that finger down my cheek and toward my lips.
"Terrifying and strange and beautiful." He murmured to me.
My eyebrows ticked slightly together in the center and I tilted my head, watching him breathe out a slow sigh.
"From a poem that reminds me of you. I think I mentioned it once before." He explained, clearing his throat and pulling his hand back from my face.
He reached back into his pocket and pulled out a slightly crushed pack of cigarettes, slipping one out and sliding it between his lips. He took the lighter from my fingers and lit the tip of it, inhaling a long drag before passing it to my lips. I pulled back slightly, raising my eyebrows.
"May I have my own?" I asked, knowing the answer.
"You may not." He replied, smiling and pressing the cigarette between my lips, "You don't... you don't share cigarettes with Finn, do you?"
I nearly laughed at his obvious jealousy, "I've fucked him and that's no big deal, but sharing a cigarette crosses the line?"
"It's our thing." He whined, frowning at me.
"Why does he bother you so much?" I asked, taking a long drag off his cigarette and passing it back to him.
"Do you really not know?" He asked and I shrugged my shoulders nonchalantly. Of course I knew, but I wanted to hear him say it regardless.
"Because you're in love with him."
"And you have a girlfriend." I replied, tilting my head.
"I'm not in love with her." He said sharply, and then shifted, blinking slowly, like he couldn't believe he had said those words out loud.
"My feelings for Finn are complicated." I said, taking the cigarette back from him and having another drag, "I have something to tell you."
Harry froze up, his body going stiff, "Okay."
"After I went back to Luca that last time, it was different. He never laid another hand on me, which you'd think I'd be happy about... but he ruined me in ways that I didn't think I could be ruined. He was so cruel. He tortured me with it, with his coldness and his distaste for me. He made me feel unworthy and ugly. He made me dependent on him, made me feel as if I could never survive without him and then he left me. He left me. I went back to my abuser and he fucking left me. It was... like nothing I had ever felt before. I didn't know that it was possible to feel the kind of pain that he put me through. It made me want to disappear, to become invisible, but that isn't possible, so I decided to..." I swallowed over the sudden lump in my throat, blinking my tears back.
His hand went back to rubbing my back softly as he put his cigarette out in the sand, realizing the severity of the topic we were about to launch into. His hand was warm as it brushed over the goosebumps that rose all over my skin.
"It was a Tuesday. I remember that I was freezing. I had spent all night crying on Finn's bathroom floor. I ran myself a hot bath and I got into it and..." I presented him with my wrist, drawing one finger along one of the many scars there.
Harry looked down at it, taking my arm in his hand so he could examine my skin. He looked up at me with wide eyes, like he was in disbelief that he hadn't noticed them before. I wasn't surprised. They blended in with all the others on my mangled wrists. I was nothing but scar tissue at this point.
"Finn found me, unconscious and slumped down in the water. He pulled my body out of the tub and performed CPR on me until the paramedics arrived. His face was the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes as they rolled me to the ambulance. He's the one who moved me to New York after that. I tell everyone that I stayed with a friend but I was in rehab, trying to get myself together." My voice was shaking as I gave him all of these details, things that until that moment, only Finn and my family knew.
I looked up at Harry and I met his eyes sternly, needing him to really hear the next words I was going to say, despite how much they may hurt him.
"I exploded." I whispered as he frowned, "And Finn taped the pieces of me back together. He started to make me list reasons to live on a daily basis. He was supportive, kind and careful with me. He is the sole reason that I'm alive today. I traumatized him and he responded with love and care. How could I not fall in love with him?"
He didn't speak for a long time, his body still next to mine. I listened to him breathe, his eyes and fingers still tracing over the many scars on my wrists. He pulled my wrist up to his mouth and trailed it along the scar tissue there. He let the texture of my skin rub across his soft lips. He was smooth and perfect and I was a mangled mess, but somehow, he made me feel as if that didn't matter. He turned his eyes to look at me as he cradled my arm to his chest, my fingers poking into his shoulder as he did so.
"Remind me to thank him the next time I see him." He whispered, shaking his head, "Because if you were gone... the world would be very dark without you in it."
I wrapped my hand in his hair and pulled his lips to mine. I kissed him hard, feeling him clutch onto me even tighter than before. If that was possible. He pressed his lips over my cheek and up the side of my face, kissing as much of it as he could. I blinked back my tears with a smile, letting him kiss all over my face and basked in his warm affection.
Harry pulled back and looked at me, one hand on my face and the other wrapped around my wrist. I stared at him, able to easily tell that he had something on his mind. He averted his gaze back down to my wrist and stared at it sadly.
"What are you thinking? Tell me." I said, watching his eyes flicker up to meet mine.
"I need you to know first that I'm not saying this to upset you or just because I'm jealous of Finn. We know I'm jealous, achingly so." He cleared his throat and frowned, "But what you describe... it sounds like you feel indebted to him for saving you. That is not love, Arabella."
I inhaled shakily, my face close to his as we stared at one another, "And what do you know of love?"
Harry only looked at me, a ghost of a smile on his lips. I could see it in his eyes. I could hear it in his silence. He knew of love-he knew more than he'd ever admit. I forced myself to breathe in and out, something I had to remind myself to do quite often in his presence.
"Only what the poets tell me." He whispered.
"What do they tell you?" I asked him.
"They tell me that if you were truly in love with Finn, you wouldn't nuzzle your face into the palm of my hand when I place it on your cheek. That if you were truly in love with him, your eyes wouldn't sparkle when they looked at me. That if you were truly in love with him, you wouldn't be on this beach with me right now. You'd be at home, where he is, waiting." He said softly, "I may not know it all, but I know that real love would prevent us both from being here."
I contemplated this, unsure of how right he was. I didn't think it was impossible to have feelings for more than one person at a time. It was complicated and messy, sure, but fully possible. I could both love Finn and hold this affection for Harry. I tried not to think about the way my heart raced whenever I looked at Harry and the way it simply settled when I looked at Finn. I tried not to compare my feelings for the two of them.
Finn was my barrier. He was what kept me from diving into Harry head first. He was what would prevent me from being completely and utterly heartbroken at the end of this. I would have Finn to fall back on. It wasn't right. In fact, it was downright cruel of me to want to cling to my feelings of love for him in order to walk away from Harry unscathed when he eventually chooses another woman over me. I knew that and yet... and yet I still held onto him. I was no better than Harry. I was also a selfish and horrible and greedy woman.
Harry stared at me, his fingertips still trailing up and down my wrist, tickling my skin. He leaned forward and kissed my forehead, smiling at me when he pulled back.
"Speaking of, I should get you home. It's getting late." He said softly, tapping gently on my legs so that I would move them off his lap.
I didn't want to go home. I knew that I should, I should get back and crawl into bed before Finn gets home and checks on me. I should be peacefully asleep by the time 4 a.m. rolls around, but I wanted to stay on the beach and watch the sunrise over the ocean with Harry. I wanted to watch the golden, fiery orange and deep pink shades wash over his face.
I wanted to stay here in this moment, where we could both pretend that our silent love was enough.
Where he could be a boy who claimed that poetry taught him what love was. Where I could be a girl who reminded him of those same poems. Where we could both pretend like we didn't see the connection between those two things. Where we could sit together in silence, running our fingertips over one another's bodies, carefully, as if the truth of our feelings were etched onto our skin in braille.
"Okay. Let's return our stolen goods." I whispered, nudging his nose with my own the way he had so many times tonight.
Harry looked disappointed. I knew he wanted me to say that we should stay on the beach longer. I wanted to say it, too. But I knew it was better for us both if we didn't. It was better if I went home and crawled into my own bed and he did the same. I feared my attachment to him was too strong already and that if I didn't start having some sort of boundaries or space, I'd wind up begging him to leave his girlfriend for me. I didn't want to get to that place. I didn't want to be that person.
We got up and brushed the sand off our legs, walking in silence back toward the boardwalk. I was buzzing, feeling almost drunk from our activities tonight, from all of the fun I had ever since I stepped foot onto his balcony. Harry tied my pink shoes for me and then his own, glancing up at me from his knees before he stood up again. His tummy bumped into mine as he moved in closer to me, his hands grabbing hold of each of my own. He let his forehead fall down to mine.
"Do you want to take the long way back?" He whispered.
It was still so warm out. The boardwalk was quiet. The street lamps were glowing a gentle yellow shade onto us. Everything in the world felt like it was frozen except for the two of us. Like we were the only ones to exist here in the Wasteland. I wanted to bottle this moment up and wear it around my neck forever.
"The long way is the only way I ever want to take when I'm with you." I replied, getting onto the tips of my toes, tilting my head back so he would kiss me.
Harry didn't pause that time. There was no hesitance, no fear of someone seeing us, no worry that we'd get caught. We were the only two people in the world at that moment. The entire Wasteland belonged to us and us alone. He leaned down and he kissed me. His hand fisted around the back of my shirt as he did so, pushing my body in against his even tighter. So close that no real life problems could wedge themselves between us.
I reached up and grasped onto his strong shoulders, curling one hand around the back of his neck and feeling his slightly sweaty hair there. I deepened the kiss. I slid my tongue along his lips and without hesitation he granted me access. He tasted like our shared cigarette and pure love. I breathed him in.
He pulled back from the kiss and I swore when I saw my reflection in his eyes-I was glowing pink for him.
And I continued to glow like that as we got on our stolen bicycles and rode around aimlessly together, making up a new excuse every half hour as to why we needed to take a detour that led us further and further away from home.
This chapter made me turn into gooey melted marshmallows, as Petalrry would say. I love them. I love them. We are all in so much trouble.
I love you all.
xx
Aubrey