"It's fear, you can either float or let it drown you."
"I can't believe this! What type of daughter are you? You useless piece of shit!"
My mother spoke to me those words, she actually said those things to me.
My mother thinks I'm a useless piece of shit.
My mother thinks I'm useless.
I run up the stairs crying, I couldn't help it. She never yelled at me like that.
She never hit me like that.
She never hit me.
My own mother hit me.
"Yeah go crying you brat! You know what I've done for you! I've given everything up for you! Your own father even left you! I didn't! I stayed!" My mother yells, but I can't hear much over my own crying. I open my door and slam it behind me. Jumping on my bed, I bury my face in my pillow. I don't wanna live like this anymore. I can't live like this anymore. I don't have anything in this life for me. Why god? Why do I get this shitty life, while others are living happily with their families? I just wanna have my family back. I wanna have a mom that doesn't hit me. I wanna have a dad.
I don't know how long I've been crying like that until I fall asleep.
I wake up seeing it's dark outside, meaning my mom is no longer home, she hasn't been home often anymore, normally it use to be just the nighttime that she was gone, I only know that cause I once had a nightmare and went to find her already gone, but now it's not just nights anymore, shes gone during the day too. It's summer right now so It's not like she has to take me to school or bring me back. I don't even like coming back. The only times I feel safe are at school and when I'm asleep. I'm only 13, normally school is the last place kids my age wanna be.
I don't know what happened or how I got there, but now I'm by the beach, by the ocean.
I can't breathe anymore.
I can't see.
Everything is blurry.
It's so dark now.
It's safe.
| <3 |
"Briella!" I hear someone yelling my name, but I have no clue who it is.
"Briella you need to wake up!" I jolt awake to find Anten there shaking me awake. He looks worried. I hope he doesn't ask what I was dreaming about.
"Are you okay? I was so scared," he said softly. His voice is so soothing. I kinda wish he could talk to me like that all the time. I then realize he asked me a question. "I guess, I mean it can't get any worse, and I'm not dead, so yeah, I'm okay," I say. Anten nods his head and I think he's relieved. I don't know why he would need to be so worried unless... I look done and see my clothes are drenched in sweat. My throat feels sore. Meaning I've been screaming. I had yet another nightmare. And Anten was here for it.
If you've ever been asked what the most embarrassing thing you've ever done is, mine would be what's happening right now. The guy I like is seeing me at my worst.
He probably thinks I'm weird now. He's also probably embarrassed and feels awkward to see me like this. Maybe he'll block me when he gets home, and I won't have to feel embarrassed every time I see him. I think he lives too close for that to happen though. "Do you wanna talk about it?" He asks.
He probably wants me to say no that way he has an excuse to leave. "No it's okay, you don't have to stay here if you are uncomfortable. I just get nightmares some nights and this night happened to be one. Besides It's just fear, you can either float, or let it drown you" I wiggle out of his hold and stand up, and he stands up with me.
He still looks worried. I pointed to the stairs and said, "I'm gonna head up and change out of these wet clothes. I'm really sorry if I woke you. You don't have to be here when I come back, I don't wanna make you uncomfortable." I begin to head to the stairs when Anten speaks up,
"I'm not uncomfortable. If you want I can wait here and maybe we can watch a movie when you come back?" Does he want to stay here? Normally I would think he would get nervous and bolt as soon as I'm out of sight. Instead, he wants to watch a movie.
I turn back around and my eyes land on the clock. It's 4:32 am. Did he stay the night? I would have thought he would have left sooner. My eyes then move and land on Anten who is still waiting for an answer. "You really don't have to Anten, It's 4:30 in the morning, if you want to go home, you can," I say and then smile at him, it's not a happy one, cause secretly I hope he wants to stay,
I just wanna make sure HE wants to stay and is not doing it cause he feels bad for leaving me here alone.
My eyes travel back to see him nod.
"Okay then, well call me if you need anything, and if you wanna hang out tomorrow just let me know, I'm not doing anything." He says and then he gathers his things up which isn't much and heads for the door. "Thank you Anten." I say softly to him as he passes me. He tenses for a moment and then whispers back to me, "You don't have to thank you Bri, I would do it for you any day."
Then he walks out, leaving me there with butterflies surrounding my stomach. Leaving me there while my heart flips so many times I think it might grow tired and give out. "He would do anything, for me?" I whisper to nobody, but me. It's just me.
I go up the steps to change and to watch the stars, cause the last thing I wanna do is sleep.
"We just take it one step at a time."
I hope I didn't make her uncomfortable.
I really wanted to stay, but she kept giving me hints to get out and leave her be.
I don't care though, I want to know what keeps her up at night like that.
She deserves better.
I have never wanted to strangle someone so much. I'm not talking about Bri, I would never. I'm talking about whoever makes her have such terrible nightmares.
She was screaming so much that it hurt to even think about it anymore.
As soon as I enter my house it's quiet. I knew the guys wouldn't be up worried for me. They probably think I'm getting laid, to be honest, but that's not true. I wish Bri would have let me stay. I really do.
I go up to my bedroom and to the bathroom to change out of my damp clothes. Bri had changed and she told me I could go over to my house and change as well, but I didn't. I wanted to stay with her. After changing clothes I hop into bed and try to fall asleep, but can't, my thought keeps returning to Bri, I just hope she's okay. I don't know what happened, or how I even fell asleep, but I did. I did not sleep well.
| <3 |
As soon as I woke up I quickly checks my phone to see if I have any messages or phone calls from Bri. None. I didn't think I would have any at this time.
I am just really hoping it's because she's still asleep. Hoping out of bed I head downstairs to see the guys are already awake. "Good morning sunshine, how did you sleep?" Acelen mocks like he always does. I groan and flip him off as any reasonable morning person would. Both Harton and Acelen laugh those stupid laughs that make me wanna tackle them to the ground. But I don't. I'm not as strong as both of them put together. "Hahaha very funny. If you must know I sleep like shit last night." I say and the guys look at each other with a smirk on their faces.
Of course, I knew they would think I got laid. "I didn't get laid if thats what you thinking and personally I didn't want to. I already told you guys I didn't want to date more or less use a woman for her body for one pathetic night." I say and shake my head, disappointed that they would think that, especially after what happened last time. "Dude you can't keep dating off forever. I know what happened last time, and we know it was bad, but shit happens, you have to move on okay. Besides this Briella chick seems nice enough." Harton says, and man if I could punch him right now I would.
I'm normally not one for violence.
I don't know why, but when he called Briella just some 'chick', that really got on my nerves somehow. I glare at Harton. "She's not just some chick okay, and I'm not in it to bang her. She's nice and deserves someone better than me okay? Now can we move on so I can eat breakfast in peace?" I question angrily as I grab a slice of toast and sit down at the dining room table. In the corner of my vision, I see Acelen and Harton share a glance. "Okay man, well whether you choose to admit it or not, she makes you happy, so maybe just give her a chance. Give yourself a chance to love again. You deserve it." Acelen says as he gets back to cleaning. Harton comes up behind me and pats me on the back before he retreats upstairs. "I'm going swimming," I say and head out the back door and down the steps to the second bathroom where we have most of our surf gear. Getting on my gear and grabbing my surfboard I head down to the beach.
When I get down there I see the one person I thought may never want to see me again. Briella is laying on her light pink blanket, but she's not reading a book, she's just staring into the ocean.
I head towards her and sit down next to her, she looks up and gives me a small smile. She then faces back to the ocean. It was silent for a moment before I decided to speak up. "How are you?" I know it's kind of a stupid question, considering she might not actually be fine. "Fine." I knew it. She's not fine. "It looks like you are about to go surfing. That seems like fun." She says, looking at my surfboard. It's a dirty white color, it's been through it. "When did you learn how to surf?" She asks me.
I turn my head towards the ocean, she was right when she said it looks to go on forever. "I was 8, my dad and I were walking on the beach one day when I spotted some teenagers surfing, I told my dad I thought it would be fun and he agreed. A couple of days later he surprised me with surfing lessons and told me if I get good enough he'll buy me a surfboard. As you can see, I got good enough, and he bought me a surfboard, I just haven't seen the need to replace it." I say. I look towards Briella and she nods.
Looking down she says, "Your dad seems like he was great." I tilt my dad down to see her face and notice she has tears in her eyes. I drop my surfboard and bring my arms around her, she doesn't cry, she just holds me, and I let her. "Hey, how about I teach you how to surf," I say. Briella lifts her head and wipes the tears from her face.
She nods her head. "Yeah? I'm gonna need to hear the words Bri." I tease and she laughs a small laugh and says, "Yeah, that would be nice." I hold out my hand for her and she takes it. I then freeze, and Briella notices my hesitation and looks at me, "what's wrong? You bailing out now?" she teases. I shake my head. "You don't have a swimsuit. I don't think you would want to get in without one." I say.
However, her response isn't what I thought it would be. She releases my hand and puts hers on her hip. "Anten do you really think I would come down to the beach and not wear a swimsuit?" She says and laughs to herself. Pulling off her dress I see she is wearing a swimsuit. It really makes her stand out. She's wearing a pink swimsuit. Honestly, it fits her. "Okay then."
I say and grab her hand. Once we get to the ocean's edge however Briella freezes up. I turn towards her, "what? Bailing out so soon?" I tease, but when I realize Briella isn't smiling, my smile fades. "What's wrong?" I ask.
Briella begins to back away. She raises her hands in the air and says, "I'm sorry Anten, I really tried to be brave, but I can't do this." There was fear laced in her voice. I didn't want her to think I was peer pressuring her. I step away from the ocean's edge as well. "Hey it's okay, you don't have to do it if you don't want to," I say and she shakes her head. "No, it's not that I don't want to, 'cause I do, I'm just scared. I haven't had the best experience with being in the ocean. I guess that's the difference between Moana and me. She's way more fearless." She says.
Although I have no idea why she would bring up Moana, all I care about right now is making sure she's okay.
"Hey, do you think Moana was born fearless? No, she had to overcome her fear, and you can do that too. We don't have to jump right in, we take it a step at a time." I say, which calms Bri down a bit because she agrees. Taking my hand in hers I gently guide her into the ocean. We keep going slow until she is waist-deep.
"Now this is the fun part. All you have to do is hope on the board." I say. Bri nods and I help her onto the board. After she straddles the board I get on after her. I paddle us deeper into the ocean til there are at least little waves we can use for training. "Okay so normally when surfing you should turn the surfboard away from the waves that way when you stand up yours gliding on the waves and not going against them, but for right now let's just try standing on the board. I'm gonna hop off real quick so you can get your balance without me." I say and Bri nods.
As soon as I get off I can see Bri's shoulder tense. I swim up in front of her and grab her thigh with one of my hands. I make sure she's looking me in the eyes before I speak. "It's gonna be okay Bri, I'll be right here," I say. She nods slowly and takes a deep breath. "Okay, now try standing," I say. Bri slowly stands up on the board. I cheer for her as she begins to laugh. "All I'm doing is standing." She says smiling. "So? Your standing. The first lesson I couldn't keep my balance and kept falling off." I say. It was true, I had an awful balance when I first started out. Bri laughs more and says, "Yeah. you were like 8, I'm 19. There's a big difference." She shakes her head. "Okay, okay. The next step is your stance, you can't just stand up on the board and expect not to fall off." I begin to say while fixing her stance.
Once she's got it I begin to clap for her, and she laughs once more which shakes the board and makes her lose her balance and fall on top of me.
"I am fearless, cause fear is afraid of me."
I'm sinking again.
My lungs are filling with water and I can't breathe.
Then something grabs my arms and pulls me to the surface.
"Bri! Bri! Your okay, hey it's okay. I'm right here I promise." Anten's calming voice pulls me out of my panic. His hands are holding my face and he looks more panicked than I do.
"It's okay Bri, I'm here, and I'm not leaving." He says. I nod my head. He's got me, I'm not going under. I'm alive and okay. "Bri?" Anten asked worriedly. "Yeah," I say. "Do you know how to swim?" He asks. Do I? I haven't swum in a while. I think I do. "No. I don't know. I thought it was just a natural thing like all humans know how to do it eventually." I say looking down at the blue ocean as the waves crash between us.
It's calm. It's always calm before the storm.
"Bri? Can you look at me please?" Anten ask, still having his hands on my face. I close my eyes for a brief moment and breath in the ocean smell. I look back up at him. "If you don't know how to swim, then that's okay. I can teach you." He says. The sand beneath my feet is swirling around me. I take another breath. "Okay," I say softly, my eyes still closed. I lean back and soak up the sun.
I spread my arms out, and Anten hands are no longer on my face, but wrapped around my waist, like if he let go, I'll be gone. "I've always wanted to do this but never had the courage to," I say, Anten is silent. I sit back up and face him. He has this look in his eye I can't place. He normally always has that look, I just don't know what it is.
"I want to learn how to swim now," I say. Anten smiles and nods. "Just promise you won't let me go under. Please?" I ask.
"I promise, I'll be right here."
And he was.
I learned how to swim, and how to surf.
I am fearless like Moana,
And fear is afraid of me.
| <3 |
Thank you for reading.
-Sydney (A simple story, goes a long way)