7 CHAPTERS TO GO!
92.
●•Scarlett•●
I was a mess, to say the least. But it was not physically; not this time around.
At this point, my brain was beyond f–cked up, my senses numbed by some sort of a sharp feeling of guilt. After all, Harry had a point. Obviously he did – he was always the right one, for God’s sake. But despite knowing he deserved someone better, I couldn’t simply force myself to say ‘I love you’ as though it did nothing to me at all, whatsoever.
Because, honestly, those three words were simply pathetic. Why does the human race have the necessity to hear them constantly? Why do words matter more than actions? Not only my brain was f–cked up, but so was society. Really, after all the huge steps I’d taken for Harry, those words should be the last ones to matter, if anything. After all I had put myself into since I met that prick (meaning it the fond way), he should at least take that into consideration.
Plus, words never meant anything at all. Quite literally. Because I had pretty much lost count of how many times for years I’d said ‘I love you’ to Tyler, and not meaning it the way I meant when I even thought about Harry. It was mostly why I didn’t want to say it, actually. Because I was pretty sure that the moment I uttered the words ‘I love you’, they would sound as fake as Tyler and I’s feelings for each other, and Harry would read into my eyes the several implications that would put our relationship into the worst situations again.
But right then, it seemed like everything I could possibly do would ruin what we had anyway. His outburst had been the proof of it. And I really didn’t blame him for most of the things, except I sort of did. Let’s face it: I had been the one to warn him from the beginning. He was the one to insist on me when I clearly told him, with all the words, more than once (or thrice, or a bazillion times, whatever), that I would f–ck him up. I told him, because I knew this would happen, though I didn’t expect many of the things that also happened, as well, to exist. Meaning I didn’t expect to fall head over heels for him; didn’t expect being so gone for someone ever in my life as I was for him; didn’t expect for my stomach to flutter with sh–tty butterflies (which I could swear were just a ruse, but) whenever he came close. I didn’t expect to leave Tyler and finally try to move on; and even less, I didn’t expect to let him know everything about me like I did.
Still. The way things unfolded was inevitable. It was written as some sort of rule, somewhere, I was sure.
And I really meant to talk to Harry about this, explain everything the way I saw it, but destiny seemed not to be on our sides. At all. Indeed, it seemed as if it was completely against us. Whenever I went to look after Harry, his flat would be empty; I’d miss him for a five minutes difference at the store, and I had not a single clue of where his university could be, let aside his timetable, class, and uni friends to whom I could talk to.
There was also his family, probably, but for what I’d heard, Gemma had gone back to her own life, and she seemed to be the only one that didn’t despise me so much at first sight. Harry’s dad had also been extremely nice, but his mother, as far as I was concerned, still lived in the same house as him, and if I showed up there she would probably tell me to f–ck right off Harry’s life and leave him to grow healthily or summat. So, no looking for Harry there. For sure.
Moreover, less than a week later, Tyler woke up. He was still under the effects of countless painkillers, but he was awake, and, apparently, his memories hadn’t been affected by the accident. Straight away, he’d started asking for me, asking – and I quote – if I’d kept standing for the whole ‘leaving him definitely’ sh–t, to which I tried my hardest to knock it into his damaged brain that I would, indeed, leave him, as soon as he was better.
It didn’t really work, if the way he kept grinning knowingly from ear to ear was something to go by.
So, all in all, it’d been two weeks without talking to Harry. Again. (Last time it maybe wasn’t two weeks, but everything still felt like a decade, so I really couldn’t bother with the accuracy of the facts). And the lack of him was frustrating, clearly, but my efforts started to seem even more useless with time. Maybe he was running away. Maybe he did want to break up with me, and to put the blame all over myself, he’d been hiding. So he could use the excuse of never being looked for; later he’d say I didn’t care enough to try to change his mind.
Maybe. Probably not. Or probably yes. I couldn’t find the answer.
“You’re doing it again,” Tyler pointed out, chewing on his terrible, pale-looking chicken. The hospital food, nor the hospital circumstances in general were doing much wonders to him. Indeed, he looked paler himself, definitely skinner, the bones all over his body more prominent than ever. His wrists and ankles protruded out of his skin, nearly, and his eyes had lost the rest of the glow he hadn’t lost when Kirsten walked out of his life. Both the original and the theoretical one.
“Doing what, Tyler?” I breathed out from across the room, slumped over the very uncomfortable armchair just to keep him some company until Zach came over in a few hours. More than ever, I wanted to leave. But then again, that had been my constant thoughts ever since two weeks ago.
I wasn’t choosing Tyler over Harry. I wasn’t.
But Tyler had a bandaged head that still looked swollen as f–ck, his face hadn’t even started recovering from the lack of skin in some parts, and every time he casted a glance towards his legs, he would look completely broken. It was as if the air had been knocked out of his lungs, like all the hope he had spent years building had just drifted away as boiled water.
And it was about that, really, the scene that I was reliving. The image of a broken, lost, Tyler; better saying: the image of a broken and lost child. The illness made him look young, as young as I’d met him years ago at some random doorstep outside school. When he wasn’t bothering being the self-confident twat he was, he was staring at all white corners, trying to understand the meaning of life.
“Losing yourself in thoughts, leaving me all alone even though you’re just right there,” he finally said, struggling to swallow what was in his mouth. According to him, his throat was achingly sore, making it hard to deal with his own saliva.
“I’ve got problems to solve, Tyler. Places to go, people to talk to, and I need to put some thoughts into that,” I sighed, standing up once he raised his empty plate with some difficulty, pointing at the glass of water on a table in the corner. “I’m only here because you need to, otherwise you know I wouldn’t’ve come at all, don’t you?”
I took the plate from his hands, ignoring the squeeze in my chest when he sighed in relief, rid of the small weight that was still causing him pain. Silently, I handed him the glass of water, which he took hesitantly, staring at it as if he was being forced to drink something rotten.
“Nah,” he shook his head after a slow gulp, handing the glass back to me. “I reckon you’re here mostly because you’re pitying me ‘cause I can’t walk anymore and everything, but you’re here because you care, too, and you know I need to be taken care of carefully. And you don’t trust anyone else besides yourself to do so.”
I did something remotely close to growling at him, swinging back to my seat in denial with myself inside. It was simply unfair how everyone around me seemed to know me better than I did myself. It was unfair how everyone was right, and I was constantly wrong. Always wrong.
“You know we’re gonna end up together after all, don’t you?” he spoke again, this time pressing a button that reclined his bed, adjusting as well as he could to make himself comfortable on the thin mattress. “Not everyone has the patience to deal with you as I do, K. Sooner or later the prick you left me for is going to realize that, and you’ll come back to me.”
Too tired to fight him over the nickname he’d used; try to put it into his mind that I am Scarlett, instead, I simply muttered a ‘shut up’ under my breath, and closed my eyes, inhaling and exhaling as evenly as possible. Counting from one to ten never calmed me down. One to a hundred didn’t, either.
If anything, the whole counting was making my head ache more, and so I gave up on it, remaining with my eyes closed only, instead. In the background there was the sound of the conditioner, way-too-cold for my taste, but I was too exhausted to try and adjust the temperature.
Tyler remained silent after that, mostly because simply tasks exhausted him, too, and despite being awake now, it was never for too long. So when I dared to finally open my eyes again, he was already fast asleep, heavy snores leaving through his mouth, his chest going up and down painfully slow.
And things were just so f–cked up.
Not that it mattered, but I had drunk quite a bit. This same quite a bit being enough to get me dizzy and senseless, lightheaded, probably a bit satisfied with myself, too. So. Okay. I was drunk. And, maybe, it hadn’t been just a bit of alcohol that had caused that (fine, it was a lot, considering my liver of steel, but whatever). The best thing, though, is that I couldn’t remember why in hell I was so upset to start with.
Obviously, my drunken state would get me in trouble. But then, it was pathetic having to work at a club, with several tempting licit drugs all over the place, having to hear catcalls each five minutes despite my clear annoyance over the years. It was only fair I could get a break. They could take that from my paycheck later, who would really care.
Trying to keep my balance, I held onto unknown surfaces with a hand as I carried a tray with a few breakable glasses of martinis on the other, squishing through fuelled tables until I reached the ones just in front of the stage, placing down the beverages as the guys there barely paid attention to my arrival, more focused on the swinging bums and tanned legs in front of them.
It’d been years and the scene still made me sick every night. But everything about my life at the moment made me sick, so I was more than used to the throwing up feeling.
Carefully, I walked back to the counter, Caitlyn ordinarily drying glasses behind it, her eyes trained to something going on in the back of the club, although it was too dark and numb for me to check upon what she was watching, so I didn’t even bother turning around. One more abrupt movement and I was sure my head would fall off.
“This is sh–t, you know,” I mumbled, swirling an empty glass by the rim, leaning forwards to grab another bottle of whatever that transparent liquid was and pouring it to myself without even cleaning the glass. If I got herpes later, I would have a reason to stay at the hospital doing nothing but lying instead. (Was it even possible to get herpes by drinking on a used glass? Was herpes strong enough to lead me to the hospital? I hoped so.)
Caitlyn sighed, pulling both the glass and the bottle away from me, just as I was about to sip it. Literally inches away from my mouth. “What is sh–t now, Kirsten?” her tone of voice was deep and tired, just as interested on what I was saying as I am interested about checkers.
“This job. I didn’t sign up for this,” I complained, pouting at God-knows-who and standing up to go behind the counter this time. It’d be easier to retrieve my drinks.
“You did sign up for this, you sh–thead. They don’t go around hiring random hoes,” she said, grabbing the new glass I’d gotten and rolling her eyes in annoyance. “You’ve had enough already. Those drinks are where my money comes from.”
I flipped her the finger, hunching over the counter. “If there’s any hoes here, ‘s gotta be you. I’m pretty sure I’m not the one who’s slept with half of the usual costumers.” I couldn’t see her face, but I was sure she was rolling her eyes yet again, ignoring me completely because I had, finally, managed to say something decent while drunk. It was still not enough alcohol to stop noticing how annoying her presence was. “Anyway. I don’t get paid enough to be hit on by disgusting male population.”
Caitlyn kept her back turned at me, drying glasses and clicking them back down on the counter, pouring alcohol to new souls at the stools. “Quit, then,” she offered, looking at me briefly right after, her gaze holding some sort of rage. “Or go back and do your f–cking job, because there’s a table right there calling you it’s been a while.”
Decidedly, I stood up, nodding my head fiercely; regretting it right after. The feeling was terrible. “That’s it, I’m quitting! I’m gonna leave this hole. And you want to know what? F–ck you, Caitlyn. You’re so annoying.”
She looked at me blankly, the same look she’d shot me several times before, when this same scene was repeating itself somewhere in a forgotten past. This time, though, these weren’t just meaningless words. This time I was decided to quit, and if I could remember it by the next morning, I was sure I wouldn’t regret my drunken decisions.
So I walked from behind the counter, making my way to the door, and yelling at all four ends of that club ‘I quit!’. Some heads turned to look at me, some others didn’t even give themselves the work, and those who had, turned back around to ignoring me less than two seconds later.
That was when I realized how useless my existence was.
●•Author's Note•●
note: 1. Well, here's something I found out on the previous chapter: many of you are from Rochester, or some area really near it (wink wink). Imma hunt you down, wait for me. (Or maybe not, airplane tickets are too expensive). 2. Guys, my classes will be back on Tuesday ): ): ): I don't know why I told you this, since the updates will most likely remain the same, but whatever. Wish me luck. 3. You are not ready for the next chapter. Just saying.
Ps.: follow me on twitter & instagram: @DaniMeloGomes
dedication goes to: @snapbacknialler Yeah I know, it's a huge step for Harry to finally tell what he thinks about the whole situation. And, well. You'll find out with time if what you think is right or not. But you know, I love making surprises :)
next update: Tuesday (January 28th)
Reach 1000 votes for early update. Best comment gets a dedication. Love you all lots, Dani xx