Optimistic Pessimist
chapter iii
warnings: self harm, talks of drug use
& an eating disorder, brief mention
of suicide
LAYNE FELT INCREDIBLY BORED THE FOLLOWING HOURS, as if her lifeline had been cut off from the rest of the world and she was left a bubbling, indescribable mess. Her U2 record had spun out a while ago, so she laid in a tiresome pile on her bed, staring up at the ceiling, and at the moth that had been darting from each corner of her room since she returned from the Wreck. Her stomach had been bothering her since she returned, perhaps it was nerves, or maybe she was about to be sick, but either way, she hated it more than anything. She thought maybe she should have tried to get Marian and Claudia to hang around for longer, but the idea of having to keep conversation with them for more than an hour seemed almost too grueling to bear. For a moment Layne wondered if she was being unreasonable, but shook it off after a moment. She had been scrolling through her phone to the point when it was nearing three o'clock, and she hadn't ventured out of room since noon. Her mom hadn't even checked in on her, and Layne questioned if she even knew she was home.
She felt herself hovering over Rafe's contact multiple times—it was a bad habit she had, almost as if staring at it long enough would summon a text from him. It was lame, and Layne was the first to admit it. So, she threw her phone over her head and heard it thud onto her pillow. Part of her contemplated driving to the Chateau to see John B and the rest of the crew—but opted against it. They were most likely all working, and wouldn't want to see their nineteen year old friend who nearly abandoned them for a year. Even seeing Kiara felt awkward, despite how comfortable it might have been. Layne thought for a moment if she was overthinking things, but the thought quickly vanished.
Suddenly she got an overwhelming urge to return to school. Perhaps it was because she felt like an outsider in the town she grew up in, but there was an odd itch in her back that she couldn't shake out. Almost as if everyone saw through her and considered her a fake. Maybe she was a fake. She hated herself so much sometimes she would convince herself that everyone did, as well. Layne suddenly got up from her bed and undressed until she was down in her underwear, and stared at herself in the mirror. It was a common thing since she had turned eighteen to pick apart everything of her appearance, sometimes to the point where she would cry. Awkwardly she gripped her left arm with her right hand, before digging her nails so hard into the soft of her elbow that she pulled off some skin, and bled into her hand. It didn't even hurt until she looked down at her arm and the skin was red, as were her fingers. "Fuck," she winced, frantically scrambling for her clothes before she hurried to get a band-aid from the kitchen.
It took her a moment to realize that nobody was home. She applied some water to the cut before patting it dry and putting a bandage over it. It hurt when she moved it, and she began to hate herself even more for being so stupid. Her insides felt funny, and for a moment, she thought she was going to throw up, but just continued to try and clean the self-inflicted wound. She wasn't sure if anyone would pay enough attention to her to notice it, but nevertheless, she felt helpless. A moment like this would most likely trigger her to stay hidden in her room until she had to leave. She pulled out the vodka bottle from the pantry and poured herself a shot, hopefully to subside whatever weird, self-hating sabotaging feeling was bubbling in her chest. She decided not to eat for the rest of the day to regain control over herself—and as a sense of punishment. Harming herself further as a punishment for harming herself didn't seem like a sensible option, but anything Layne did was far from sensible. She quickly stuffed the vodka back on its shelf and washed off the shot glass.
When she returned to her room, she saw the missed phone call notification from her mom. It only said one minute ago, but it felt grueling to try and call her back. Layne knew she would want to go out to dinner, or some sort of family event, and it made her head spin. But, Layne felt as though she owed it to them to at least try and be a bit more sociable toward them. It made her sad sometimes, when she thought of how she treated them—so much so that, at times, Layne would bite herself or scratch herself hard enough until she bled. The skin around her nails were chewed open at times, or picked apart so harshly by her doing that she'd have to put band-aids on almost all her fingers.
Layne stopped trying to hurt herself when Rafe and her parents would say something to her about her always having band-aids on. She'd never give a straight answer—it was easier than trying to make up some sort of lie. Maybe she could say she had a chronic illness that made her bleed from random, unprovoked cuts. She knows no one would believe her, but they also wouldn't question her otherwise. She was doing good for a long time—the last time she harmed herself was January. She was helping a Junior girl do the dishes at her apartment one night, and when she picked up a knife, she had the sudden urge to cut her finger. So, she did, and bled everywhere. Layne never spoke to the girl again—she was pretty the girl had told multiple people, since she hardly gained any more friends after that. Although, Layne wasn't exactly a sociable, optimistic person to begin with.
There was a slight hesitation before she decided to call her mom back, who answered after the third ring. Layne mindlessly tugged at the loose string on her bed comforter, until she heard Rory's voice from the other end. "Hello?" (She never understood why people said hello, in a questionable manner, when answering the phone to someone in their contacts list. Layne thinks its stupid.)
"You called me?" she grunted as she flipped to lay on her back on her bed, and stared back up at the ceiling. The moth was still fluttering about her room, as if it was trapped, and as if there wasn't an open window right there.
"Hello to you, too, Layne,"
Layne rolled her eyes and placed a hand on her forehead. "Hi mom,"
"Did you go to the Wreck, like I asked?"
Layne could hear the bustle of the surf shop on the other end of the line, and she wondered if Rory was having this conversation with her on the main floor. Probably. "Yeah, I went after breakfast. I got a form and Kiara said to come back tomorrow after I filled it out," she breathed, removing the phone from her ear to put it on speaker, and tossed her phone on her pillow while she went to pick Luna up from the other side of the room.
"Okay, cool. What are you doing now?"
"Uh—nothing, really," she spoke, and Rory craned her neck to try and listen. "Where are you? Why do you sound so far away?"
"You're on speaker, I'm just in my room,"
"What?"
Layne groaned, placing Luna back down on the ground, and she skit across to jump up on the window sill, basking in the sunlight that pooled from between her curtains, and stretch her limbs on top of her book shelf. Layne picked up her phone and placed it on her ear again. "You were just on speaker phone, I'm just in my room,"
"Perfect, that means you can come down to the shop for a bit,"
Layne threw her head back and practically stomped her feet on the ground. Part of her wanted to flush her phone down the toilet, while the other wanted to pretend they got disconnected, and their phone plan went haywire. She decided to avoid the latter. "Mom, why? I'll just see you when you get home,"
Rory sighed from the other side of the phone. "Me and your dad just have to work for a few more hours before we close. Then we can go out to dinner, as a family, like you promised me,"
Layne rubbed the bridge of her nose. "Actually, I didn't promise anything,"
"Layne Hetfield,"
She sighed, catching herself picking anxiously at the skin around her nails. She sat on her hand as a result. "Alright, fine, I'll be there in twenty," she didn't wait for her mother to answer before she hung up, tossing her phone back onto her pillow and moving to her closet. There were some dresses—mainly ones that were hand-me-downs from her mom or bought at the Goodwill—some of them were even a size too small when she got them, but were worn out to the point where it stretched enough to fit her. She hadn't worn a dress since the fall before, and part of her felt self conscious where she almost resulted in wearing a sweater in nearly ninety degree weather. But, she sucked it up and picked a floral one out that Marian had given to her when it was too big, and it was a strict no return policy from the store she bought it from. The tag was torn off, so Layne wondered if it was actually even purchased or given to Marian by her older sister. She had never worn it yet, and she worried it might be able to stand up on its own.
The dress hung low on her chest, and Layne had to tighten the straps. She fiddled with her hair in the mirror, running her hands through it as though it would magically make it more presentable. She suddenly grabbed the scissors off her desk, and lined it up a few inches above the ends of her hair. Layne wasn't sure if this qualified as an impulsive decision, but she did it anyway, cutting the dead ends off her hair until it cusped her breasts. The shacked off ends looked visibly disgusting, and she attempted to even them out the best she could—and then wanted to cry once she had realized what she had done. Layne cherished her hair—so did Rafe—and she wondered if he would consider her undesirable now that she had chopped it off.
Layne stared at herself in the mirror for a moment, taking off the majority of jewelry that she still had on, and replaced it with others. She felt like a Tim Burton character—she had bruising and discoloring all over her body, and even if she did apply makeup, she continued to look like a washed out mess. Part of her felt as though it was only in her head—many people had told her how pretty she was. Layne only wished she believed them.
The sun was still pretty high in the air when she decided to text Rafe. She hadn't spoken to him since last night, and her attempt at trying to wait for him to text first seemed to be going down hill.
it was good to see you last night
She pressed the backspace button after a moment of thought.
will i see you again tonight?
No. Too needy. She backspaced until the text bar was empty, again. are you going to the party tmrw night?
She pressed send without thinking, again. She knew if she kept thinking about it she would never send the text to begin with. Layne had the urge to break open the scab forming on the soft of her elbow, again, but the band-aid was acting as a makeshift shield. She pressed down on it to feel the slight surge of pain—it was soothing. So, she kept doing it until his text bubble popped up that he was typing.
Don't know
There was a second of silence before he sent another text.
What u doing tn
Layne sat on the edge of the bed, her heart beating like a schoolgirl. She felt stupid.
going out with my parents
Layne noticed that he had turned off the 'read' receipts. It wasn't something drastic, but she wondered if he didn't want her knowing when or if he read her texts. Maybe it was something he did for something else—she liked to think he did it for something else. He didn't answer.
Layne stuffed her phone in her purse, and stuffed her feet into her Converse, before making her way back out to her car. The sun was trying to set behind the trees, but the heat was still rapid. The trees were a beautiful green, and Layne tried to remember if the cicadas were coming out this year. Last time they did, she remembered stepping on tons of their carcasses and plugging her nose at the smell. Her dad wanted her to collect a few of the shed skin that would pile up on their driveway. Layne refused at first, but did it anyways, and Kurt took them to work to show the little kids that would play basketball in the park down the street or draw with chalk on the sidewalk. Sometimes, Layne envied them.
The drive to the shop was quiet—she didn't play any music, and just listened to the sounds of the island. Layne had an overwhelming sense of sorrow in that moment, and she wasn't sure why—it was a normal occurrence, now, for her to have these random spurts of sadness, unprovoked—especially when she drove through the nicer part of town. Their shop wasn't in Figure Eight, but not in the Cut—it was almost in between. She swore she saw Rafe easily five times, but Layne couldn't tell if it was just her imagination. She found herself hoping to see him every time she saw a tall, tanned boy wearing a polo shirt and khaki shorts, with a backwards hat, or gelled back hair. She was let down every time.
The surf shop was a store on the corner near the first entrance to the beach, and it had doubled in size since the summer of 1995 when her father inherited the store after his father's (Layne's grandfather) death. Her dad didn't go to college, instead stayed on the island to run the shop to make his mother happy, and had now been the main owner for twenty-five years. It was the main place to go for all surfers, kooks and pogues alike, and made a good amount of money—but Layne wondered if her parents were too scared of change that they stayed in the same house they bought all those years ago, instead of saving money to buy someplace closer to Figure Eight. Layne wasn't entirely complaining—she didn't really know how much money they had, anyways—she enjoyed her comfortable, considerably non-vexing life on the Cut. Too much change was never good.
The parking lot was seemingly empty, a few cars and bikes scattered about. Layne felt cold all of a sudden, and her stomach growled, and she tried placing her hand on her stomach as if that would quell the hunger. The sun seemed to be at its peak in the sky, and was boiling hot, and she had to wipe off her forehead with the back of her hand. The handle of the door nearly slipped out from her sweaty palm, but she was able to pull the door open and welcomed the air conditioning with open arms.
Immediately she dropped her keys in the little shelf beneath the counter, sending a nod of acknowledgement to her mother who was ringing someone up. Layne could see her dad up on the second level, standing tall on a latter and restocking the surf wax on the shelf. She jogged upstairs to take a look at the wet suits.
"Hey hon," he greeted, nearly tripping down the latter as he stepped off. Layne gave him a brief smile. "You got all spiffy for us?" he kid, tugging on a strand of her hair. He didn't seem to notice that she had given herself a trim—but, Layne wouldn't have been surprised if he didn't even know how long her hair was to begin with. "You need a new suit?" he asked, and Layne nodded.
"Yeah. Mine's too big and worn out. The water is too cold to surf without it, though," she sighed, fingering through the different sizes. There was one with blue stripes down the side—the material was soft against her fingers.
"We just got those shipped. Roka's, they're called . . . check the price tag for a reality check,"
There was tiny lettering at the bottom of the tag, with $395 in skinny numbers. Layne nearly coughed up dust—she noticed how they always tried to deceive you, placing bold words of all the great things about the suits until you reached the thin, petite price at the bottom. For a moment, she even considered buying it. It washed away briefly. "You can't just . . . take one?" she asked, tracing her finger over the blue section underneath the armpit. Kurt scowled. "When have I ever taught you to just take things?"
"I get free wax. And other stuff,"
"Yeah, things that cost like—twenty dollars. Not three hundred," he kid, pushing her shoulder lightly. Layne frowned and skipped back downstairs to greet Rory, who was cleaning up the counter. "We'll close up the shop in about twenty minutes. Can you run a quick stock in the back?" she called out to Kurt, who saluted her. "Yes ma'am,"
"Don't call me ma'am. It makes me feel old,"
"My apologies . . . ma'am,"
She flipped him off, and Kurt ran back to the stock room. Layne sat up on the counter, even after Rory had cleaned it. "Layne, get off the counter,"
"We need seats back here,"
"Off the counter,"
Layne hopped down, getting pins and needles in her feet. She could feel Rory scanning her body, up and down, and Layne felt like retracting into herself like a snail into its shell. Her shoulders lowered and she could subconsciously feel herself dropping her head like a guilty puppy. "You look too skinny," Rory muttered, reaching forward to pinch the skin on her collarbone. "Ow!" Layne winced, pulling away.
"You're losing too much weight. You're even skinnier than you were back in January. Are you eating? I told you to stop losing weight—do we have to start weighing you everyday again?"
Layne grunted, turning around to avoid eye contact with Rory—because she knew if she did even look at her mothers watering eyes for one brief moment, she might break, crumble, and admit to all her faults. Maybe admit to doing coke and sleeping with Rafe Cameron since high school, although she believes her mother already knows some of it.
Rory pulled down the neckline of Layne's dress slightly when she pulled her hand away, and saw the few hickeys littering on her chest. Layne could see her mother's face flush, and she pushed her hand away. "Mom, stop,"
"Is that from that boy last night? Rafe?"
"Who is Rafe?" Kurt butt in from around the corner, carrying a clip board under his arm.
"Your daughters secret boyfriend,"
Kurt's eyes seemed to bulge like saucers. "Boyfriend? Since when?"
Layne started to walk away from the counter. She wasn't sure where she was going, maybe off to hide in the racks of swimsuits and cover-ups. Layne could practically hear her mother smirk from behind her—and even heard a slight chuckle. Layne was blushing like a little kid, and she even felt her heart beat in her ears. "That boy Rafe Cameron, the one with the rich father,"
"Ward Cameron's son?" Kurt looked to Layne, who was hiding behind a shelf of bikini bottoms, her face blocked by a BUY ONE, GET ONE 50% OFF sign. "Layney, you're dating a kook?" Kurt teased, and Layne then moved to the ground, nearly retreating underneath the shelf, knees to her chest. "Can we please just go out to dinner already?" she called out, her hands holding her cheeks and she winced at the heat of her blush. She imagined Rafe walking through the doors then, pupils dilated, itching and sniffling. She thought of her dad scowling and her mother sneering. Then, imagined Rafe ignoring her after he found out that her parents thought they were dating. Blocking her number, maybe even shunning her. Her friend were right. Rafe was weird. Layne shouldn't be scared of something like that happening. Layne shouldn't be scared of him.
It took about ten minutes of harmless taunting before Layne helped them close up the shop, and followed them in her Jeep to the Wreck. Layne supposed this was her parents idea of a nice dinner—but she wasn't entirely complaining. It was easy to hide in a place like that, even though she knew a majority of the workers from school. She prayed none of them would approach her, and would simply mind their business, make awkward eye contact and then pretend it never happened. Layne was accustomed to that behavior, for the most part.
It was a nice night, and most people sat outside. Her parents decided to sit by the dim candlelight inside, and they were sat at a table in the corner. Layne was incredibly grateful to be placed in a corner.
She swirled the straw around in her water, with a lemon. "So—you never told us about ECU," Rory hummed nudging Kurt slightly with her elbow, as if Layne wouldn't notice. Kiara wasn't their server tonight. In fact, Layne was sure she didn't even see her here, at all. She wondered if she was with the boys. She missed them. Maybe they'd be at the party tomorrow night—probably. Was she too old to attend those parties? She was nineteen—but that was still a teenager. Kind of. She mindlessly took a sip of her water and shrugged.
"There isn't much to talk about," she breathed after swallowing her water, leaning back in her chair when the waitress came around to give them their food. She got fish and chips—although her stomach wasn't entirely agreeing with her, and she just took small bites of her fries. They thanked the waitress, her name was Samantha, and she looked to be in her mid-twenties. Layne knew she had been working at the Wreck since she was in high school. Layne wondered if she ever went to school or did anything with her life outside of this job. Another family from the Cut that would stay here until they were old and wrinkly.
"No new friends? Boys?"
Kurt held up a hand at his wife's inquiry. "I don't need to know about the second part,"
Layne really didn't make any friends at college. She felt restrained—almost as if if she did make friends, the ones she had on the island would vanish. Her heart was too tied up with the people here, she didn't even want to think about making any other friends. Not to mention that her face would get red and her eyes would get teary when she tried to conversate with new people—no one wanted to be friends with an sickly thin, anemic looking girl who couldn't laugh without tears welling in her eyes.
"There were a few girls on my dorm floor—but no, not really. No boys, either. I didn't like any of them,"
Rory smiled to herself while pushing her fork through her salad. Layne swished her water around in her mouth before furrowing her brows at her. "What are you smiling about?"
Rory shrugged, still mixing around her salad. "I just think it's funny how secretive you're being about everything. I mean, I get it, you might not want to tell us—but you've gotta give us something. I mean, we know you're seeing that Rafe kid—"
"Mom, shush," she hushed, gesturing with her hand for Rory to lower her tone, and looked around to see who was staring at them, or who had noticed. Visibly, no one—there was hardly even anyone in their area of the restaurant. Rory dropped her fork. "Why do you not want anyone knowing? Why is it such a secret?"
Layne pinched the bridge of her nose. This was the second time today someone questioned the secrecy of her and Rafe's relationship—if you could even call it that—and Layne truthfully, didn't know how to answer the question. She knew they wouldn't understand. Not even Marian and Claudia could understand, how could her fifty-year-old parents? Of course, she would never say that to them, although it didn't hurt to think it. "I don't want to talk about. Can't we just enjoy our dinner?" she distracted them—and herself—by eating her fish and chips as if it as the last meal she would ever eat. She thought it might be—maybe killing herself could get her to avoid talking about this any further, with anyone. Maybe killing herself could get her out of this labyrinth.
The rest of the dinner, no one brought up Rafe. Rory was doing her thing of humming and nodding along with things they were saying, and not contributing to the conversation, to show Layne she was annoyed without actually saying anything. Kurt was trying to bait both of them, but neither would bite. Layne talked about the waves with him—how the water was freezing and how she needed a new wet suit. Rory talked for the first time to mention that "getting a job would help" her save up money. Layne knew she was just saying that because every other topic of conversation swimming in her head was intrusive and nosy. Layne contemplated pouring her water over her head.
They got ice cream afterwards, and every time Layne stepped foot into the custard place, she couldn't stop thinking of Rafe. Everything seemed to be surrounding him today, and she felt sick. Her hand clutched her stomach, and for a moment she wondered if she was pregnant. The slight paranoia dissipated almost instantly—although, she did linger on the idea of having Rafe's baby. What he would do—she wondered if he'd ever want to marry her. In some masochistic way, she wanted to get pregnant so he would need to be with her. She clawed at the band-aid on her elbow and reopened the cut at the thought, wanting to rip off more skin for thinking of it.
"What happened?" her dad nodded to the band-aid, that had newer blood beneath it. She ate bits of her custard as they sat on the bench outside, and shrugged. "Just got cut by a shell this morning," she dismissed it, and Kurt nodded. They went home after that, and Layne had to sit on her hand to stop herself from picking away at it more.
It was dark by the time they returned home, because her parents were caught talking to some couple that Kurt knew from high school. Layne stood awkwardly by their side while they talked about her, and their kids, as if she wasn't there. She would check her phone occasionally to see if Rafe had texted her. So far there wasn't anything—it looked as though he was at a party. She wondered if Marian and Claudia were there.
She fell back on her bed with a breath, staring up at the ceiling. The moth was gone, and she had closed the window in result of it. The only light was her lamp, which was dim and had an orange glow. Layne wondered if she lay here long enough if she would vanish. What would happen to her body? Would she melt into the comforter? She thought for a moment of being like the moth—flying from corner to corner in the room, being stuck to the light, trapped in between four walls and a roof and frantically trying to escape. She wondered if it was dead. Maybe it was hiding behind her desk.
For a second, Layne thought she may have fallen asleep, but her limbs were still their normal weight and she dragged them along the soft of her bedsheets before pulling herself up to get ready for bed. No text from Rafe, or any of her friends—sometimes she thought they forgot she existed. It would be impossible for Layne to forget about them, no matter how much she has tried.
She went to throw her dress in her hamper, and it was already emptied—her mother must have taken her clothes to the laundry room without her realizing. Suddenly Layne felt very poorly about how she had treated her, and even her dad. She wondered if they had treated their parents that way when they were teenagers. Most likely. The few times Layne had met her grandparents on Rory's side, they always told her how much she was like her mother. She conjectured if that meant in all capacities—did her mother used to harm herself for stupid reasons, or force herself not to eat because she made a mistake? Did she let a boy who treated her like she was some sort of object to throw around and to make himself feel like more of a man, take advantage of her? Did she have friends who seemed genuine for a few moments before they turned and acted like completely different people? Layne caught herself picked away at the scab on her elbow, and she wanted to break her fingers. She impulsively reached for her hairbrush and brushed hard through her locks, enough to make her scalp red.
Rafe saw her from the window. The dry marsh grass was cutting his ankles, and gnats were swarming around his eyes. He remembered Layne telling him to put his hands up, because the gnats are attracted the highest part of someone's body. For a moment he forgot where he was—he could feel everything, his body was experiencing its own heat wave, and he could even feel the air against his skin. Some sweat even got into his eyes—he lifted the collar of his shirt to wipe it away. He also forgot that Layne thought he was trying to get clean. He felt a sudden wave of sorrow, and even contemplated not tapping on her window. There were no rocks nearby. Maybe that was his sign to go away and never look back. She was too good for him. But he needed her, even though he may not admit it, and before he could make a decision, his fingers were knocking on the glass, and for a moment he thought it might break.
Layne nearly jumped out of her skin, and saw Rafe's face through the mirror. She dropped her brush to the ground, quickly turning around to shush him. There wasn't a screen on the window for how many times he had come through it—her parents noticed about a year ago, and Layne said it was only broken. They had said they were going to fix it, but never did.
"What the fuck?" she whispered once she opened the window, and noticed how sweaty he was. "Are you high?" she placed a hand on his chest to stop him from climbing through yet. He stared at her like she had three heads. "I just—I need to stay here tonight, I can't go home . . ."
Layne sighed, loudly, still not moving. "So you don't text me pretty much the whole day, and you only come here, high, because you need a place to stay?"
Rafe pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head. "Yeah, yeah, I know, I'm always the douchebag asshole. I'm not doing well, okay, I can't help it, it's not my fault. I knew you would judge me," he hid his eyes from her, and Layne reached forward to grab his wrists. "No, no I'm not judging you—come in," she pulled him forward, and he crawled through, nearly knocking over some items on her desk. Layne lunged forward to stop them from hitting the ground, and rushed over to the door to lock it. She saw the moth escape through the window.
"What happened?" she asked, turning around, back against the wall. Rafe was taking off his shirt, down to his boxers, and crawled onto her bed. Layne was slightly scared to go onto the bed with him, and she held her left arm with her right hand as if she was some awkward preteen. She felt like she was hiding. "It's my dad—and that stupid bitch Rose. He said if I came home high again, he'd kick me out,"
Layne wondered if Rafe was telling the full story. He almost never did. He had told all of them he was getting sober—Layne tried to feel guilty for him, but in some morbid way, she wanted to see him vulnerable. Almost a reminder that he was human. Sometimes she forgot he was.
"I mean—you did tell me you were getting sober. You told your dad that, too,"
Rafe looked at her as if she was holding a gun to his head. "You sound just like my fucking sister. Why can't you just be on my side, for once?" he raised his voice, and Layne walked toward the bed to tell him to keep his voice down. She sat on the edge. "I am on your side—I want what is best for you. You're going to die if you keep this up,"
"You're talking to me like I'm an addict,"
"You are an addict,"
Rafe moved to the edge of the bed, feet down on the ground, elbows on his knees and face in his hands. He kneaded his hair between his fingers anxiously, and the gold ring on his pinkie shone against the lamp light. "You're just perfect, aren't you? Nothing wrong with you, going off to college, away from me,"
"Why are you still so mad about that? I feel like in some sadistic way you want me to tell you how many guys I hooked up with and how much better they were than you, or something," she scoffed, and Rafe moved to grab her arms tightly. She winced at the pressure, and swallowed thickly at how dilated his pupils were. She was visibly shaking, and Rafe seemed to realize what he was doing, and let go of her. "I'm sorry," he muttered, and Layne shifted so her feet were hanging off the edge of the bed, and anxiously rubbed her arms. She didn't want to look at him, because she thought if she did, she might start to cry. Her throat hurt.
"Hey," he muttered, rubbing his nose. Layne was still too scared to move. "Hey, look at me," he inched forward, placing his hand under her chin and moving her face to look at him. "I'm sorry for getting angry with you . . . I am, Layne, really . . ." she felt some tears in her ducts and she sniffled to subdue them. She wondered if he liked seeing her scared.
"You're safe. I will always keep you safe, always," he stroked her cheek, and Layne didn't even know she was crying until he wiped a tear away. She felt weak and stupid—but he didn't seem to be enjoying it. Layne actually thought he may have been genuine in that moment, but it was so hard to tell that it scared her.
"That's why I picked you. You need me. We need each other," his other hand moved to her cheek, and tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. He reached forward to kiss her, and she complied, even as a few tears dampened her lips. It was a quick enough kiss that made her melt into his hands. "I'll never hurt you—never again, okay?" he kissed her cheek, before pulling her into his chest. She smelled his sweat and her arms fell limp onto his lap as he stroked her hair and kissed her head.
"You'll keep me safe, too, right?" he asked her, once she pulled away, and they were face to face again. Layne nodded slowly. She felt to weak to even speak, and she wondered if she had lost her ability to. Maybe the left hemisphere of her brain was finally rotting, and her mouth was sewn shut. Maybe she was better off.
"This is why I love you," he tucked another strand of hair behind her ear, and pulling her wrist up to kiss it. Layne didn't know what to do. Her limbs felt like they were cemented in place, and she questioned whether it was real life or not—perhaps she was in a dream. She had the urge to hit herself upside the head to see if she would wake up. There didn't seem to be a time in her life where she wanted to badly to be asleep. Layne thought it would feel good to hear Rafe say something like, something so pure yet so poisoned, but it didn't. If anything, she felt worse—almost dirty. Like it wasn't something she was supposed to hear. There was a moment between consciousness and sleep that made her body tingle, teetering on a deep sleep. She felt the sudden urge to sleep for a year—she read that in a book, once, a woman trying to sleep for a year. If she tried hard enough, she might be able to do it. Layne never wanted to hear him say those words again, but another part of her wanted to capture it on video, so she could listen to it over and over again.
His finger brushed over the band-aid, and the pain reminded Layne that she was in real life. She hoped he couldn't hear her heart beating. "Did you hurt yourself again?" he asked, ghosting his finger over the rest of her arm. Layne tried to pull away but he kept it in place. "It's nothing—"
He looked up at her, under his lashes, under his hair. She wanted to kiss him so bad. She wanted him to hold her again, like he did moments ago. Layne didn't know if she loved Rafe Cameron, but right now, she didn't want any other feelings but love for him. He was so beautiful she wanted to cry.
"You promised you wouldn't, anymore,"
Layne swallowed, her throat hurting again. "I didn't think you cared," she admitted. Layne wasn't lying—she truly didn't believe he cared, at all, let alone loved her. He stared at her again. "Of course I do. I'm always going to keep you safe, you know that," he pulled her into his chest again, and they laid down. Layne liked hearing his heartbeat, and her eyes closed—she felt as though if she didn't cherish this moment now, she would lose it. Like a mental picture. She saw them from an aerial view, him holding her like she was going to melt away. She snapped that picture in her head and sank further into him, like she was going straight through him, through her bed, and into the ground—she was so close to him, but he felt so far away.
"Do you love me, Layne?"
"Of course I do,"
"I want to hear you say it,"
Layne placed a kiss on his chest, and below his ear. "I love you, Rafe."
Authors note: another long ass chapter, IM SORRY YALL