Chapter 1

Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake and then subsides. And when it subsides you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the promulgation of promises of eternal passion. That is just being "in love" which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over when being in love has burned away, and this is both an art and a fortunate accident. 

     ~Louis De Bernieres 

 

CHAPTER ONE

Time moves like excruciating slow waves against the rocks near a faraway, yet rapidly approaching shore. Each day starts out like gliding against the tide, fighting to avoid the sharp painful rocks until the end of the day. Then the wind picks up and I find myself crashing anyway. Exploding into several drops of who I used to be. And I allow it, I allow the pain to fall down my cheeks because I can no longer fight it on my own.

I have found myself watching the clock. I round out the days and dread the next because I know I’ll have to make it through the day without him. I’ll have to make something out of nothing. With the feeling that no matter what I accomplished in that one day, it wouldn’t make any difference the next and it wouldn't bring me closer to him.

My Parents never help. It’s always Better fish in the sea and you'd never know until you try and let’s not forget their favorite you're better off.

They've given up on it recently.

They stopped giving me fake words of encouragement because I wasn't listening.

I’m glad I have ignored their words. Glad I stopped fighting back and telling them how much I cannot do better on my own"without him. Who are they to tell me that I am better off without Bryce?

Is the agonizing pain I feel throughout my body better off for me? Is the aching I have in my brain every second it can't register his voice, touch or breath on my skin better off for me? Is it normal for a seventeen year old girl to go through weeks"no months, feeling as though everyday she's dying a little more inside?

No.

I am not in any way shape or form better off. No matter what they tell me. 

It's just a crush, it'll die out. Rebecca, my friend from school who has been with the same guy for three years, told me during lunch three days after he left me.

I shouldn't say 'he left me' when it wasn't his decision. It wasn't his fault, it was theirs. The cold-hearted strangers, who enjoyed sucking the life from two helpless teenagers in love, he called his father and the other two, I called, My Parents.

It has been over three hundred agonizing days. For personal reasons, I refuse to count the extra days in between the hundreds. They all just mix together anyway.

“Three hundred.” I whispered under my breath in more of a reminiscent tone than despair or sorrow. No matter how full to the rims my heart was with those emotions.

I turn eighteen today. He had his birthday in April.

His birthday….the entire day was like attending his own funeral. No casket to be found. As if his body had been in a terrible accident and they refused to showcase how painful his death was.  Everyone at the funeral, mourning the loss of someone they cannot see. Yet I could feel him. Or at least I thought I could. A thought can only fool the mind so much if nothing but past experiences are felt. Especially if those past experiences are fading memories on the edge of your aging mind. When you haven't felt or heard the person in so long, but your heart refuses to let them go.

It's a painful process...to feel like you've been ripped apart from the inside and are expected to live. To feel as though everyone around you is waiting for you to stop dead in your tracks, waiting for the moment when you finally break so they can pick and prod at you to keep you alive, to make sure you survive past the heart-ache. Then start all over again.

Hold onto the memories, ignore the ache until it starts ripping you apart again from the inside. Pretend it's not there. Pretend to be whole. Pretend to have a meaning or purpose. Pretend that the one person who you felt understood you on this earth is no longer near you....

Eighteen. The number all teenagers wait for during so many lonesome nights being ruled and overshadowed by their parents. Eighteen with its promises of freedom can sometimes seem forlorn to those with parents who refuse change, or refuse the promise the bright age brings.

Mine are one of those.

The ones who, since you have no way to get any cash flow to leave or any of your friends to let you stay with them, think they own you.

I have been locked away in my room for days. They bring me food and drinks. Yet the promise of seeing outside of my own walls looks like a distant horizon I'll never be able to follow. On a few occasions last year they would allow me out, with only my brother and a couple of friends.

The friends were the ones they knew had zero interest in me or I had zero interest in them. They were terrified I would look for a ‘rebound’ and get back to how I was before Bryce’s father took him from me.

It was bad enough on his birthday when they thought he would come for me. I knew they did despite their constant reassuring rolls of their eyes and words that were meant to crush me, in some instances they did but I kept my anchor intact, my sails raised to high speed winds with the promise of rain.

Bolts. Funny little things, aren't they? I think that's what they're called when you have a bolted window. Whatever it is, I can't get it undone. There's even a lock on the window with the bolt, the key has been floating somewhere around the ocean or sewage systems. Dad flushed it back in January and I haven't been allowed out at night since.

The reason had to do with me and some stranger...

“Where have you been all night. You call and say you're at the movies, an hour later your brother comes home drunk as a mule, without any knowledge of how the alcohol got into his drink... then a police officer brings you home at five in the morning. You stopped answering our calls. You turned your phone off. Explain yourself.” My father's voice was loud, so loud I feared the neighbor's would wake and call the police"though they had already been here, a second call wouldn't make them any friendlier than the first time.

“I-” My voice shook, eyes fixed away from his. “Dad. I'm sorry.”

“Sorry doesn't calm me or your Mother down. Sorry doesn't fix your drunk brother who's sleeping on the couch because I couldn't carry him upstairs. Sorry doesn't make us trust you anymore than we do right now. Sorry doesn't cut it.”

“What do you want me to say?” Annoyance edged it's way into my voice. I was tired of them, tired of their rules and tired of answering to everyone. They drove him away. Along with his father.

He's not here because of them.

“Tell me what you were doing....”

My body was getting the need to laugh again. Everything seemed hysterical. “I-” My mind was going blank, all I could think about was laughing and how good it would feel to laugh. So I did. “I don't know what to say.....” I shook my head vigorously trying to stifle the giggles.

“You're drunk.” He huffed, placing his hands on his hips and glancing over his shoulder at my brother who had fallen off of the couch, still asleep.

“I've only had eight or ten sips from a flask. I'm not hugely drunk.”

“You haven't ever had any alcohol!”

“Until now...” I whined. “There was this guy at the theater. He had a flask and I slipped a couple drops...well…half of it into Kevin's cup before I brought it to him and had a few sips myself and...It made things easier. I didn't have to see the stupid movie about finding meaning in life and I had fun. I finally had fun.”

“Alcohol induced fun, Alice. That's not the same as getting through this yourself.”

“Don't you see, Dad. I can't get through it. I've tried!” I blurted out, my words slurring.

“Go upstairs.” He shook his head at me. “You're not to see that boy again.”

“I don't care about the boy! I care about Bryce and the pain that's gone now. The pain I don't feel.” I pressed my fingers hard against my chest for emphasis. “He doesn't matter to me right now. That's all you and Mom have wanted. You should be happy!”

“What did you and this boy do?” He asked, concern written on is face.

It was so like him to ignore what I had just said. How I had just poured my heart out.

 “Nothing.” I began chewing on my bottom lip, feeling a slight sting as I bit down.

“Tell me the truth, Alice. Now.”

 “We talked and that's it. All we did was talk. Do you really think I would sleep with anyone else?”

“You've...” his face was red now, I had never told them I was no longer a virgin. Had never told them when Bryce and I had moved our relationship further. “Upstairs. Now.”

They've been more on edge knowing my virginity is no longer in tact. More careful with me. I gave up all of my activities when Bryce left, so I have no excuse to stay after school if I wanted to. I ride home with my Brother and am not allowed to bring home friends unless they know them. I'm not allowed to be one minute late while my Brother waits in the car or when I get home. My curfew is four in the afternoon on weekends or vacations from school and I'm not allowed out during school days.

“Happy Birthday, Alice.” I say to myself, placing my hand against the window. The grounds are dark with the promise of the sun in the hours to come.

Midnight. I spent my entire day enveloped in dreams and nightmares of him gone. I knew I wouldn't sleep as long as it was my birthday.

I have to wait for any sign of him. I can’t give up.

“Alice, phone.”

My heart surged into a spasm as if shocked into life.

Would he contact me this way? Would it be too obvious? If he had would my Mother really be allowing me to answer it?

Reason was knocking at my brain yet every fiber of my being was telling it to come back later, that it would rather jump then wait for the parachute check. It wanted to take the chance of falling, of colliding with the ground.

I slid off of the window seat I had been perched on for hours on end, waiting to see a silhouette walking towards the house. Waiting for him.

I walked towards my bedside table, my feet feeling as though they couldn't carry me fast enough or would cave under my weight should I hear his voice on the other line.

Would I break down? Would I forget to breathe? Would my heart give out due to the previous lack of wondering if he cares or if he has found another?

I froze, my hand outstretched, reaching but not completing the task I had meant to finish moments before. I had been so fixated with the thought his heart still matched mine in a perfect synchronous rhythm I never considered the possibility it might be out of step. I held my heart out on the line for him to wrap his warm fingers around and hold onto should I need saved, if he didn't reach out"I could flat-line, if he did I would be his forever.

My fingers curled around the smooth surface of my telephone's receiver and put it to my ear. “Hello?” I asked, my voice shattering into pieces and falling to the ground.

“Happy Birthday, Alice.” The voice was shrill, light, it belonged to a girl.

“Thanks.” My heart froze over as the chill in the room gripped it in it's icy palms, preventing warmth from closing in around it.

“Are you having a party?” The voice sounded hopeful, yet concerned.

“No.”

“But I’ve received an invitation to a party at your house?”

“My parents are having a party.”

“You're not going?”

My body collapsed from the weight I have been carrying lately.

The floor was nice, warm, and firm. Like him.

I answered her, but the sound that came out was inaudible, so I tried again this time a bit louder. “No.”

“Why not? It'll be a nice party.”

“No, it won't.” I knew these parties. I would be allowed around my friends and family seemingly a free teenager on the verge of adulthood but inside I would know it was only for show. I'm a caged animal and the party was the harsh, cruel, and unemotional circus to show off their new freak.

“Well, I hope you change your mind.”

“Goodnight, Abigail.” I said, my voice cold enough to freeze the line. Silence filled the conversation before I placed the phone back where it was to begin with.

Anger began building within my shaking frame for no reason. I didn't want to scream, kick or hit anything. No blame was in the air to cast on anyone.

I brought my knees to my chest, wrapped my arms around them and the storm that threatened the confines of my shielded room many nights before, ripped through it as if it had paper walls.

Leaving nothing behind, nothing but me stranded in an open field with incinerated trees stretching towards the mourning sky. No one around who could console the young woman soaked in her own pain. Her own mind keeping her sanity in tact, applying tape after tape, piece by piece.

“He loves me...” I whispered through sobs. Piece in place, duct tape. Healing. “..He hasn't forgotten me.” piece in place, duct tape. Healing. “He'll call...” Piece in place, duct tape. Healing. “He'll come.” Piece in place, duct tape. Healing. “He remembers me.” Piece in place, duct tape. Healing. “He remembers my birthday.” Piece in place, duct tape. Healing.

Whisper. Rock. Healing. Repeat. Whisper. Rock. Healing. Repeat.

I finally drifted off into a nightmare filled sleep somewhere between I'll be fine if he forgets. I'll live. The pain will stop. 

The sun rose without me. The darkness retreated into the depths of the shadows among the trees beside our house and no one tapped on my window. No one begged me to come with them away from my captivity. Not one word was uttered to me that entire night but my own pathetic lies.

“Get up! You have a party to attend today.”

“I'm not going.” I groaned, my body felt as though I had been dropped from our roof and clawed my way through the walls and into the position I was in on my bedroom floor.

“Yes you are. Get up and get dressed. This will be good for you.”

They wouldn't know. They always thought he was bad for me, thought we weren't a match. The rough shards of what was remaining of my heart on the floor were proof enough. Who did these people think they were? They were trying to kill me. Drastic. But it felt that way sometimes.

“Kyle's coming.” Mom called back again, her voice teetering on annoyance.

“Kyle isn't who I want to attend my party.”

“It doesn't matter. He likes you.”

“Not interested.”

Kyle had been throwing himself at me like a boomerang since middle school. He had come in between us, he had caused my parents to paint a picture of the perfect guy deeming Bryce tainted and unfinished.

Bryce. Bryce.

I shaped my lips around his name without muttering a word. Taking the memories out of their box on my shelf, dusting them off, and basking in their glow " their warmth. The dull familiar pang rose under my skin, in my chest.

“Are you goin' to spend all day up here?” Kevin came into my room " my older brother was such a realist. He could never understand what I was going through.

“I'm hoping to generate some cobwebs so Mom can decorate around me. You'll get that sports trophy room you've always wanted.”

“Finally you're useful for something.” his voice trailed off as he walked away. It had finally occurred to him a few months ago that he wasn't able to help me, that he couldn't comprehend for a second what had become of his baby sister.

Things have always come easy for Kevin.

No, I'm not just saying that.

He's talented. Very much so. He excels at every sport imaginable in the United States. He's broken more bones than I can count. He's also an a*****e. Too confident and a brat. If something doesn't go his way or the focus isn't on him in it's entirety, He's unhappy.

Yeah, that's right. There's one small crack in my perfect brother's facade. Can anyone else see it? No. No one could or ever would. Apart from Bryce.

Bryce.

Automatically his eyes come to mind. As if just his name being thought focuses on the one mesmerizing piece of memory I believe I have not forgotten, an image that cannot fade no matter the time or space between us now or the past moments that threaten to diminish my sanity.

His eyes. The decadent edges coated like dark chocolate with the defined lines of gold that set your soul on fire with just one look. I closed my own, allowing the liquid that stung my eyes to release, as the thought faded into the numb abyss my mind has evolved into. Watery depths that have become too treacherous to wade out in.

“She's crying, again...” Kevin was at my door as I lifted my heavy lashes, the smug look on his face seemed permanent lately.

“Why don't you just run off to your perfect little world. I'm sorry I'm not fit for it!” My voice broke as the sentence formed from my lips, the rain cascading down my cheeks, burning my skin.

“Now she's lost it.”

Lost it. Lost it. What did that mean anyway? If he was referring to my heart, I hadn't lost it. It was on the floor in shattered pieces. If he was referring to my sanity, yes, I had.

“Come on..” My Mother had barged into my room, her expression coated in concern and annoyance.

Which to everyone's surprise, was shockingly rare.

My arm was grabbed from it's hold it had on my knees. I was pulled to my feet, my mind working as fast as it could to ensure I wouldn't trip over the shadow of myself that followed this shell where it went. “You need to get into the shower and get ready for your party.”

I nodded to myself more than to her. I wanted nothing more than to wash this agony away with the dirt on my skin. Wash away Bryce and what he had made me become. But no mass amount of water nor rain would take away the excruciating pain my body had been wracked with since we parted.

She turned the handles and started my shower water as if I were a child, as if I were incapable. At least she could see me, really see me and the numbness I was under. Or maybe it was for her own benefit. Maybe she didn't want to think I would skip it all together and act as though I were clean. Either way I undressed as she left the room, pulled the curtain and sat against the marble texture of our bathtub.

I assumed the position I had been in on my bedroom floor and allowed the moist drops of water to hit my skin. I allowed the heat to warm my sore bones.

The ache didn't budge however the memory of the time we had spent in a shower together did. It rose to the surface and dabbled with the liquid drops on my skin. It had been the first time either of us had seen each other without any clothing to hide ourselves from our needy gazes. If I had shared this piece of information with anyone they would think something different of it and twist the comforting moment into something it's not, something it wasn't and would never be.

Some would want to know if we touched each other and the answer would be yes. But not for what some would imagine. That answer isn’t what they would want to hear.

They wouldn't want to know how we had both experienced a stressful day with our parents arguing back and forth, with skipping school because we weren't allowed out together unless it was for educational purposes on school grounds, emotionally with bullies at school who picked on me and his abusive father who hadn't stopped when Bryce begged him before the stool they had in their kitchen came at his chest.

They wouldn't want to know how he cried in my arms, showing his first sign of weakness, as I held him close to me without speaking. How we both just listened to the water fall around us mixing with the sound of our breaths. How we kissed, but that is all. How we bathed in a well-mannered way, keeping our hands to ourselves apart from him helping me with my back and I with his. How his arms were my only salvation when my body reacted to the stress my mind was under. How his words kept me from doing so many things I would have regretted because the memories after that moment are some of my most treasured. How his voice calmed the shaking in my bones that day and hushed me to sleep as we gave into our heavy eyelids when we were dry. How I couldn't succumb to sleep unless I had his arms around me and the scent of him absorbed into my lungs and buried deep into my skin.

Now, I cried myself to sleep. I let my body get so worn out that finally my mind would shut down taking my thoughts of him with it, just to let them ignite in my dreams. Let them taunt me with his touch, scent and the feel of hin.

I have been having nightmares of him since I saw him last, before his father made him leave.

When I say nightmares, I mean it in the most literal sense. Sometimes it can be just a simple dream of us laying on a blanket out in the sun and enjoying our time together. Other than that, the majority of the time it’s him transforming into Kevin or a face I don’t know.

My worst fear is hurting him. Just the thought of falling for another guy or waking up in bed with someone else just sends me into panic mode.

“Five minutes until Party Time! If you're not ready, I'll come up there and drag you down here myself.” My Mother's southern drawl had come into her voice. That's one of the perks of her growing up in Texas, it rears it's ugly head every now and then. If she's in a good mood though, I'm very fond of it. Almost envious. It sounds sweet like honey when she's happy. When she talks to my Brother.

I brought myself to my feet, hearing my toes squeak against the marble. I have no issues with my Mother seeing me naked, never have, but I wasn't about to cause a scene. It would be better to pretend, better to put on a mask and parade around as if nothing happened. Guess those acting classes pay off sometimes.

I knew the guest list. Knew every face I would see in the crowd downstairs. The forlorn faces that hadn't seen me for days, hadn't went through the motions of one simple conversation with me during the time we attended school.

Once I finished washing my body and my long chestnut locks, I turned off the water. I grabbed a towel, wrapped it around my lean frame and stood in the bathroom counting my breaths.

One. No one's coming. Two. No sounds of footsteps at the door. Three. No thuds in my bedroom. Four. No voices pouring in through the walls. Five. No screams or loud remarks being thrown in my direction.

I walked out of the Lavender coated bathroom, into my room and shut the door before anyone could rush me any further. I had no desire to attend this party, nor did I intend on acting like the best host in the history of earth. But I could try. I could do my best.

 

Reviews

[Kaylor Mason]

I would love to review this properly, but I am really not qualified to do it justice . . . even so, it's good