Dreamers Never Die

Sixteen - Now Your Life Is Free

There always comes a point when things you used to find fun begin to seem tedious at best and at worst... pure hell.

I couldn't shake the feeling I was missing something each time I watched a sunset with Jenna or told her a funny story.

Maybe it was Jenna's fading smile at things she used to find amusing, or how her hands were always cold and uninviting now.  It was something I had never been able to pinpoint and something that was always preoccuping my thoughts every waking moment.

So when we arrived back to my dingy apartment after weeks of traveling with her, I was almost glad to tell her goodbye with an empty promise of seeing her later. Or even something as meaningless as texting her later.

We had hit a patch I didn't know how to fix and was too embarrassed to bring up to anybody to see if I could fix it or at least get help for the problem.

The empty promises were beginning to weigh on me and I could feel the dull buzzing off my phone as it buzzed on the curve of my stomach. I hadn't even remembered putting it there but I forgot a lot of things now.

When I grabbed it and saw the same glowing picture of Jenna's face, I even dreaded answering it. Afraid that I would say something I would regret because I had grown bored of talking to Jenna every day.

I somehow found the phone still pressed up against my ear and Jenna's voice ringing through it.

"Are you okay because it seems lately that you've been ignoring me. I... did I do something?" Jenna's voice sounded desperate.

Normally I would have felt guilty for this, but all I felt was annoyed by her for some reason. It took strength to not just hang up and toss my phone across the room so it couldn't bother me with constant reminders anymore.

My silence earned a somehow annoyed sigh from the other line. It sounded exhausted and tired as if Jenna was just growing tired of my constant distance.

"Well, Tay. Call me back when you feel like acting civilized." The line beeped quietly afterwards and I just found myself listening to it before setting it on top of my blanket and standing up.

I was at a loss for words. Instead of sad, I was actually mad that Jenna had begun to get mad at me right back. She had no right.

Jenna was supposed to be there for me. She was supposed to try and at least want to fix things. I wanted her to try and fix the problem she must not have noticed between us until the distance grew more and more obvious.

She wasn't allowed to get mad.

It took me a moment to realize what I had just thought. I was mad because Jenna was mad at our lack of communication between both of us after we had seemed perfect and happy. Or at least we had seemed that way to her.

Jenna was taking the initiative to bring up the topic for us to try and work through and all I could think of was that she wasn't allowed to have an opinion unless it somehow benefited me in some way. That was the part that scared me.

Instead of grabbing my phone, I walked out of my room, feeling the need to slam it behind me because it felt good to have a negative reaction towards something that wasn't a living being.

I was honestly terrified of trying to talk to Jenna again. I had no words for what I was feeling because I personally had no idea myself. All I knew was that I was mad and it was having a negative reaction to somebody I had previously cared a lot about.

Across the hallway I could hear a loud pop hit playing behind a door. Sam's door and she was the exact person I needed right now.

Sam had been in so many relationships that I had begun to lose count. She must have felt like this at some point and it felt like she was the only person that I was going to be able to turn to right now.

Because of her shut door, I lightly knocked on the wood with my knuckles, only to earn a somewhat muffled 'come in' response.

I opened the door slowly like there might be some caged animal hidden in there and shut the door just as carefully behind me.

After slamming one door, it almost felt like I would just feel even worse if I tried to slam another.

"What'cha need?" Sam turned in her computer chair, her mouth partially filled with food that she had been eating, the bag sitting in her lap.

I laid on her bed and grabbed a pillow to place over my face before screaming as loud as I could into it. The sound came out quieter than it sounded in my head, but it was still enough for a sound of thought to come from my sister.

"Ah. Relationship problems?" I glumly nodded, not removing the pillow from my face. At this point it almost felt like a cushy barrier from myself and anything Sam may say to me.

We sat in a silence, as if Sam was trying to take in whatever problem I was having via my aurora or some mind power that must have skipped a generation.

"Talk to her. That's the best advice I can give. Just sit her down and talk this shit out." I recognized the last bit as my sister's way of trying to cheer me up while also slipping some life advice in there, but I was too confused to fully appreciate it.

I still felt mad Jenna gets to have problems too, but at the same time I was trying to register them as being just as valid as my own. It was difficult and I sat in a weird sort of limbo mind set with myself.

"Okay." Was all I could muster. I placed Sam's frilly decorative pillow neatly back onto her bed before heading back to my room.

I didn't know what I was going to do, but I knew I needed to at least try something.