Please Don't Go (The Story of Us Book 3)

Chapter 16- New Perceptions

The first step is always the hardest. It was a common phrase that everyone heard frequently but most never really grasped the true meaning of it. Most people never found themselves in the position where they had to take a hard first step. A first step that seemed impossible, as if your feet were stuck in cement shoes and you simply didn't have the strength to lift them. Most people were lucky. Amanda and Spencer were not particularly lucky people.

Spencer had to take several first steps. The first step he had to take was dealing with undiagnosed autism. His whole life he had trouble interacting with other people and that always seemed to make the bullying worse until he just stopped. He learned that when he made an effort it gave them ammunition so he stopped doing that. Perhaps it was the bullying that made the step so hard to take rather than the Asperger's but it was difficult nonetheless. Amanda made it easier, however.

While other people in his life either ignored his vetted interest in random topics or made fun of his social awkwardness Amanda found them to be charming traits. She listened to every topic he talked about, not necessarily retaining the information for later but listening enough that she could join in the conversation. Whenever a social interaction went badly, she was always there as well. Sometimes, when it involved others, she made sure they didn't make fun of him and always broke any tension he may have created. She was also good at explaining why the situation had gotten awkward so Spencer knew what not to do or say again.

The next hard step he had to take was to deal with schizophrenia being hereditary. First, he had to get his mother help. Amanda made this easier as well because she was the only one able to convince Diana that she needed to take care of herself, if not for herself than for Spencer. Amanda also unknowingly made the crushing reality that he may one day suffer the same fate as his mother easier for Spencer as well. After all, he knew that even if he lost himself completely, Amanda would always be able to guide him back.

Spencer's last major step had been kicking his drug habit. That step had been the hardest because he knew from the beginning before he took the drug on his own that first time that one day he would have to take it. That knowledge made everything so much harder as did the knowledge of how much he had hurt the others around him. But he took the step. The only step he had taken not knowing if Amanda would be there waiting to steady him if he stumbled, ready to make sure he didn't fall flat on his bottom like a toddler just learning to walk.

But she had been. Amanda had always been there right when Spencer needed her. She was his anchor, the one steady thing in his life that he could always feel even when he had no idea of where she was with only a handful of unopened letters sent in a desperate act of reconciliation to assure him she was alive and well. Maybe that's why to him she seemed so unbreakable. Perhaps he had formed all the notions about how strong she really was because she was always his strength, always there waiting to lend him her energy even when he didn't really need it.

Maybe, just maybe, seeing her in her depressed state had been good for him. He wasn't implying that he was in any way glad it had happened because he wasn't. He could never wish for the sleepless nights where he sat awake just watching her sleep, terrified that she would wake up and try to end the pain in some permanent way. Once, he had imagined that this was how she felt when he was taking drugs. That one day he would want to escape so bad that he would escape forever. At that moment, he hated himself for his addiction even more because he wouldn't wish that type of pain on anyone.

However, despite wishing it never happened, seeing her in a light that wasn't the one above the pedestal where he had affixed her so many years prior showed him a different side of her. He always knew that she was strong and he had shaped that into her being flawless but Amanda wasn't flawless, in fact, she was just as flawed as he was. She wasn't some superhero that was never affected by torture or pain or heartbreak. She was human. She got hurt and then with the healed wound, she grew stronger.