I Can't Stop [Niam]

Chapter 30: Epilogue

I know I promised to have this up last week, but I was ready to finish it yet. But now I am. It's quite bittersweat finishing this though because I really enjoyed writing it. I started this story over a year ago and it's just kind of sad that I'm finally finishing it.

I have had so much fun writing it and I hope you guys had just as much fun reading it and thank you all for sticking with me through the story and all the long waits between updates. I love you all and I hope you guys enjoy the final chapter of I Can't Stop!

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Life didn’t just suddenly become easy or just went back to normal once we got out. If anything, it got harder. The only difference is we were now able to handle the hard times better.

My first obstacle was trying to get back in the groove of being at home again.

It took a while for Greg and Denise to stop walking on eggshells around Liam and I, it took them even longer to trust me again. For months on end they would monitor my eating and watch my every move after I ate. They wouldn’t let me be in the bathroom by myself for more than five minutes and someone had to be in the room with me while I showered.

After a while, I finally just sat them down and talked to them. I explained to them that I was better. That I might not ever be a hundred percent ok again, but at the moment I was ok. I didn’t need to be watched 24/7 and they can trust me. It took a little while longer after our talk, but eventually they backed off.

I really didn’t know how to react with my old friends after I got out. I didn’t know what to feel really, I mean, I always knew they were closer to Liam then they were to me, but I never once heard from any of them when I was in the center. So, I was kind of wary of hanging out with them when I got out.

And it was awkward being around them. They would either act like Greg and Denise and treated me and Liam like we were fragile china dolls or just acted like we had never even left. I guess I preferred having them act the second way, but I also wish they would just kind of just acknowledge just once. After a while, I got used to it and just realized that I will never be as close to them as I was to the friends I made while in the center.

Another problem was school.

I was behind most of the other people in my grade, even though I did take online classes when I was at the rehab center. They wouldn’t let me take more than a few classes at a time there though, because they didn’t want the workload to stress me out. And getting used to the stress of going back to school every day again was really hard, but I somehow managed. And I was able to graduate with the rest of peers with the help of summer school. Which wasn’t fun, but Liam had to go to it too since he missed that month of school, so it ended up not being that bad.

Another reason why school was such a hard obstacle to overcome was because of all the taunting and teasing I had to go through, most of them coming from the oh so wonderful Sophia. She somehow found out where I was those three or four months I was gone and spread the news like wild fire.