Everything is Green

Chapter 15

    Well, shit. That did not come out how you wanted it to. As soon as the words leave your mouth, you know it was a mistake. Yes, you should have been honest, but there were plenty of better times and ways to do so.

    Your eyes never once stray away from Lizzies face, pleading for her to let you explain. You haven't been standing in silence long, but it's getting unbearable. You want her to say something, anything. You want her to yell at you, cuss at you, throw something, break something. But, she doesn't. She doesn't say a word. She doesn't need to. Her eyes are doing all the talking that she needs. As soon as those three words flew from your lips with no warning, the same red eyes that were holding back tears for far too long finally let one fall.

    As soon as Lizzie becomes aware of the tear she presumably didn't mean to let slip, she wipes it quickly from her cheek, nods her head once, and turns to leave your apartment.

"Lizzie wait, please let me explai—" you try to get out before you hear the click of your door closing. She was gone.

    Flashbacks of Audrey doing the same thing, walking away, run through your mind. Only this time, you knew the reason. You messed up. You were the one in the wrong. She had every right to leave. As soon as you hear the door close and see that she is really gone, your legs seemingly give out, causing you drop into a squatting position. You immediately rub your hands over your face and through your hair aggressively.

    How could you let this happen? All of your previous rationale for waiting to come clean has gone completely out the window. You should've been open and honest from the very beginning. You should've explained everything to her instead of hiding it like a fool. You have been running from this problem for so long, running from Audrey for so long, it came as second nature to run from Lizzie too. And now here you are, left broken and alone on your kitchen floor.

    Your thoughts are becoming painful, your chest is becoming tight, and your emotions are getting overwhelmingly hard to contain. You slam your fist into the ground once, twice, three times. Your anger at yourself takes over, you lose count of how many times you throw your fist into the floor, only stopping when you hear a crack. You look down to find the source of the noise, noticing your knuckles are now bloody and bruised. The knuckles of your middle and ring finger of your right hand are noticeably more swollen than the rest, the cracking sound you heard being the result of the bones in them breaking.

    As soon as you see the state of your hand, you get the sense to finally pull yourself together. You immediately become embarrassed by your actions, even though no one other than yourself saw them. You feel a sense of shame for reacting the way you did, for a person you only met yesterday. But, for the first time in a long time, you saw yourself being happy again, you saw yourself feeling safe again, you saw yourself with Lizzie. And you were the reason she walked away.

    You decide to finally get up. You've been withering away on the kitchen floor long enough. Although your world stopped spinning momentarily, the real world never stops. You still have your audition tomorrow, and you are still sticking to your word and getting those papers signed. Maybe Lizzie with give you a chance to explain, maybe she'll hear you out, you need those papers to be able to prove to her she wasn't wrong about you.

    You head to the kitchen sink and run cold water over your hand. You wince at the pain, a pain that you didn't notice until the adrenaline left your body. It's almost as if the pain of your hand is a physical sign of what your heart feels. You deserved this, Lizzie was being genuine. Only, you noticed far too late. The signs were all there but, you were too stupid to notice.

    You feel yourself getting riled up again by the context of your thoughts. You need to go to bed. You wrap your hand in a kitchen towel, you'll do a better job of cleaning it up tomorrow. You head to your room to change out of your clothes. As soon as you do so, you throw yourself onto your bed and release a long, painful sigh. One that holds not only sadness, but anger and remorse.