Sometimes he loves me

CHAPTER 3

EMMA

"It hurts." I hear myself say, almost suffocating.
"That's your own fault." He says with an arrogant laugh. His bright blue eyes look at me as if he really believes it.

I shoot up in bed and gasp for air as I feel a tear roll down my cheek. My eyes shoot from left to right, looking for danger, for Richard, but darkness and the bass of loud music greets me instead. It echoes through the walls of my new room, slowly coming back to the reality that I'm not at my parents' house.
Even though I know he can't hurt me, my heart is still beating way too fast and I have trouble catching my breath. I thought a new place would mean a fresh start, but it seems my demons came along with me.
I don't want to feel his hands on me anymore. I want to heal. I just want to fucking heal the wounds from when he pretended I could trust him.
I throw my legs over the edge of my new bed and brush my hair from my sticky face. My bed is soaked in sweat and so are my clothes.
Breathe...
I take a deep breath and feel how badly I'm shaking as I put my hands on my face and start to cry. I suddenly feel like that little girl again, so vulnerable.
Normally I jump out of bed and climb onto the roof for fresh air, but now I have nowhere to go.
To avoid having a panic attack, I try to focus on the things around me. What do I see? What do I hear? What do I feel?  My hand automatically goes up to my necklace. I still wear the one I got from Finn years ago because it's become some kind of safe haven to calm down whenever I feel a panic attack come up.
My room is completely dark, the only light coming from the bright moon that shines through my window. It's full and beautiful and it instantly calms me down. I stare at it for a couple of minutes until my heart stops racing. I'm so tired of this anxious bullshit. It has gotten worse and I've been feeling like this for a year or two now. I don't even remember how it all started and therapy hardly helped. Having to express my feelings and my anxiety are my biggest struggle. I can't even take the bus or walk past strangers without feeling distressed. The worst part is, I know most of it is all in my head. I know people aren't paying attention to me, I just feel like they are.
I pat my cheeks dry with my sleeve and get up from the bed. When my eyes are used to the dark room, I slide my hand along the wall in search of the light switch.
I'm startled by my own reflection in a mirror on the door that I hadn't noticed when I came in earlier and smile to myself. Stupid.
My long black hair is a little dishevelled. Luckily it's not tangled since I put in two boxer braids before getting in the car. I walk over to the box I filled with the stuff I had at home. I sigh when I realise I still have to unpack, but I'll do that tomorrow.
"You won't come far in life if you keep procrastinating,"  I hear Vincent say in my mind, which reminds me that I promised to call him before he would get on his flight today. I quickly grab my phone from my bag, which I haven't looked at since this afternoon. I am shocked to see that it's already past midnight and I have six missed calls from Vincent. 
Shit, shit, shit. I didn't expect to sleep this long. He must have landed already.
I sit on the floor and call him back, but he doesn't answer and is probably already on his way here. I hope he won't be angry with me. I turn the volume of my phone up so I can hear it ring if he calls me when he arrives.
In the meanwhile I hear the music bump through the whole building, but it doesn't transcend the sound of my rumbling stomach. All I ate today was a banana and even that took me a lot of effort. My nerves were too intense to eat, but now I feel dizzy and I'm starved. I put my hand on my rumbling stomach and look inside the box. The only food I have with me are instant noodles, which I threw on top of my packed clothes before I left home.
Home... I suddenly realise I didn't even get a call or text from my parents, but before sadness can take over me, anger does. Fuck them. I don't need them anyway.
My gaze moves to the noodles. I haven't bought a kettle yet, so I'll have to go to the kitchen to boil water. The thought of it instantly makes me hesitant to eat at all. It's Friday night. That means it's the weekend and the building is probably packed with people that are here to party. My heart starts beating faster from the idea of having to go through that crowd. Great.
Just take a deep breath. I repeat those words to myself which Finn had calmed me down with when I had my first panic attack at 5 years old. He had to say it many times after that, but it always helped.
I hesitantly grab the noodles. You'll be fine, just fine, I try to encourage myself. I walk to the door and stop in front of the mirror to untie the two braids in my hair. My black hair flows down my back, making me look like my mother when she was younger. Her hair is short now. I helped her cut it last year because she says it's too much work to untangle it every morning. What she actually meant was that she wants to numb herself with alcohol the moment she wakes up instead of taking a minute to comb her hair.
I flat out my white oversized shirt that hangs loosely over my shoulder and look down at my black leggings to see if it's clean. I don't know why I think anyone would care if it wasn't, but I just feel like it would portray how I grew up and I don't want people to know that.
I put my hand on the doorknob and freeze, feeling my chest tighten again. Wondering if anyone will look at me as soon as I step outside of this door. Okay just fucking breathe, will you? I need to stop overthinking this, otherwise I'll be too anxious to leave this room at all.
I take a deep breath and exhale all the air from my burning lungs at once before opening my door and walking down the hall, almost getting mentally blown away by the amount of people around me.
I'm not made for crowds like this, it gives me way too much to worry about in bed at night. All those people and conversations that keep spinning around in my head. Overthinking every word I said or could have said.
This feeling almost has me thinking I should just continue living with my parents in my familiar surroundings, but I don't know if I could bear their arguments any longer. Not to mention having to go back to avoid Richard every Saturday. I can't stand him looking at me like I'm some kind of snack. I get nauseous thinking about him and how I've been hiding for him the past five years. Hiding in my room or on the roof, starving myself because I didn't want to go downstairs for food, afraid he'll come talk to me. I don't want to go back to living like that.
I quickly make my way down the stairs. It's busier down here and I have to squeeze through the partying people to get to the kitchen, if I can find it. I had a quick glance of the ground floor when I arrived, but I didn't explore further than the stairs and I really regret that now.
When I finally find the kitchen and walk into it, it's almost empty, which is a relief. I head straight for the kettle and step over a small pool of liquid leaking from a red cup on the floor just in time. I shouldn't have left my room with just my socks on.
While I wait for the water to boil, I put the spices on top of the noodles and search the drawers for a fork. When I hear it click, I pour the water inside the noodle container and rinse the rest of the water from the kettle down the sink. The last thing I want is for anyone too drunk to drop it on themselves. It wouldn't be my first time to witness that. 
I want to grab my noodles to make my way back to my room, but stop when I hear a voice behind me, "Did you lose your shoes, Cinderella?"