When Liam laid me down on my bed, I came back round. I felt the tiniest flicker of hope that he might stay with me and stay up all night talking the way that we used too, (back when she still cared about me and thought I had something interesting to say). For him right now, I felt like I could set aside my exhaustion.
As he went to get up, I placed my hand on his shoulder to pull him back down and obligingly he did, with his feet on the floor and his body turned so that he could see me. I couldn’t see him or his face, he was just a silhouette, “yeah Onnie?”
A chill ran through me when he called me that. He was the only one who ever called me that.
“Did you miss me?” The minute I said it, I regretted it but in the morning I could blame it on the drink talking.
He shifted, (uncomfortably maybe?) “I do miss you.”
I tightened my grip on his bicep and then we sat silently for a moment. He leaned over me and brushed the hair away from my face the same way he always used too. I opened my mouth to say something, not sure what I was intending to say, but closed it when he stood up. He pulled off my heels and laid them down next to my bed and covered me up with my blanket. Suddenly I felt very awake. And I wanted to cry. I wanted to beg him not to leave.
He stopped at the door and turned back “You alright, Onnie?”
All I could do was nod, feeling like a little girl again. And sick. Although again it was probably the drink, it felt more because Liam was here and that nothing in my power could keep him here. I wanted to tell him I could be me again, but why would he believe me? I didn’t know if I could be, or that I’d want to.
I missed the times when the worst I’d drink before I went to bed was a drink and the hardest decision I had to make during the day was whether to go to the pool or Liam’s house. Now I was just a fool of a girl who spent all her time trying to be cool. Not the smartest. Not the best. Just the most…powerful.
Tears built up in my throat. I wanted to cry. At the loss of Liam, the loss of myself, the loss of innocence.
“K, I’ll see you tomorrow then yeah? That is if your still up for it and don’t feel too awful.” I didn’t want Liam to see how I was feeling but I could tell in the way that he uttered these words that he knew I wasn’t ok but that I needed some time. Man, how well did this boy know me? It was kinda scary.
“I’ll be fine, and yeah that will be great.”
He left and I fell asleep, slipping quickly into the kind of dream, that isn’t a dream at all just memories with all the details you never thought you’d remember and couldn’t believe you’d forgotten.
*****
I woke up in the morning with a banging headache. I could hear someone bustling around downstairs and could only assume it was the housekeeper that I had forewarned that I was having a party. I took my time getting up, gulping down a large glass of water before pulling my hair into a ponytail, wiping away any remaining make-up and shrugging on my dressing gown.
I wondered if Meredith had got back from the meeting she had to have with my teacher Mr O’Connelly who apparently didn’t like my attitude or something like that. It wasn’t the first meeting and it most likely wouldn’t be the last either.
I heard a car door slam outside and raced down the stairs so that when Meredith opened the door, she was met with me standing on the bottom step, lips pursed and arms crossed.
She looked at me and sighed.
“Listen Honor-“ Meredith began
“So what did you talk about then? Did you swap stories about how awful I am?”
