Angsty - Enemies to Lovers - Slow Burn
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Hitch Pepper might've had a stupid name, and a personality that drove me crazy, but that didn't stop her from being gorgeous. Everyone knew it, guys and girls alike.
And my buddy Phil Childre...
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IT WAS THE coke that masked the effects of alcohol in Phil that night. The doctor theorized that it was most likely why he developed alcohol poisoning, all because he didn't feel that drunk with coke in his system. It led to him accidentally drinking himself to death.
I gave up drugs and alcohol after that.
It wasn't a conscious decision. I didn't give it up in some way to honor Phil or his memory, it was more like I couldn't stomach them anymore because of what they did to him. I had no desire for them anymore. And, even if they weren't involved in Phil's death, I still would have stayed away from them.
Sobriety makes you confront your emotions and feel them clearly, and I wanted to feel the agony and anguish that came with Phil's death. I wanted to curl up into a ball and wallow in it because there were so many different ways I could've kept Phil alive—but I had ignored all of them to take care of his girlfriend. The girlfriend that I had feelings for behind his back.
I was punishing myself, and I wanted it to stay that way. It felt right that way.
The first few days following Phil's death were the hardest. After someone dies, you begin to realize how important they were in your life, and Phil had been very important in my life.
I had always known that in the back of my head, but never confronted the notion until after he was gone.
I'd realized that we weren't friends, we were brothers. It was an unconditional love that we shared for each other, the close kinship feeling that surpassed friendship.
We'd grown up together, me an only child and him with four brothers 8+ years older than him. It was hard to think of a memory that didn't have him somewhere in it.
Realizing all this had been a gut punch.
I felt even worse at the funeral, seeing all the pictures his parents had put together on a board next to the refreshment table. I was in most of them, all bruised and scraped up from the messes we used to get in.
I'd had a hard time staying away from those pictures, standing by them and wishing I could time-travel back to those moments.
Hitch had been right next to me the whole time, asking me about each picture and what we were doing in them with teary eyes. I think it was her way of keeping herself distracted from it all, or maybe she was trying to cheer me up somehow.
She had been a mess after his death. I was the one to deliver the news to her, and held her while she sobbed until she couldn't cry anymore.
It was the first time either of us had lost someone close to us, and we didn't handle it well.
We moved around the house like ghosts, avoiding stepping foot near Phil's room or moving any of the items that were his.
