Trouble Times Two

Chapter Fifty-Six

Sunday

Donovan is still latching me onto my arm.

"Get off me please. I just want to go. I'll go to the couch and lie down, I just need to sleep. I'm so tired." I am, I really am.

He stands up and lifts my arms up.

"You're going to overheat if you wear this." He holds down the top underneath and pulls the hoodie off with his other hand.

I guess he had lots of practice.

Why was I even thinking that?

"Why are you keeping me here? You clearly don't want me here." Usually, I'd be very sarcastic and biting when I say this. This time, my tone is soft and tired.

"Well, I don't want you here, but clearly something is wrong and my parents will kill me if they find out I let you sleep on the couch. They'll kill me even more so if they find out you were ill." Yeah that tracks. "Sleep."

He goes to the other side of the bed and lays down.

"But this is your side of the bed?" I'm slightly confused.

"Well maybe someone came to check up on you and saw what side of the bed you were on, so if they saw that we switched they'd know I made you get up." Okay. Whatever he says.

My phone charges enough, so I put it on my beside table.

I lie down but I can't sleep. I'm so tired and my eyes are drooping, but I get jolted awake each time I finally start to fall asleep.

I get a call and it persists. I silence my phone but the person is calling over again and again and again.

I answer it.

"Hello?" I don't really know who it is. I can't tell. "Go kill yourself. You're a stain on earth and an embarrassment to your family. You should be ashamed for what you did and everyone's life would be much easier if you just fucking killed yourself."

It was Joni. I cut the call.

I put my phone down and sit up. I start to feel my chest constrict again.

"Oh God." I whisper.

I pull at my hair.

"Oh God." I can't stop whispering it over and over and over again. It's like a sick joke. My siblings ganging up on me all over again like I'm a child again, like I'm some scab they can just pick at.

I felt like a child again. All I could do is cry.

I feel sobs coming out of me and I can't stop them this time, they're not silent. I can't stop pulling at my hair as I try to comfort myself.

Donovan mumbles a little bit in his sleep and I try to keep quiet but it's really hard.

"Why are you being so loud..." I guess he's awake now and I've not stopped crying. "What the hell..."

He turns on the lamp.

"Oh. I see why your face was like that now." He says and I swear, if I was normal, I'd clock him right now.

He gets up. I think he's about to leave, but instead, he goes. to his bathroom and returns with a wet flannel.

I try to wipe my face but I just cry even more because I don't want to take my foundation off and make him aware I wear makeup even when I'm sleeping.

He knows that hasn't worked and gets a dry towel. He sits next to me and pats my face dry.

He rubs and pats my back awkwardly, and I start to calm down.

He eventually manages to get me to calm down and lays me down on the bed again. He turns off the light.

"Do you want to talk about it?" He's facing me and I can smell the alcohol.

"You disappoint me." I respond.

"You were crying about me?" He asks.

"No. I don't ever cry, so I wouldn't cry about you. I thought you had stopped drinking." He inhales sharply.

"I'm sorry. I was pissed after what happened today." I truly don't understand his motives. Why was he rebelling so hard in a family that loves him so much?

"You say you're sorry but you'll just do it again, won't you? You know it really hurts to see people throw away their lives like this. I don't even want to offer you any more help because you won't remember this in the morning. You'll just be drinking the next time something goes haywire. You'll be aggressive towards me because you'll forget why I'm here, and then you'll kick me out. Like you did last time."

"I mean I guess I haven't been totally forthcoming about my behaviour because witnessing what I did was a big part of it but there's more to why I act the way I do." His arm worms it way underneath me and he pulls me closer. "I can't ever stop getting those images out of my head. Every single time I shut my eyes I can see Lola and I's best friend drowning in that freezing cold lake, I can see his blue face and his purple fingers. When I drink and smoke, I forget, I forget the dead bodies of that couple. It helps me to not remember." He was crying now.

I wrap my arms around his neck and hug him even though this is a little bit uncomfortable.

He cries into my shoulder and I hug him even tighter as he cries. It's cruel. Someone who's been loved so much, still has to go through all that he did.

Arthur explained to me that when I left, there was a shift in Donovan's behaviour.

We knew each other when we were younger. We got along, and he knew me then. He knew me when I was happy. He didn't realise that this miserable, lonely girl, was the same one he once knew.

I couldn't face the truth about what happened to me, not fully.

It still haunted me and followed me wherever I went.

So, if not identifying with what got me into trouble in the first place, just being a grieving child, then I wouldn't do it.