CHASING THE ATLANTIC | H.S

II.

She told me she loved me but I do not deserve your love

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II. OZONE

Charlotte had been sad.

Well, that was a given. There was always a melancholy cloud that seemed to follow behind her since she was a child, shrinking some years and puffing up others. It was a common occurrence for her to spend a day or two a month holed up in her room, surrounded by giant blankets and overstuffed pillows, reading a romance novel with tears streaming down her face.

By the end of the book, when the main characters get a sappy happily ever after, she'd shut the book and lay on her bed, staring at the ceiling until the hours turned into a whole night. She called it her version of Rest and Relaxation, but she knew it was probably a psychological problem she needed to evaluate much deeper.

But recently, the cloud of melancholy seemed to grow so much it enveloped her. She trudged to work, trudged to classes, handed in assignments late, stared numbly out her old window to the beautiful view of the city. It didn't seem to have the same spark as it did before; like she finally saw what every depressed, corporate New Yorker saw.

Today, on a particularly cold and rainy Sunday, she was on her old couch, curled up with a blanket as she cried. What she was crying for, she didn't know.

She could be mourning the loss of Hannah, who hadn't returned any of her text messages since the event over a week ago. She could be upset by the unexpected absence of Harry—after all, she thought men like him enjoyed a good chase. She could be homesick, despite not traveling back to France for almost two years.

She couldn't figure out what had gotten her so down, until she finally understood. Everything. Everything had her upset and overwhelmed.

Knowing she had to wake up each morning with her heart full of unrequited love, aching heavily in her chest and weighing her down. Knowing she cared too deeply for the man across from her on the subway who seemed to live there, his arms crossed as he tried (and failed) to get comfortable for a fitful bout of sleep. Knowing she had never felt the same amount of love she gave for others. No one ever thought about how her day must have been as they lay awake at night, no one picked up a magazine off the stand at a convenience store simply because it reminded them of her.

But complaining about being too caring wouldn't feel right. So she didn't tell Niall, despite his prodding at her upset resting face at brunch the morning before.

"Chazzy," he poked her with his fork. "You know you can tell me anything. I won't tell Hannah or Harry or anyone. It can just sit in my brain like a hen sitting on an egg."

Charlotte remembered she burst out in a delighted laugh, then. "Your brain works in mysterious ways, Ni," she deflected his previous comment.

She could've told Niall her woes; in fact, she's unsure why she didn't. He wouldn't have judged her, she knew that. She'd spend a fair amount of nights crying in Hannah and Niall's arms after getting ghosted by a man she swore was different—or the time her family canceled her flight home, explaining they needed the money to focus on the kids. The kids being the children her parents had together after she moved across the country.

Nevertheless, it had come to her attention that she was too emotional. And from then on, she dedicated one woeful day to just herself, and the other six were complete with cheery smiles and bright eyes.

A loud, unwelcome knock on her apartment door, though, disrupted her misery.

It was sharp and short, though it repeated itself when she didn't get up in a timely manner. She cursed to herself, blinking tears from her eyes and scrubbing the redness cheeks as she made her way to the front door.