Old Money, New Love

Damsel in distress

Henry :

Sometimes you sit down and think about how passive and intoxicated the environment around you has become. And sometimes you feel like you're fighting against a current trying to prevent yourself from drowning in the sea of inebriation.

And then, sometimes you feel like you're all alone, the only one who has morality, but in the same time you feel so desolate and empty after creating the bubble around you.

Until you meet a person who shares the same mind as you. Who cares about what right and wrong. They slowly become your best friend. Not like most do refer to as "best friends", but a real friend. Mine was called Sophie.

The most delicate of flowers, the most kindest of people. We bonded over words, making bracelets and listening to her favourite music, or playing hockey for fun even though she's terrible at it.

Even through an A4 sheet of paper we would pass to each other during class, like a little note full of conversation.

Now that I look back at the piece of parchment and review every little discussion we had, there never anything really negative.

Have you ever heard of the hot and cold method? It's a form of manipulation where one is getting fed with compliments and commendation just for it to be taken away in a blink of an eye.

The person then feels like they crave validation from the other, feeling useless and of no value after their blandishments have been swiped away.

How sad is that? Having to depend on someone else's validation to have happiness.
You might as well call me pathetic because that is what is happening, minus the manipulation.

I confided myself in her and depended so heavily on her company that the prospect of losing her was ten times as painful as the prospect of losing any of my other friends.

I had never really developed that close of a relationship with Noah and Russ. Which makes it easier for me to avoid them.

Now hear me out, I'm only sitting in this waiting room chair for one reason and for one reason only. Because I am concerned for my friend, not because I am here to emotionally support her reckless inamorato. Noah and Russ's stupidity really hit the spot, and I don't mean that in a good way.

I rolled around the pink beaded bracelet around my wrist, in attempt to ease the thought of her lying there attached to all of those machines, what do they even do anyway?

"Here you go." Noah passed me a paper cup, it's contents disgustingly swishing around. Gross. Black coffee. I don't even think thank him before I proceeded to dump the cup into the trash bin beside me.

I turn my head to face him, my affronted expression not faltering, as behind it, we're cogs shifting powered by anger and distress.

"Are you sure you don't want the coffee Hen?" He sighed accepting my response.
"The anger pent up inside of me right now is enough to keep me awake Noah." My voice had evolved into something so monotone I couldn't even hear Henry anymore.

"I'm sorry. I really am Henry."
"Sorry doesn't cut it. It's below the bare minimum of remorse."
The clacking and tapping from the keyboard of the nurse behind the desk in front of us replaced silence. I've never heard silence quite this loud.

The nurse looked up from the pool of blue light and eyed the both of us, she began whispering something into her coworkers ear before proceeding to approach us. "Are you two here to see someone? Because you don't seem to be physically harmed, and there are other people who could really use the seating." She says looking at Noah up and down seeming to have some sort of attraction towards him.

Eugh. "We are actually waiting for someone. But we could definitely stand for a while. Can't we Noah?" I nudged him in the arm clearing my throat, and the air from any form of eugh tension.

We followed the nurse into the hallway right across Sophie's room. Except this time the curtains on the viewing window had been pulled shut.

Silence towered over us like a rain cloud as soon as the nurse left. And instead of water raining down, little droplets of thoughts fell upon us. Coming from the same rain cloud, it was almost as if we shared the same thoughts.

I soon realised that our petty feud would be washed away once Sophie wakes up. She'll share her words with us and somehow tie us together again. It was her special skill, being able to bring people together again, she focused on it so much so she forgot about herself.

So why not end it here? I think that over the course of me and Sophie's friendship, I've learnt that "Forgiveness is a better and shorter path to happiness than having persevering neglect." Her words.

But I had one last question. Knowing Noah's history, I needed to know it was true.

"Did you ever even care about her?"
I looked at his stuff figure, leaning against the wall, hands in his pockets, his expression unreadable. Just blank.

"More than you could ever know." He kept his eyes trained on the floor where rusted tiles lay in a pattern as he drowned out every word, truthfulness lacing his sentence.

"I really don't want to argue with you Henry." Time had passed and we remained in the same position. Both of us having a hard time adjusting to the current matter.
"Me neither."
"You're very hard to be mad at if I'm going to be honest." I spoke quietly, being mindful of the other people in the hallway.

"Why is that?" He responds, "maybe because you are most definitely bound to become my best friends boyfriend, and also because you've always been really kind to me, you know, when I first joined the hockey team." I do remember the small moments we shared when the team had resented me for being young and unproven to be diligent enough for the role.

"Was I? I clearly remember tapping in on the hair bleach shampoo prank."
"That was you? Seriously? I still have neon orange stripes at the back of my head, now I have found the culprit."

And for the first time in twenty four hours, I actually laughed.

A/N : You know when music artists comeback with a crazy good song after ages of not being active? That's like this except with parts and books.

Hey there, it's been a good month (and a half even though I prefer not to admit it) since I posted. And a lot of comments have been added, so just to clarify, Henry does not like Sophie in a romantic way, he has no romantic attraction toward her. I saw a comment saying that Sophie and Henry should get together, so I just wanted to say that; He. Does. Not. Like. Her. In. That. Way. ✋😭

But also, I seriously cannot explain how my jaw was wiping the floor after returning to this app to see that I have 65k reads, like what-

Thank you so much for contributing and I hope to post more soon. 💗