Call It What You Want To

Chapter 17: Taya

*This chapter contains adult/potentially triggering topics*

I ran out of my bathroom gasping as tears poured down my face. Pushing the bathroom door that connected to my bedroom shut behind me, I slid down to the floor on the other side of my bed wrapped in my towel, hair still completely soaked and making droplets on the carpet.

You're so fucking stupid.

You really thought it would be okay?

That's what you get, idiot.

You're always gonna feel this way.

Pulling my knees to my chest and adjusting the towel around me, I coughed out my sobs. I was trying to slow my breathing and let it steady, but my heart still felt like it was racing at a million miles an hour. Just as fast as my chest was beating, Kyler came out of the bathroom, her hands grabbing at the wet hair that was stuck in the back of a big t-shirt that I was letting her borrow. She had enough time to pull on the pair of underwear that she kept in her backpack in case of a "girl emergency". "Tay!" she gasped out, rounding the corner of my bed, seeing me in an absolute mess.

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" I apologized over and over through tears, clenching and twisting my tan towel around my hands.

Kyler squatted down next to me, and instinctively I pushed away. I felt like the worst person in the world and I deserved it. Everything was ruined now and it was all my fault. "Tay, please. I'm- I'm not mad," she whispered, just barely loud enough for me to hear it over my own wheezing cries.

"I"m sorry, I'm sorry. Please...please don't be mad at me!" I pleaded.

"Taya, I'm not mad. Honey, I promise you."

I looked up at Kyler and could see that she was so confused and probably just as scared as I was. Twenty minutes ago everything was fine, and because I was trying to be cocky and sexy I ruined it all. I should've just shut my damn mouth and I wouldn't have been so stupid. Now, I looked like a complete mental breakdown disaster. "I fucked everything up. I'm sorry. I'm so stupid," I sobbed.

Kyler adjusted her position so that she was right next to me, and when she reached her hand out to move a wet dread of hair from my face I didn't flinch this time. "Taya, honey, I'm not mad. I- I don't even know what happened. Please, baby, what happened? Are you okay? Did I do something?" Kyler searched for anything that could've caused this, and it broke my heart because none of this was her fault.

"No. No, you didn't do anything. It's my fault. I'm so stupid," I whimpered. This was the part I hated. The part where I looked like a pitiful, little baby who couldn't really tell what happened. I didn't know what happened. I didn't know then, and I still don't really know now. I always thought I deserved everything that happened, and even after nearly a hundred therapy sessions telling me I didn't deserve it, it still felt like I did and always would.

"You're not stupid. Nothing was your fault. Taya, honey, you- you didn't do anything. I just don't understand what happened. I thought we were okay?" Ky asked, gently running her hand up and down my arm that wasn't covered by the towel. The water that still clung to me was starting to feel cold under my ceiling fan.

I just shook like a leaf in the wind, trying to find the calm within myself and maybe also find what words to even try to explain what happened. Resting my head on my knees, I just cried. I couldn't think and could barely even breathe. All I wanted was comfort, but how was I supposed to ask for that from the girl that I just shoved off and away from me, from the girl who I just confused the shit out of because I can't get it together?