I Only Know How To Love

6: Ben

Pain. It just surrounds me everywhere I go. Why can't I escape it? It's just a never-ending cycle of life. There are some days where I think about death and others where I try to see the good in life, but it's just not there. I separate myself from others because I don't want them to worry about me. If I hide my face and no one notices, then that just proves that no one cares.

I see Cashmere walk by; she heads over to Jason. He's putting his trombone away. He's a good friend of mine. "Jason?" She asked him. "Hey Cashmere". He says back to her. "I owe you a long overdue apology from earlier in the year". She told him. I didn't want to know what happened between the two of them. "Don't worry about it". He tells her before he heads off. I see her before she goes to grab her French horn from the Tuba storage room for tonight. It's been about a week since I've heard about her trying to commit suicide. Well, really 6 days. It happened last Wednesday, and it's Tuesday today.

After I see her go off, I get up and head towards Jade and Amanda, who just happen to be in the area. "Hey guys", I tell them before I head off to see Cashmere in the distance. She had bumped into Jack; I had heard about the rumor about the two of them. "What is wrong with you?" I overhear her saying to him, as I head up to her. "It's not what's wrong with me, it's what's wrong with you. Do you really want to know the reason why people don't accept you? It's because you don't belong here. This world is better off without you here ruining it." He told her before heading off. I headed up to Cashmere.

"What was that all about?" I asked her. "You witnessed that?" She asked, before burying her face into her hands and looking away. She went to sit, but I grabbed her hand. "What's going on?" I ask again. "It's nothing for you to worry about. It's just my life and how fucked up it is". She tells me. "I'm diagnosed with depression, so I think about death basically every day." She continued, grabbing me and going in for a hug. I held her, even though I didn't want to. "Now I think Jack is right and I should just leave this world for good". She finished; her tears were now going into my shirt. This was my favorite shirt, but she needed help. Instead of backing off, I held her in and gave her a kiss on the forehead as a sign of friendship.

I held her face, running my hand through her hair. Her tears were still falling, and were slowly drying off. I looked her in the eyes, and I dried off her tears with my hand. Holding her in one more time, I realized something. Cashmere is going through the same thing that I'm going through as well. I gave her a kiss on the forehead one more time, before she backed away from the hug. Holding her face, I lightly touched her lips with my thumb. She saw me do that and I started to lean in. Still holding her face, my lips almost came in contact with hers. Someone had come up to us and we had to stop. I didn't want to, I wanted to kiss Cashmere. "Hey Cashmere. What are you guys doing?" She asked as Cashmere had backed away and slipped her hands from my grip. "We weren't doing anything." Cashmere told her as she walked away. I headed home, regretting not holding her back just for one more second.

Throughout the rest of my day, I wouldn't stop thinking about Cashmere. I was so close to kissing her, but why couldn't I do it? Maybe it's because I've never felt this way about someone aside from my family. I know that this isn't love; this was lust. I just wanted to be with her. If I could go back to earlier today, I would kiss her if I had one more second.

I saw her at All City, sitting beside Alex. She was laughing at a joke that he had told her; she looked like she was enjoying herself. She tucked her hair behind her ear, and all I wanted to do was to tell her that she looked beautiful. No, not beautiful. Perfect. Whatever Jack thinks about her is just wrong. I had caught her looking at me, and I had looked away right away. I think it's best if she doesn't catch me blushing.

I think back to when we used to talk a lot. I remember one time after Jazz band, when we talked about getting back at Mr. Jazler for not getting us our pizza. We talked about stealing his wallet, and witnessing him swear in German. German people are fun to watch when they're mad and they swear. I laugh at myself, thinking about it. I look at her again, without her noticing. I think about earlier that day, and how I wanted to kiss her. "Ben!" Mr. Hudson calls me back. "Sorry, I just phased out at the moment", I told him. "Please get your head out of the clouds and back into the music. And stop looking at Cashmere for Pete's sake." He spoke in front of the entire band class. I was now embarrassed; I wanted to bury my head in the floor.

After rehearsal, Alex came up to me. "What's going on with you?" He asked me. I didn't want to answer him if it had to do with Cashmere. "What are you talking about?" I asked him. "I'm talking about Cashmere. She's gone through too much. Look, I'm not mad at you for looking at her. I'm really not. I'm just saying that if you want to have a relationship with her, just be careful", he told me before I thanked him and headed over to Cashmere to see if I needed to apologize to her. "Cashmere?" I started. "Ben? What is it?" She asked. "I'm not so sure if you overheard what Mr. Hudson said earlier in front of the class about me". I told her. "No sorry, I didn't hear anything. Alex had told me a joke, and I was trying to recover from laughing. What did Mr. Hudson say?" She told me. "It's nothing for you to worry about. I was actually wondering if I could take you out." I ask her. "I'll have to ask my parents. I should be good though." She answered "Okay. Does this Friday work for you?" I ask her. "Yeah it works." She answers. "Okay, then meet me by the river near the bridge on Friday night. I'll bring snacks." I told her before heading home from rehearsal.

I missed another chance to kiss Cashmere. Dang it.