Are You Afraid of Musicals?

Chapter 6.9: Breaking Up*

Dani's pov:

Mrs. Spiers keeps talking, going on about some historical event with her usual passion, but everything she says vanishes in the air before the words can reach my ears.

I'm trying to pay attention, I'm really trying, but my eyes keep drifting to Gabby the whole time.

She's sitting two rows ahead, paying attention and taking notes with her usual concentration, but I can tell that something's wrong... and maybe it's been for a long time and I didn't want to notice.

Because once again, she's sitting between Ruby and Freya, and when she's not sitting with them, she's with Hanna, or EJ, or Gina... but never with me.

After what happened at the park nearly two weeks ago she's been giving me space, she's been respecting my pace and waiting for me to reach her and talk, and I...

I've been using that space to run.

It's not that I don't trust her, I know I can tell her anything and that she won't judge me, that she will stay with me, but I just didn't feel ready to talk about it, to put that weight on her shoulders.

Because this time it's different. This time there's no middle ground, this time if I tell her something I have to tell her everything... and I can't do that to her.

She's already dealing with so much. She already knows about my parents, about the panic attacks, about my fear of the dark, my strange relationship with Spanish, my fear of being alone.

But she doesn't know why do I have those fears, and everything inside me keeps telling me that it's better for everyone keeping it that way.

It's not like it matters anyway, not anymore.

The things that happened to me just... happened, and it's not like something's going to change if I tell her. Those memories are still going to be there, that room is still going to be there, the nightmares are still going to be there... so why should I tell Gabby?

Why should I do that to her?

And most importantly, how would I even tell her?

Because she already knows some things, the superficial stuff, the visible and undeniable consequences of everything that happened, but she doesn't know what's hiding behind the scars.

After the nightmare she stayed with me. I couldn't talk, I couldn't sleep, I could barely eat, but Gabby stayed. She kept the lights on, she took care of me, she didn't force me to tell her anything, she was just... there.

But then on Sunday she left and suddenly, something in me broke again.

I tried to control myself, to sleep, to just hold myself together until she could get home again, but that was the problem, she was the one holding me together.

That previous night was the first time I managed not to faint after a panic attack, it was the first time that the darkness wasn't able to take me, but it was just waiting for the right moment to come after me, and the moment I was alone, it hit me all at once.

The absolute panic I felt when the person standing in front of me at the park stopped being Jave for a moment, the fear I felt when my mother started trashing my room, the pain I felt when my back hit the corner of the bed, the helplessness I felt when Swanny's body disappeared under the car... and the way I closed off right after.

I ignored him, I left him out, I left him alone.

Just like they had done with me.

I remember thinking that and being completely disgusted with myself, because it didn't matter why I did it, it didn't matter that I just wanted to shield myself, that I was just trying to protect myself from loosing something important to me again.