A slow fall

Chapter 44 - Caleb

     I'd begun counting down the days.

The pastor told me I needed to work on strengthening my relationship with God: prayers, passages, communication. What better place to have enforced daily quiet time than in the cupboard. Deadbolt locked, clock ticking and an unwelcome companion squeezing his hand around my throat and tightening and tightening and tightening.

As much as I hated being forced in there, sometimes being let out was worse. I'd be met with praises, warm embraces and loving smiles. They'd tell me I did well after questioning me on my progress. They tell me I was strong after staring at my red rimmed eyes. They tell me I was improving, I was better and moving further away from that version of me–the one tainted by the devil, rotting from sin–and was moving closer every day to my true self.

They said a week in the room, a week where they monitored me and tested my progression before they entrusted me to continue the routine on my own. In the safety of my room once more.

I was counting down the days until then. The days until Adam and Bailey came home. The days until I could see Lucas again. The daily until graduation. Everything felt too far away, like time had slowed down, each moment stretched in an agonising haze and I couldn't get closer.

I came home straight after school, swapped my phone for my bible and hunkered down in the cupboard. After that we ate. The same small portions, the same consuming silence followed by stilted conversations. As if we were strangers and not family.

I cleaned up, did my homework downstairs under my parents watchful eyes and then I was sent to bed. That was when I was given my phone back. "For your alarm only." Dad had started Sunday night after we'd first completed the routine. I'd agreed and despite my restlessness and insomnia that night I fulfilled his request.

I replied to my brother and Lucas once I'd got to school, told Marcus and Shane my parents were being slightly strict right now, and no, everything was fine they just wanted to make sure i was working hard. They wanted to make sure I got into a top university and had a good future ahead of me.

Monday night was the same, Tuesday too. On Wednesday, my lack of sleep and the lingering effects from the panic attacks I couldn't control when the door was shut and I was trapped in the darkness made my movements sluggish. My eyes drooped more often than not and my friends encouraged me to take a nap at lunchtime. It was too enticing an offer to turn down.

That night, when the clock creeped closer to twelve and the house stilled, my phone buzzed, a simple message from Lucas asking if I was awake. My fingers hesitated over the message, aware that as soon as I opened the chat he would have his answer. The pull was too strong and once the message flagged as read, his name flashed up on my screen. I answered it straight away, settling deeper into my blankets as his comforting voice filtered over the line.

"Hey Cae." His voice was soft, a whisper in the dead of night, and I imagined him in the same position as me. Snuggled up under a pile of blankets and wishing the space beside him in bed wasn't empty.

"Hey Lu-Lu." I whispered back.

"I've missed hearing your voice." A content sign. "I've missed you."

In the dim light of my room and the world asleep outside of my window, I confessed the secret that I'd tried to keep vaulted away in my heart, "I've missed you too." I felt like I was admitting more than I could offer, a truth I didn't deserve to utter and an insinuation that would need more than just an hour in the cupboard tomorrow, but for now it was just us. It was Lucas' light breaths and soft voice and honesty.

"How was your day?"

I snorted, "It was school, what do you think?"

"Okay, let me try again. Anything interesting happened today?"