Just Friends. (A falling in love with my best friend story)

Chapter 13: Can't let go.

Genna's POV:

        "Holy crap you have two tattoos? My mom won't even let me get one." Chelsea said, examining them. I gave her a tentative smile as we sat together at lunch. She seemed to come off as the type who really didn't have many friends because she seemed to scare them away with her over-zealous personality. But I liked it. 

I gazed off around the cafeteria, picking at the packed lunch Mary made me. Now that she had my doctor's advice to back-up her meal plan, but with less stuffing me; she was extremely strict about it. And school food didn't make the cut.

        "Hey, are you normally this moody and spacy?" Carter asked me. I shrugged and Chelsea hit him on the shoulder lightly.

        "Be nice." She said. Then they got into an argument while I rolled my eyes and sipped my V8.

Did I come off as moody to everyone else? I never really gave much thought to how I seemed to other people. I haven't had much interaction other than with doctors, therapists, my dad and Parker's family. And they all knew the situation.

I really have been trying to forget the past few months, I've been trying to deny it all ever happened; that mom had just got up and left. Although I couldn't confuse my brain into thinking that, because that went against mom's nature. She was too loyal for that. It's like there's a constant black cloud hovering over me that I can't shake, no matter what I do or think to try and make myself happy again. It's always there, waiting to spring at me like an unforseen monster. I wanted it to go away. It wouldn't.

        "Hey, just checking up on Genna. How are ya?" Parker's voice cut through my thoughts and I blinked to see him sitting in front of me, with a smile on his face. I focused more on his face to see that it wasn't just a casual smile, there were tight worry lines in between his eyebrows.

        "I'm fine." I say nonchalant-like. Parker nods, but doesn't press the matter. 

        "Have you uh...taken your-" He starts to ask, but I cut him off.

        "Yes." I say. I was given special pills to help me gain some weight back and regulate my metabolism. I cut him off because I didn't want to look like a pill-dependant person to Carter and Chelsea. I didn't want to scare them off too early. But they still seemed to busy arguing to even notice Parker's existance. He raised an eyebrow in their direction and I just smiled.

        "Brother and sister." I said. He nodded and got up, giving me a small wave before heading back to his table.

***

I decided to open my mother's diary tonight. I've long since put it off, but I finally saw how dumb I was being. I mean, it's just a diary. 

I unclicked the broken lock, and opened it to the first page. It was when she was eight years old. I saw how terrible her writing was.

        "I still can't believe mom made Juliette go away! Why would she do this? I miss her! Why?" She wrote, her words jumbled and hard to understand. I flipped through a few pages until I got to when she was twelve.

        "I've just been diagnosed as Bipolar. I figured there was always something wrong with me. And here I thought there was no name for my craziness! My mother seems to hate me for it. She wants to get rid of it. So do I. But I can't and never will." I flipped through more pages, but more slowly, taking in the information.

I flipped towards one page, and once I read a few sentences and saw a small razor with blood dried to it, I dropped the book and put a hand to my heart. My mother had cut when she was a teenager. She had cut just like me.

        "You're more like her than you realize." My dad's voice entered my memory. I put my shoes on and told Mary I was going for a quick walk, then I started running down the street towards my house. I walked right through the door to find my father sitting at the table, and I ignored the fact that he had let go so much.

        "My mother used to cut?" I asked, panting. He looked up with sorrow in his eyes.

        "Hello Genevieve." he said quietly. I took a seat at the table across from him, staring at him until he answered. He sighed and looked down.

        "Yes. She did. I think she did it before I met her, maybe when she found out. A few times.....I was part of the cause of it." He seemed ashamed.

I didn't know what to do with this information. I couldn't fathom it.

My dad didn't say anything more and I realized he had fallen asleep. I quietly got up and ran back to the house, saying goodnight to Mary and Wes before walking downstairs.

I walked into my room and shut my door, climbing into my bed. I put my face in my pillow and cried, crying as loudly as I could without yelling. My own mother... was just like me as a teenager. Something about this information made me want to stop cutting, since it would now only remind me of how she did. I shuddered, desperately wanting someone to hold me.

Have you ever just felt so alone, consumed by your own thoughts as if you were drowning in a sea of them, and no one was awake to comfort you because it would be in the dead of the night when everyone was asleep, and you needed someone desperately but didn't want to wake anyone up? Because they wouldn't understand.

        "Genna...I thought you stopped." I heard Parker's voice in the darkness. I wiped my face and sat up, trying to look normal. I didn't realize he'd heard me cry myself to sleep all those nights.

        "I did. I...I read a sad book. A John Green one." I lied. Parker didn't believe me.

        "Bull shit." He said. He didn't move forward. He was hesitating, probably wondering if I wanted to be left alone. I decided to break down any walls of uncomfortableness that I held up between me and Parker, and be vulnerable again. Let him see me like I really was around 2AM. Like I used to be around him before I shut out him and everyone else over the summer.

I got up and walked over to him, and hugged him, putting my face in his shirt and crying. He hesitated before hugging me back, pulling me close.

I felt so consumed by everything. Everything in my room seemed to be a reminder of how much I was like her.

        "I can't be in here. So much like her." I said, my voice probably not recognizable through me crying. 

He held me until I stopped crying, and as I was wiping my face, I felt the need to apologize.

        "I'm sorry." I said.

        "Don't be, I know it's been hard to keep all these emotions pent up." He said. I shook my head in frustration.

        "No! I mean.... I'm sorry I've been distant towards you. I've been acting as if we haven't been friends for 11 or more years." I said. I saw him smile really huge, as if he was glad that I realized that I've been distance.

        "It's okay. I understand." He said.

        "I'm gonna sleep on the couch tonight. It's," I wave my hand to gesture around the room "too much like mom in here." I say. Parker nods and walks to his room, throwing me one of his blankets before giving me a quiet goodnight and going back to his room.

I climb onto the chilled couch, and cover up with Parker's blanket and my ipod and headphones.

Sometimes it is easier just to forget. But I just can't let go.