No More Lies, I Promise - The Watty Awards 2011

No More Lies, I Promise - Chapter 9

I woke with a jolt, confused yet very alert. I glanced around at the green around me.

The park.

I was at the park.

Someone moved next to me, so I turned to see them. His face made me remember what on earth was going on, and what had happened. I had fallen asleep with Dylan. He still had his arms around me, but he removed them to answer his ringing phone.

"Hello?" He answered. I could hear a voice at the other end of the phone. A girls voice. She asked him something - I could tell by her tone, even though I couldn't hear what she was saying. "Erm..." He shuffled himself upright; he had been leaning over from when we had both slumped towards each other while I had slept.

My face burned. How could I have fallen asleep? Stupid, stupid stupid! The most popular guy in my year wanted to hang out with me. He had come round my house to get me. He had asked if I could come with him. Me! The other girls who pestered him like flies were prettier, funnier and not so... Depressing. And I had probably bored him to death with my life - he probably didn't even care. He probably just wanted to leave me, like I had expected him to every minute I had ever spent with him. I would regret being with him at all. Messing with things I couldn't control.

 "I'm at the park... Why?"

 I decided that I had made an idiot of myself enough already in the last hour. Standing up, I looked down on the boy. He didn't look back - instead, he answered to the voice on the phone.

 "I'm out until nine..."

I turned my back on him, walking down the grass towards the gate. What had I just done?

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As I reached the front door, the realization of what had happened was finally beginning to dawn on me. What if Dylan tells someone? What if they find out? It'll just make the whole thing worse. A lot worse. They could find out everything about me. What I hated the most of the many ways they tortured me with their hate. If they knew that, they could destroy me. They could finally make me crack.

My fingers fell on the handle of the door, and paused there, the cold metal freezing on my warm skin. I couldn't go home. Not yet.

My hand slipped to my side as I turned and walked back down the pavement I had just came.

He couldn't tell anyone. I'd trusted him - he made me promise to tell the truth. And then it had all came rushing out in a crying mess, and if not for the situation I was in now, I didn't think I could ever see him again. The embarrassment was still burning at my cheeks, yet I couldn't help walking so fast I almost broke a run as the gate to the park came into view. But I still seemed to move to slowly.

When finally, finally, I reached the big iron bar gate that creaked as I pulled it open, the park was still as empty as I had left it.

Slipping through, the gate clanging loudly behind me, I began walking towards the bench I had last seen Dylan. I couldn't see the bench until the very last minute, so I hoped desperately he was still here. Please, let me be lucky just once.

Turning the final corner, the bench came into view, and I stopped dead in my tracks. My breath caught in my throat, my heart pummeling me from the inside.

No. Oh, no.

Perched next to Dylan, the words streaming from her mouth, was a girl. One of  them. What was her name? Rose? I didn't care.

I saw her eyes - those hazel pools - flick up at me.

I prayed Dylan would turn away from her to look at me. To turn around. To see the expression on my face.

For a moment, Rose stopped talking. She smiled, obviously enjoying herself. Triumphantly, she turned her head back to focus on Dylan. Her hand slithered around his neck, like a poisoned worm. Sliding herself closer to him, she leaned in.

And touched her lips to his.

But I was running. Running away. Like that could help it. Like I could run. Like I could hide. He was a traitor. He had probably already told her.

I wasn't angry. Not really. Just...

Just...

Just heartbroken.

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 I wanted to be alone right now. I wanted to hide from everyone, to pull the walls I had made around myself higher until they held me and soothed me in the blackness of not knowing. I had made the mistake of trusting him. It was a stupid, foolish mistake that I should never have made.

I should have never even talked to him. Never have looked into his eyes. Never have made myself comfortable with him, shouldn't have let myself be mislead into a fake sense of security.

I was so stupid.

My side leaned against the front door as I reached for the handle to let myself in. I felt a wave of exhaustion sweep me, and I knew that I could quite happily just sleep here. But I knew that was not clever, or possible.

Shutting the door behind me, I walked down the corridoor towards the kitchen - the light was on in the thin slither of room I could see.

"Finn, I'm going to bed so could you switch off all the lights when you-"

Getting my first proper look at the kitchen, I stopped, paused, stunned.

Finn sat at the table, a very guilty look on his face. His head was hung forwards, his eyes glancing up to me from his hands where they rested on the wood. Across from him sat a woman dressed in grey, with a white blouse underneath her smart jacket. She lifted her head to look at me, her face showed me what she was feeling. Confusion. Anger.

I was too tired for all of this. Too upset.

"Hi, mum."

She stood, the chair sliding back as she straightened her legs. I had no idea why I noticed that.

"Amy. I'd like you to explain something for me." I already knew what she was going to say - it was obvious, even for me in the brain dead state of tiredness I was in. I knew this meant change. But I didn't care at the moment what she did to me - what punishment I would face.

 I was worried about what this meant for Finn. What would happen to him?