Say My Name

Chapter Six

What people say to me tends to stick for a while. Whether it's about me or about someone I care about, no matter what, I'm going to remember it and let it bother me. When Nico told me about needing to protect Zachary and stay with him, it was only natural for me to be concerned about what's really up with my boyfriend. When I finally got to see him after school, it didn't take much thinking before I went in on my conversation.

"So I met your bestie Nico today during my French class." I initiated.

"Oh you did? Looks like we both met each other's besties today." He responded, his happy eyes looking elsewhere.

"We should go on a double date one day. You know, try to hook up Steph and Nico. Unless he's taken. Steph sure isn't."

"Nico is as single as all my female teachers. We should do a double date tonight." He chuckled.

"We should. I'll text Steph in a moment." I responded, before everything went quiet.

"Why are you so sad Zachary?" I asked him on our walk to my house, the question coming out of no where.

"I mean like what type of question is that?" He responded, clearly caught off guard. It took me a moment to wonder if he understood what I asked but pretended he did not, or if he really was not ready to.

"I guess my question really is, do you pretend you are sad? How am I ever going to know whether or not i'm supposed to hold you and tell you everything is okay? It's just you are so caring of my feelings and I can't even return the favor." I went on, continuing to ramble on until a graceful kiss stopped me from all the questions.

"I'm sad for a lot of reasons Audrey. It does not matter why i'm sad though. I'm good at pretending, and honestly, as long as I can keep you happy, I'm happy. Stop worrying about me, i'll come to you babe. Or just get intoxicated." He chuckled, holding my hand while we walk through the grass of my neighbor's property.

I could not help but to smile, even though the fact he said he was still going to get drunk and high whenever he got sad made me want to slap him in the face. I unlocked the door, leading him to my room before sitting on the bed, my back finally getting a rest. It was the first time he actually got to go into my room, but since we've been together for a couple of weeks now, it was safe to say this was a good time to really get moving with our relationship. Zachary had the same cheesy facial expression he had the first time he saw my house, which made me giggle. He examined my whole room, top to bottom before pulling out my diary- I mean journal and opening the first page. I did not realize at first what he was doing because I was texting Steph regarding the double date tonight.

"Dear Journal..." He began to read before my eyes went wide, jolting up to stop him.

"Today was a good day." He continued, before I grabbed the journal out of his hand, sticking his tongue out.

"Not for reads." I snapped, his amused smile returning. He left it at that, leaving the journal alone before looking at my wall. My light yellow walls were plastered with pictures, from me being young all the wall up until when I was maybe 14. The more I look at the pictures, the more you could tell something was not right with me. It started out with bright, happy smiles about being naked in a bathtub, to dark, tired smiles that clearly indicated I did not want to be existing at the time. Zachary clearly noticed too, because he pointed it out. I only tried to shove it off like it was not a big deal, the wall did not matter. It was only a reminder of all the things I did not have now.

"We should finish it." Zach said, turning towards me.

"The wall? Why?" I responded, curious of his reasoning.