Five Foot Four ((Zach Abels Fanfic))

Chapter Six

    11:22. 

    E l e v e n  t w e n t y - t w o . 

    8 minutes left.

    E i g h t  m i n u t e s   l e f t .

    Rainey walked beside me, with her head focused straight ahead, as if she was deep in thought. I knew she had something on her mind and I had a feeling it was something that she had imagined to be much worse than it actually was but she looked almost too worried. 

    Her hands kept moving from her lips to her hips over and over again, and not once did her fingers stop moving on her imaginary piano. I wanted her to just stop for just one second to see how confident I was towards whatever she wanted to say. I wanted her to see how calm I was and then maybe she would have understood that I wasn't going anywhere. 

    She brought her left palm up and starting slowing scratching and tapping at it with her right hand fingers. Her nails were so clean and long. They had no coating on them and I started to smile because she was completely herself. It was like she hadn't even changed anything about her normal look to go to a gig, unlike a lot of the fans we saw. She looked like she would every other day of the week and she was fucking perfection. 

    "Sorry, I'm spacing." She spoke up and brought her eyes up to mine. 

    I watched her closely and could see her giving me the same look.

    "I used to have a bunny who was so full of life and..." She paused to take a breath. "I loved her to bits but she got sick, like every other kind of living thing, and the time came where I had to take her to the vet." 

    I stopped. "Do you want to-"

    "Can we keep walking?" She interrupted, fully aware of what I was going to ask. 

    "Okay."

    "The vet gave me a list of things I could do to find out what happened and it was endless, but the one thing that caught my notice was when she said that she could give the rabbit painkillers and just hope for the best... That's when it hit me. If my rabbit was living in pain, why should I be the one to force her through it, she was seriously ill and I couldn't be the one pushing her to either pull through it with this medication or letting her be prodded and poked at by these people and needles!" She exclaimed. "I had to make the decision of letting her go. I had to do what I thought was best and put her down."

    She paused for a moment, but then continued. "She died later that day and I was left in misery and grief. Anyway, days later, people were questioning what happened and when I told them, they automatically assumed I was a horrible person who didn't care for anything. They assumed that if I could make that decision, I was a cruel human who chose to get their pet killed. And when people say something over and over, you start to believe it. I started to think I didn't care about anything and eventually, it became very hard to put other people first."

    I felt sick to my tummy. Not because of what she did. Not because any of her doing. The thing that was so fucked up was that she got the blame for doing the kindest thing that could have been done in that situation. There was no other fucking option.

    "That was not your fault." I said.

    She stopped and blinked at me, blankly. She stared at me as if she was surprised with my reaction. Like I was the only person not to act harshly towards her. 

    "You shouldn't have been scared to say that." I lowered my voice.

    Rainey still stared at me stunned and she very lightly shook her head is disbelief.

    "Why are you..." She faded out.

    "Zach! For fuck sake, answer your fucking phone! Where were you?!" Jesse shouted from the other side of space.

    Devon stood with him and waved over at me. She then put her arm back around Jesse and hugged him tightly.

    I looked at Jesse over the top of Rainey head. "I've been here."

    "Fuck it." He pushed his hair back, "Everyone's waiting for you."

    "I'll be there in a few." I said, dismissing him.

    Devon grabbed his hand and pulled him away. They slowly disappeared out the doors, leaving a huge breeze to hit us.

    "Come tomorrow." I said, with my eyes still on the door.

    "I can't, I don't have tickets! And I have no way of getting there." 

    "I'll get you in." 

    She pulled her phone out but then hesitated.

    "Thank you." She smiled. 

    "We should be getting there early again so I'll see you." I said.

    She nodded.

    "You should go." 

    "Yeah..." 

    "See you tomorrow, then." 

    I pushed the one strand of hair that fell out of her mess behind her ear, like she did to me earlier and put my hand on her cheek, cupping her face. She moved her face in my hand and kissed the palm, before pulling it off and putting it back by my side. 

    "See you, Zach." She said and walked away.