Stars Leave Black Holes Behind [HS]

2

Val lived a few minutes away from campus in an old crooked flat that she could barely afford now Harry was gone. It had yellow painted floor boards and purple wallpaper in the bedroom and a shower that took too long to warm up; but really, or at least she told herself: it was simply convenient.

The walk to lectures was ten minutes; and it was too much effort relocating; and Zayn helped out on rent now; and really, actually really, Valerie had thrown up two months ago at the thought of leaving it.

It was her home.

It was hers.

And it was the place Harry might one day come back too.

But, of course, Valerie stayed because it was convenient.

As she shut her front door and tumbled down the stairs, she found herself shaking away the idea of Harry coming home. The idea that had lived inside her brain ever since he had left. The idea that haunted her night and day with a hope she knew was impossible and implausible and absolutely fucking ridiculous. But it was there. And Valerie tried to ignore it as she kept on walking, slowly, onto campus.

She became distracted as she basked in the strange, cold December sun and found herself able to forget that delicious dream of a door opening and Harry coming home as she took in the feel of the breeze and the warmth on her cheeks.  She became reminded of why she enjoyed the daytime. Everything was light without depending on the stars and the moon and everything else that hid away from the daylight. Valerie quite admired the sun, admired it like she admired Virginia Woolf and Sylvia Plath. She liked the way it said fuck you to everything. The way it sort of endlessly burned everywhere, how even if you couldn't see it- it was there.

It was above you.

It was underneath you.

On her walk to campus, sometimes Valerie would close her eyes, just for a moment, and absorb the light that fell from the sky onto her skin. Tried to remember that feeling of soaking, of taking in, sort of like a sponge.

The lecture ended up boring. Ended up sat in her seat at the back, listening, but not really. The words crumbled as soon as they reached Valerie's ears, disintegrating into a mound of illegible letters on her shoulder that she couldn't be bothered to work out, couldn't even try to make sense of if she wanted to. Val didn't care though. Even if the words were understandable, she wouldn't care.

Her mind was always too preoccupied.

Too busy replaying the looks, the touches, the smiles. The way their bodies came together and fell apart like crashing china plates. How his fingertips had unzipped her brain and undressed her heart until she just stood there. Completely at his mercy. All his.

But - looking back on it now - he took that all too literally.

Because when she said "I'm all yours," with love and lust and adoration dripping from her lips, trailing down her chin and sitting in the dip at the base of her throat, she didn't quite mean it the way he took it.

"I'm all yours," to her meant I love you. It meant you are in my veins. It meant it doesn't make any sense but you're my everything.

When she spoke those three little words, whispered in his ear, breathed onto his skin, she didn't mean you can break me. Didn't mean, my heart is yours, fucking carve it out of my chest. Didn't fucking mean kill me.

But he thought that that's what it meant. Because Harry broke her, carved her heart out of her chest, killed her. Ruined her. Fucked her up so much, that now she had sadness living in places sadness really shouldn't be. Living in the ridges of her collarbone, living underneath her fingernails, living between her teeth. Sadness living in her heart, her chest, her mind.

It was too big for her body really, and Val sort of felt like the was drowning.

__

Song: Fossa by Daughter

"I feel sick. I'm drowning in the pit of my stomach."