Stuck with me

huit - the reason

Valerie

Another three days and finally, I'd been practically yanked away from the comfort of my mattress. Jasper and Cam decided to show up in my room out of nowhere.
"Val, why haven't you been at school?"
Jasper's words already had tears pinching the inside of my eyelids, but I'd never let them fall through.
"I don't want to go."
Cam sighed. "I knew it. She's hiding."
"What the fuck! I'm not hiding. I have absolutely nothing to hide from. If you know so much, then please tell me, why am I hiding, you fucking know-it-all cunt!"
My tirade sent the heartbeat pulsating heavily in my chest like it'd collapse into my stomach, the veins ready to break through my skin and my blood hotter than the desert sun.
"I think the real question is, why are you getting so defensive? If I'm so incredibly wrong.."
She trailed off. My head was spinning. I could've burnt down the whole town in that moment, if I really wanted to.
"Why do you have to do this to me?" I screamed. "God, you assholes have to corner me all the time.. I swear! What do you want out of me?"
The tears were streaming down my Crimson cheeks out of extreme frustration and defeat.
"We just.. God, Val.. you need to stop pushing everyone away all the time. That's all we want. Why is that too much to ask?"
I sobbed. "Because! Because.. god, you don't understand what you're asking of me.. it's so fucking hard, man."
I sat down on the edge of my bed, my eyes pouring into the palms of my hand.
"Val, we've been friends forever. Ever since  fourth grade. You can't push us away too." Cam explained.
"I know."
But I wouldn't break.
"So now, can you please explain why you've been hiding in your room all week?"
I sighed, wishing I could just chuck both of them out my bedroom window.
"The other night," I started shakily. "Billie asked me to come to the Longview house-"
"Did he do something to you? Oh my god, Val, I swear if he did something I'll fuckin-"
"No! God, shut the hell up and let me finish!" I cut Jasper off. "Anyways. He called me up because he wanted me to come to the Longview house to see his band play, so I snuck out of the house at like, one in the morning, right? And then he played, and I watched him.. And then we went outside and I made him a water bottle bong and then he out of nowhere just said to me how I couldn't avoid him and how i'd never be able to push him away.. and that I was stuck with him."
Jasper and Cam weren't confused in the least bit. They knew now.
"You're scared."
I ran my wobbling fingers through my matted hair, trying to figure out wether or not to agree or create another bullshit excuse.
But I was exhausted. Fuck the 'I won't break'. I've broken. I'm shattered. I'll spill.
What's the use in hiding forever?
"Yes," my lip quivered. "God, I'm fucking terrified."
The identical look of sympathy on their face was unbearable. I couldn't keep it to myself anymore.
"I don't wanna do this... oh fuck.. I don't want to do this."
And the tears came flowing down my cheeks like a waterfall against rocks, and I was eroding away into nothing.
"Valerie.."
Cam immediately was at my side on the edge of the bed, pulling me into her oversized maroon sweater that sagged down her chest. I buried myself into it like the grave I wished I'd created for myself.
She knew it's because nobody in my life has ever really stayed. My mom died, my dad (was dead to me, anyways), and I left. The part of myself that I wanted to keep company, the euphoric part of me, left. And it hurt to wonder if it'd ever return, or if it'd just forever roam.
After my thousands of tears had been soaked up into the fabric that hung loosely over her neck, she pushed me back and held me by my shoulders.
"You need to talk to him."
At first, I didn't think anything of it. I thought she meant a simple apology, or something like that. Can meant a full on explanation.
Which first of all, was bad because I barely know him, if you really think about it. It even seems to me I've known him for quite some time and I could just explain to him like that, but if you really dive into it, I've only known him a few weeks.
Second of all, it was me apologizing. Me, Valerie, a stubborn, broken, humiliating mess. It practically seemed impossible. Knowing me, I'd probably faint in the midst of it.
But I didn't say aloud (for once) all the thoughts that surfaced in my mind. I simply blinked, agreed, and that was it.
Cam and Jasper made me hang out with them the rest of the day. They didn't want me all stuck in my room, alone again for another day. But even then, the fact that I was sincerely going to apologize to him was plastered in the back of my mind. I could practically see the word apologize scratched into the inside of my eyelids, and it irritated the hell out of me, but despite that, I was gonna apologize, and I was gonna explain myself. I can't keep living like this forever, anyways.