Strangers, Friends and All the In Between

Chapter 15

Sam stirs the next morning at around 10 A.M. She opens her eyes and looks into mine. I smile down at her before giving her a kiss. She returns the kiss without delay.

"I could get used to this," Sam says once we're done. I chuckle slightly.

"Ditto," I respond. She smiles before giving me another kiss then standing up and heading towards the door.

"I'm gonna use the washroom," she informs me. I nod my head in response before turning my gaze back towards the ceiling. "Uh, Aaron. You should get out here," I hear from the hallway. I give a quizzical look before standing and walking to where I see Sam is standing. I follow her gaze to see what she wants me to see. My mouth drops at what I see.

I look down and see my parents standing in the middle of the room, hugging my brother. He's hugging them back. I speak up at the sight.

"Excuse me. What the actual hell is going on?" I ask, appalled at the scene laid out before me.

"We just gave your brother the great news," my dad says, looking up at me. I am dumbfounded at this. I'm unable to come up with any sort of rebuttal or response of any kind. Danny turns around and looks up at me, tears streaming down his smiling face.

He's actually happy about this? How could he be happy about this? Doesn't he see that this is just awful...? The train of awful thoughts just continue to go on.

"What's wrong, dear?" my mother speaks up. I just shake my head slightly before heading back into my room, closing the door behind me.

I practically collapse onto my bed, the anxiety attack already taking over. I begin to shake violently, my breathing becoming shorter and shorter, and my heart rate increasing exponentially. The room around me becomes pitch black, nothing around me but my bed. Next thing I actually feel is someone pulling me onto their lap, enveloping me in their arms. I'm surrounded by a wave of comfort. I sit there, awaiting the end of it. It seemed to take longer than normal to get over with. As soon as it finished, I open my eyes which I had closed in attempt to focus on ending it. I look up into Sam's eyes, which are filled with tears.

"Hey, sexy," I say, my voice barely audible. My voice tends to do that after anxiety attacks.

"God, it's so difficult to watch you go through that," she responds.

"I know. I'm sorry. I try not to show others when I'm going through it 'cause they just look at me with such sadness. I don't like it," I tell her. "Kinda like you're doing right now." I gesture to the tears spilling from her eyes. Before she has a chance, I reach up and wipe them away, leaving my hand there afterwards. She nuzzles her face further into my hand. "Hey, why don't you come with me to look for an apartment today?"

"Sure, I'd love to, but you're still going to move? You're brother looks like he loves the face that your parents are getting back together," Sam responds.

"Yeah, but, even though he might want my parents with them, I don't want anything to do with them. He can stay if he wants. I wanna move out and not see them ever again. In fact, if I were to move outta the country, it'd still be too close," I say.

"Okay. So, you're just gonna leave your brother after taking care of him after so many years?" she asks.

"If he wants to stay, I won't make him come with me. He clearly wants to stay with my parents, I don't, so it doesn't matter." Sam pulls me into a hug, rubbing my back.

"You and I both know that it's gonna be hard to leave him here, especially after the way they treated you and him," Sam expresses.

"Yeah..." I trail off for a little bit, "I know, but I don't have a choice. He wants to stay and I can't. Every time I even think about them and what they've done to me, well, you've seen what happens."