Operation: Stay Alive

♦️ Chapter 24 || It's My Fault ♦️

Chapter 24 || It's My Fault
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* * Nicole's POV * *

(this chapter uses the video above, I will let you know when to play the song)

I stayed bedridden for days - just lying in bed unable to move and unable to speak. I don't even think I have slept. I just stayed in my bed doing nothing except replaying that day over and over again in my head.

I wish it would stop replaying its self but it doesn't. It just keeps coming the second it finishes.

The look on Liam's face was burned into my brain. It scared me. He even threw me into a wall as if I was nothing...... nothing.....

I couldn't even stop him, with everything I've done to help me in situations like that I still couldn't even stop him.

I couldn't cry anymore, I had no more tears. I didn't have enough strength in me to cry.

My door slowly creeks open - I ignore it - lying in the same position I was in from who knows how long.

I hear footsteps come my way as a hand gently rests on my shoulder.

"Nicole... I brought you breakfast" Jake says in a soft voice as he rubs my arm.

I don't move... correction I couldn't move.

He lifts his hand from my arm and places down the tray of food. I hear Jake take a deep breath as he slowly places one of his arms around me and the other under my head and lifts me to a sitting position. Once he props me up he places the tray on my lap. He's been doing this for days now - Helping me. I don't know why but he is doing it. Every day around a meal time he comes in with a tray full of food, sits me up and helps me eat.

I remember how tight he held me when he found me on the bathroom floor of that night. He kept saying he was sorry over and over again. It got to a point where I thought he was telling himself more than me...

I don't stare at him or the tray. I find my self staring at a spot on the wall near the door. I never noticed it before, there was a tiny tiny little crack in the wall. It was so small that I could barely see it.

"Nicole? Are you hungry?" He asks as he starts cutting part of the waffle.

I just kept staring at that little crack.

He sighs and places his hand behind my neck, "You need to eat"

You know that crack reminded me of something... I can't put my finger on it though...

I felt Jake rub the back of my neck. His warm fingers grazed my skin sending shivers down my spine.

As if out of nowhere I was brought back to reality - it felt like someone grabbed my foot and pulled me back onto earth.

I shut my eyes and took a deep breath.

Jake stopped rubbing the second I did that but then immediately picked back up.

When I finally opened my eyes again I noticed the crack in the wall again, "You see that crack in the wall over there? By the door?"

Jake looked at me confused, then to the crack, then back at me and nodded.

"I'm like that crack in the wall" I say slowly as I tilt my head sideways.

Jake didn't say anything as I spoke, as if he was afraid that if he said anything I'd stop and go back to what I was doing before.

"That tiny little crack is like me" I reiterate "The whole wall is perfect... perfectly put together. Nicely painted and polished, no cracks... except that one little crack by the door over there. It's a broken piece of the wall, unlucky, ugly and nobody wants it there. The rest of the wall hates the crack because the crack wrecks the wall. It's the only crack." I take a deep breath, "I'm that crack."