Life's Fear

Chapter Thirty-Two

The wind seemed to be drying my tears for me, so by the time I got home, my cheeks were dry. My heart, on the other hand, wasn't all in one piece.

Mum had been emerging from the lounge to see who had burst through the front door and had caught me, face scrunched up and running up to my own room, having tripped on the stairs in the process. "Blair?" she called out tentatively. "Blair? How was the chemistry homework? Did you finish?"

I slammed my bedroom door shut, dropped my bag on the floor carelessly and flopped down on my bed. More tears plummeted straight down onto my pillow I was burying my face in, and sobs were racking my body. I couldn't breathe deeply by this point, but it didn't matter. It was all my fault. And I'd just lost Jason because of my own moronic mistake.

"I'll go in and see what's wrong," I heard Jesse say. He was loitering outside of my room and must have heard the commotion I'd caused only moments prior. "It's fine, Mum. She might feel more inclined to talk with me."

"If you're sure," Mum replied.

Jesse didn't bother knocking on my door as he could probably already hear the sobs I was generating. He closed the door softly, sat down next to me and began smoothing the back of my hair. It took him a moment before asking, "What happened?" though I think he knew better than to ask, but he couldn't think of anything else to say.

"He hates me," I replied, turning my head away from Jesse's direction so I was facing the wall. Tears were now completely smothered over my face and I was sure my makeup wasn't doing much to improve my appearance... or lack of thereof from all this crying.

Jesse sighed. "I doubt he hates you, Blair. He's probably just overcome with emotions after being told all of this. It's a lot to take in." Jesse knew everything; I'd told him about the photograph and everything, but that still didn't stop him from opting which side to pick. He could either be on my side and defend me, or on Jason's and see from his perspective of being "betrayed". "He'll come around eventually. If he likes you as much as you like him, he is bound to come around."

Once the tears had finally stopped, Jesse demanded I go to the bathroom to "freshen up" and to make myself "look presentable for dinner". Sure enough, as soon as I got back into my room, got out my homework with Jesse sat on my bed on his phone, Mum was hollering up to all of us declaring dinner was waiting patiently for us on the table. Jesse stowed his phone away immediately but loitered by the door for me.

"You look okay," he stated, having just surveyed me piercingly.

Tilting my head to the side, I sarcastically responded with, "Thanks, Jesse."

He smiled at me, joking that I had some humour about me – though there was a definite lack of wit, he informed – and then opened the door. I thought perhaps he would hug me one last time, but there didn't seem time for that as Mum was calling again for us for dinner. This time she seemed less patient with her tone of voice as Jesse and I left my room finally and made our way downstairs. Turns out, we were the last ones to dinner, though I'm sure some of the younger ones like Warren and Carmen raced to get to the table, though they couldn't actually consume anything until everyone was present. That was a rule for our household.

Mum eyed me quickly before I could sit down, but she said nothing. Dad was preparing to already dig into his food, but eyeing it up, no matter how much I loved Mum's cooking, right now I was not hungry. Not after what transpired between Jason and I. And Jesse was occasionally staring at me throughout the meal. Even Mum noticed my apparent lack of interest in my food, because she nudged me gently as she was at the head of the table and I was on her immediate left.

"Is there something wrong?" she asked me, concern lacing her words, though her eyes were her weakness. You could tell she was more intrigued than concerned, and this could have been primarily due to it being about Jason. There was a vast factor of this, and she was blatantly aware of that.