Lost And Loved

8. Regretful

As the next morning rolled around, my back hurt quite a lot from falling asleep sitting on the ground while leaning against the couch, but when I woke up, I was the only one in the living room. My first emotion was worry. Where was everyone? Where was Marley?

I suddenly hear voices coming from the front yard that seeped into the home through windows, and quickly made my way out of the front door. I stopped as I see people working within the garden, and as I looked up at the sky, the sun seemed to be in the wrong place. It displayed itself at a noon-ish time, but it can't be that late, can it?

"Good afternoon, sleeping beauty." Jackson's voice called out from under a sun hat. When he said this, everyone looked up but my eyes focused on Marley and how her smile gleamed in the sun's light when she sees me. I smile back at her and it was if she had to catch herself and forced her eyes away from me while clearing her throat. I wanted to ask how she was feeling but Jackson's voice speaks up again. "It's 2pm. Sleep well?"

"The floor is very comfy." I say softly as my hands move to my butt to rub a bit, feeling the hours of sleeping in a sitting position. An older woman who I assumed was Jackson's grandmother giggles at me, and I stop my massaging actions at once. I smile politely, bowing my head slightly in her direction out of respect as I say, "Hello. I'm Edward, you have such a lovely home." She thanks me quietly before getting back to work on her roses.

As I make my way over to Marley, she doesn't look up from her busy hands that were replanting a flower from a small pot to the dirt in the garden bed. She holds the flower straight up with one hand with the roots of the flower a few inches down in a hole as her other hand moved the dirt into the hole she had made. I squatted down next to her and helped to fill the hole and make a slight mound to hold the plant. When that was done, she finally looked at me, her breath coming out in a sharp sigh.

"I'm sorry." She softly mumbles and quickly looked away, but I saw that her eyes were threatening to tear up.

"What for?" I ask, keeping my tone light and my voice soft so our conversation wouldn’t feel shared between everyone else in the garden.

"Kena told me what I did to you. What I said. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings." She distracts herself by dusting off her hands over the garden before she stands. I do the same before trapping her wrist in a gentle hold and guiding her toward my jeep. We lean against the vehicle, and I waited just in case she had anything else to say because it looked like she struggled to find the right words.

"We don't have to talk about last night if you prefer not to. I don't want to make you feel uncomfortable." I say, hoping my words were more of a safety line for her.

"I don't mean to be this way." She finally says, her words spilling with emotion and her voice trembles a bit. "I didn't want to turn out to be this kind of person. I never intended to go to parties and get so wasted that I forget the next morning. But when I try to stop, I feel lost."

"What do you mean?" I try to look as if I wasn't so eager for her to continue to open up to me but on the inside, I was screaming for her to keep going.

"I don't want to be hurt anymore. I don't want to let people in who haven't already been in my life. I've been trying to harden myself so I become this emotionless machine because if I let myself feel, I just want to cry." She raises her dirty hands to her face, wanting to cover herself but when she realized they were still gross, she put them back down to her sides. She was beginning to get fidgety and it was because she was becoming emotional. "I want a drink right now."

"You can't hide from your problems forever, especially not behind booze." I lick my lips as I watch her. I wanted to take her into my arms and stroke her hair and tell her beautiful nothings because she was being the Marley I fell for. I saw the old Marley coming out. "What's bothering you the most?"

"I guess my brother." She says with a light shrug. "He's been trying to visit but when he brings it up, I tell him that I'll be on a trip with my parents."

"Why don't you want him to visit?"

"I want him to continue thinking that I'm doing great here."

"But you're not." I softly say. It wasn't supposed to come out as a statement but she only shook her head, agreeing with what I had said. "Then let us help you. We all want to help you. We miss you."

She sniffles and uses a clean part of her shirt to wipe the tears that spilled from her eyes, looking almost offended that they fell. Her strong façade was fading, and I knew she had mixed feelings about it. She lost herself in thought, looking at the curb in front of her as if she was deciphering every particle that made up the lump of cement.

"Can I ask 'why now?'" I soft speak as I lean my side against the jeep so I was completely faced toward her. She looks up at me with raise brows and so I carried on. "Why only now do you feel the need to stop all of this? Why only now are you opening up?"

"Because hearing about last night scared me." She shuts her eyes for a moment, and when they were open again, I swear that they became so blue that they were almost see-through. She looks to me with a solemn look and lifted her shoulders. "Because you mean the most to me, and I hurt you. I hurt you in a way I would never forgive if the situation was reversed. When I was told what happened and how upset you were, I couldn't blame you for possibly hating me. In front of all those people… I'm opening up now because I don't want to take the chance of ever losing you."

"I thought you were still kind of pissed at me about what happened in England." I softly confess, my voice not much louder than a whisper. I didn't like bringing up everything that happened in England, in fact, I don’t even like to think about it to myself, but she didn't seem to dislike the leading of topic.

She shook her head in response to my honesty, moving closer to me and locking her pinky with mine. I wasn't expecting the contact and it took me a solid second before my hand responded to her hold.

"I love you, Edward… I love you more than I hate you for what you did. And I don't know how much of a large flaw that may be but… I'm happiest when I'm with you."

"You don't seem happy when you're with me though."

"Because it scares me." She says in a serious but soft tone. "You scare me."

"I don't want to scare you anymore."

"I don't think there's anything you can do to change that."

As I look at Marley now, things felt different. They felt "in place" and familiar. I got to know the new and party-animal Marley more than I got to know the Marley before England, and the duality showing now between the two personalities nearly knocked me over. But made me happy all at once.

As I was about to speak more, her silence reassuring that she didn't know what else to say, but my phone rang. Out of habit, I dug around fr the device and looked down at the screen as quickly as I could just in case it was an emergency.

Zayn's name flashed across my screen and my thumb hesitated over the answer button. I didn't want to keep anything from Marley or feel bad for not telling her who is calling and who I'll be talking to so I showed her the name. She surprises me with a soft nod and waits for me to answer with a lift of her brows.

My thumb swiped over the green button and I pressed the device to my ear. "Hello, Zayn." I say in a polite greeting, eyes fixated on Marley for any distaste in what I would be saying to her brother.

"Meet me at the airport now. Don't keep me waiting too long." Zayn's voice say loud and clear.

//Kind of sucks but I'm trying to get back into it for you guys. I'm sorry for the absence x