Zero Out || M.C.

Nineteen

"Romie, what do you mean?" Michael asked again, a concerned look overtaking his face.

He grabbed my hand in his, bringing it up to his lips, kissing it ever so lightly. "Ro..." he trailed off looking at me again.

"Something happened. It...It..." I stopped to take a breath, in desperate need of some air. "It started again."

"W-what do you mean?" He dropped my hand and scooted back on the small hospital bed. "Why? How?" his voice nothing more than a whisper.

I slowly shook my head, not knowing what to say to him. I was just as clueless as he was a this point. I didnt know why the timer had restarted and i didn't know why this was happening to me. I was dumnfounded by what my life had come to the past few days and i didn't know how i was still managing to be alive. I forsure thought that cutting the timer out would kill me this time. It wasnt even that i wanted to die, i just wanted to be freed from the satanic device running my life. I didn't plan on dying from the cut, it would have just been a plus. But the more i think about it, the longer i sit here staring up at Michael, the more i relaize how glad i am that i didn't die, even though i was close. I couldn't leave him here all alone with nothing but memories of me being miserabel and in pain.

I reached for Michael's hand but he quickley flinched away from me. I scooted closer to him in an attempt to regain his attention.

"I don't know. I'm still trying to figure this out. I'm just as confused as you are." I felt my throat begin to close and I knew I was about to burst into tears. "Michael I love you though. I don't want anything to happen to us."

He still hadn't looked up at me and the lack of eye contact was beginning to really worry me. "Just tell me why, why did you cut it out. I want to know from the beginning what happened."

"Okay." I took a deep breath trying to calm myself enough so I could get through the story without crying. "I don't know why it turned back on and reset but it did. I was just at the apartment, cleaning the house, trying to get it ready for when you came home. I was going to make you dinner and surprise you because I figured you would have been starving after the gym. I was just about to start dinner when I had a pain in my wrist and I looked down and realized the timer was blinking. I didn't realize what was going on. I just felt the pain, it was one of the worst things I've ever felt. It hurt so badly Michael. I tried to ignore it but I couldn't. Then the timer started blinking and numbers appeared again. The first thing I thought of doing was cutting it out. So I grabbed a blade and just went for it. I wasn't in my right mind. I don't know what I was thinking. I'm sorry I just, I'm sorry Mikey." By the time I finished I was balling and could barely breathe.

"Romie, calm down." He reached for my hand but I flinched away at the touch of him.

"I can't!" I snapped at him. "Do you even realize what I've gone through? Do you even realize what's happening in my head right now? You don't. So don't you dare tell me to calm down."

Michael stood up from the bed and took a few steps back. I could tell he was getting frustrated with me when he started pulling at his hair. I always had this fear that his lack of hair would just get worse due to the amount of times he's dyed his hair. Yanking at it from the roots wasn't going to help the hair stay on his balding head.

He took a deep, frustrated breath and walked towards me again, he hands in fists at his side. "I don't realize what YOU have gone through? Are you serious right now Romie?" he let out a chuckle, laughing at my stupidity. "Do you even understand what i have been through? Do you not see how hard this was on me too? You will never understand how scared I was while you were in here and I couldn't talk to you or see you. You can't understand what was going through my mind while I was out there just waiting for you to be okay. I had no idea if you were even alive. Do you even understand how much I love you and how distressed I was and still am? You have no idea what it's like to feel so helpless and....and...just fuck Romie! You make me so frustrated sometimes. You drive me crazy and sometimes i just can't stand you. I don't even know what to do with you half the time."