everything I didn't say

twenty eight

My day starts slowly, I'm dragging in the morning and barely make it on time to my first class. It doesn't start until ten, but I was extra slow and it was a shitty start to my day. 

Niall ignores four of my texts today, and I know that seems like kinda a lot of texts to send to one person in the span of a day, but that's because it's a fucking lot of texts to send to one person in the span of a day. I don't like being ignored and I don't know what to do about it besides add to it. The little mechanism that tells me what time he read my text messages is the most annoying yet helpful thing a phone can have. 

After excepting the fact that Niall's just being a little shit today, I turn on the tv. It automatically turns to the news station, and I let it play as I pick out a movie from the case.

Why isn't Julie ever home? What's the point of having a roommate if you can't have a shitty day then talk to her about it afterwards?

I decide on a romantic comedy anyways. I watch the news report when it says Los Angeles, because that's near me even though this is a huge fucking city.

It just shows a anchorwoman talking about a bad crash that happened on the highway, about twenty minutes from where I live, I'd estimate. It was a head-on collision with a fatality and two critically injured. I hate these kind of crashes. This stuff is preventable, but people drive like fucking maniacs anyways. 

I decide to watch some of it, since it interests me. I take a seat on the couch. Not even a split second later, my door is thrown open and I jump from the couch, completely startled. Niall stumbles through it, running into the kitchen counter and leaning onto it. 

"Niall?" I walk closer to him, shutting the front door. He remains in the same position for a few seconds, before violently turning to face me. "Hi." He coughs and moves his hand from behind his back, a bottle of clear liquid in his hand. Alcohol. 

"Have you been drinking?" I ask him. I step closer to look at him. He nods his head up and down continuously, and I can't see into his eyes. He reaches out for my shoulder and sets his hand on it when he's done nodding his head. "There's two of you." He giggles then turns his back to me again. 

"You drove here while you were drunk?" I cringe, just watching that news report. "I'm not drunk," he slurs. "I'm drunk and high." I stop speaking and he sets a lazy hand in my hair, rubbing through it. "Your hair was brown like hers." He says almost to himself.  "Like whose?" 

"But your eyes are darker than hers." He says, this time quieter. He presents himself like he may break down any minute now. "Who are you talking about?" I ask. 

Something snaps inside of him and he rips his hand from my hair and collapses past me. 

"Are you really high?" I ask him. He ignores me, and heads right for the couch. He stumbles over the coffee table and falls on his side. He sits up on the floor and holds his hand over his stomach. 

"I only smoked," he rolls his head around. "A lot. I smoked a lot." I walk beside him to help him up, but he kicks his feet at me, keeping me away. 

"Why would you drive so far in this state?"

"I'm not in any state, Sam, this is who I am." 

"What did you just call me?" I look at him. "Your name?" He questions. 

"I'm not Sam, I'm Leah." I tell him. I don't know what to think about him calling me by her name, but that's not the most important thing at hand right now. 

"Who?" He looks over my face. Again, something snaps, and he stands up, backing away from me. "It's you." He says. "I shouldn't have come to you." He rushes for the door but his drunken state slows him down, and I beat him there. "You're not going out like that." I say. 

"I don't want to be with you." He tries to grab the doorknob but I block it. "Are you always this annoying?" He begins to whine. 

"Come on, you need water." I drag him to the kitchen, filling a glass with cold water and handing it to him. He sets his bottle down and looks at it.

"No." He tries to hand it back but I don't take it. "Fine." He says, lifting it in his hand. He pulls his hand back and the glass goes flying across the kitchen, hitting the wall and shattering. "Niall!" I yell. "What the fuck!" 

This is so unlike him. I tell myself that this isn't him, this is what he is when he drinks too much. I don't believe that he's high, he couldn't be. He wouldn't smoke randomly one night after going through so much to stay away from all of that.

I'm proven wrong when a small white object is pulled from his pocket and placed in his mouth. He grabs a lighter from his jacket pocket, and brings it up to his lips to light it. I grab it from his mouth, his lighter flame grazing the side of my hand, burning it. I pull my hand back, clutching it in pain. "Hey!" He extends his arm and shoves me backward. "That's not fucking yours." I'm lucky that I don't fall from his push, I catch myself on the counter but he grabs the smoke from me. 

This is too much for anyone to handle, even me. I can pretend not to see this and justify it, but this isn't okay, not even for sweet, kind Niall. 

"Don't put your hands on me, got it?" I try to set the ground but he just shakes his head. "You mean like this?" He reaches into the band of my pajama pants and his icy cold skin hits mine. I grab his wrist and remove his hand, screeching at the contact. "Niall!" This time I'm giving him the shove instead. He chuckles. 

"I don't even want to touch you anyways." He shakes his head. 

"I didn't realize how angry a drunk you are." I brush my arms off. "I'm not angry!" He screams. 

He walks into the living room and I follow. He swings his arm at a glass on the table and it flies off and breaks. I jump, startled.

"Stop doing that, Niall! Just fucking stop!" I scream, reaching for his destructive hands. He lets me grab them for a second, staring down into my eyes. I wonder what his incoherent mind is thinking. I can't believe he smoked tonight. I wonder what pushed him over his edge. "Let go." He demands, shaking off my grip. He turns away from me and I sit down on the couch.

He doesn't join me, he doesn't even look at me. He is so much pain and I can see that, hurting underneath this anger he has and I want to make the pain go away but I can't. There is too much, more than I see, and he would rather inflict more than take any away. He has gone through a lot, I should know more than almost anyone, but that is still no reason to act this way to me. I've only tried to bring him up, never sink him.

"I hate it here." He breaks the silence. "In California. I hate it here." 

"Why?" 

"I came to run away, but this made everything worse. It was supposed to make my problems smaller, now it's the whole backing behind every single thing wrong with me." He scrunched his hands in his hand and begins to cry. He speaks so well for someone drinking so much. 

"Niall, you need to tell me what happened." I say sternly.

"It's all your fault. You had to come in my life, didn't you?" He leans over me. 

"Why are you doing this?" He leans over me further like he's going to kiss me, but instead whispers "I hate you." And then pulls away. "I hate you, I hate you so much. You did this, and I hate you for it." 

"What did I do?" I ask over and over but he just keeps mumbling that he hates me. 

"If you hate me so fucking much then go, leave right now." I say. 

"I don't even care how drunk or high you are, get out of my apartment." He looks up from the ground and to me. 

"Fine. I will." He walks towards the door and I follow him. 

"Just know, if I leave, I'm not coming back." He says. He hates you, Leah. He fucking hates you, he even said so. 

"Good. Because as much as you hate me, I hate you twice as much." I lie and slam the door forcefully in his face, locking both deadlocks on it.

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