Separate Ways - Byler

II - Promises We Made Were in Vain

Relentlessly attempting to fight back all-consuming tears - tears that had inevitably spilled the second I was alone, locked away in bathroom stalls - all day was honestly and truly exhausting. By the time I had stumbled through the front door to the home I shared with my family, I wanted nothing more than to collapse into bed and forget this day (and almost everyday for the past three years) had ever existed.

My heart was worn out and so was I. I'd been battered and bruised on so many more occasions than I could count and by a seemingly endless number of people - and creatures - yet this broken thing contained within my chest had been the one taking the worst hits, time and time again. My life truly didn't feel as though it belonged to me and it hadn't for a long time. I'd all but entirely relinquished control to the people around me and I'd followed mindlessly in their footsteps for years, barely holding onto the person I'd once been.

I ran my fingers up and down the quilted blanket that lay beneath me as I spread out on my bed just for the chance of feeling something and to ground myself. My gaze, though unfocused, remained staring upwards and unseeing at the blank ceiling above me as I tried so desperately, but ultimately in vain, to banish and abandon all thought that would only bring me grief.

Guilt gnawed at my stomach as memories of all the times Tom had held me as we curled up together on this very spot exploded within my mind. No matter how hard I had tried to ignore the thought, his arms had always felt wrong and I couldn't help but wish they belonged to somebody else. The very somebody else who I wished and dreamed I was all wrapped up in at that very moment. The very somebody I was so sure I was never to see again as, if there was anything life had taught me, it was that destiny had never been so generous to me.

My eyes fluttered closed and the image of a smiling face I knew better than I knew my own appeared to me in the sudden darkness and brought more warmth to me than anything else ever could. I could still remember every freckle that decorated the face of Mike Wheeler so beautifully and I saw them as clearly as if he was lying right beside me, our hands entwined and our breath ghosting over one another's faces.

How did it come to this, Mike? How did we get here: all alone and miles and miles apart?

The thoughts of every promise the two of us had made to each other flooded through me like a sudden tidal wave. I began to choke and splutter as I drowned in memories of a life I had lived and loved. A life that sometimes felt as though it had been nothing but a dream. Our futures had seemed so bright, so near and so real yet none of it had ever come to pass. Even years later, that knowledge still caused an intense agony like only a festering, open-wound ever could.

A tentative knocking on the door of my bedroom had me opening my eyes and the face of the boy who had once been my everything disappearing once more into the nothingness it really had been all along. "Will?" My sister's gentle voice fluttered through the space between us. "Do you mind if I come in?"

Schooling my features into as passive a face as I could muster, I headed towards the door and swung it forth to see Max lingering on the other side, shifting her weight from foot to foot. Her face broke into a shy grin as she nodded her thanks and slipped through beside me and onto my bed.

As I positioned myself across from my sister with my legs crossed beneath me, I looked towards her to find her eyebrows pulled ever so slightly closer together as her wandering, sapphire eyes searched every inch of my face. The two of us remained in silence for a moment and I knew she was waiting for me to tell her how I was feeling. Eventually, Max accepted my stubbornness and spoke first. I heard the attempt at nonchalance in the girl's voice as she announced: "Mom has been asking where you are."

"I've been in my room since I got home from class." I replied steadily, not allowing my voice to betray me as I stared into the eyes of my sister. Within her deep, expressive pools of blue, I was able to clearly read her concern and I immediately understood that she knew exactly what day it was and why I had been keeping my distance from everyone.