Regrets||✓✓

18.10

I spent the next few days being watched by my friends, who each took turns checking on me. Gold moved in with me temporarily, and Conner would be at my apartment as early as five am and leave as late as ten, only to come back at five am the next day.

Me?

I was alive but not living. I ate little, and would vomit it anyway. I didn't get out of bed until Conner threw me over his shoulder and dropped me on the couch. He'd tell Gold to change my clothes while he played my favourite movies. I'd stare dead ahead at the TV, looking, but not seeing. I'd burst into tears at any second until I fell asleep, and even in my sleep, I cried. I was devastated, and heartbroken, and Liberty was the one to blame.

∆

"She's seriously passed out?" I heard Liberty ask.

"Well, what do you think?" I heard Conner reply sarcastically. I woke up on Conner's legs, panting heavily. I felt like I was trapped in a nightmare, and if I snapped my fingers, it'd stop. But when Liberty stepped closer and crouched in front of me, i knew this was reality. "Naija, you know this person?"

"I told you, I'm her sister. Liberty Mendelssohn, at your service," she said, taking a bow.

All I could think of was, why? What had I done to deserve this? Why did she do it? "Why?" I asked, tears falling from my eyes.

She shook her head and cocked her hip. "You thought, that you could be baptized, and waltz back into the house, like you did NOTHING WRONG?! I didn't think so." She flung the disc at me in disgust. It hit in in the chest. "You're disgusting."

Disgusting.

Conner held me in his arms, and I clung to them for comfort. I could hardly breathe. I could only watch as my only sibling stared at me with so much hatred and disappointment.

"Naija, I told you. You were beautiful just the way you were. You didn't need so much make-up. But you said when I was your age, then, I'd understand. I honestly don't. You remember, don't you?" I did. "What is so special about being beautiful, and being popular, and disobeying your parents, huh? Nothing. It's disgusting. Like you.

"Everyday I watched you ruin your life. I heard stories, Naija. I heard stories aboit how you and some stupid boys went around doing stupid things, Naija. I was only ten, Naija, imagine hearing all those things about you!

"You came home with tattoos, Naija and you begged me not to tell ma. You used clothes and socks to cover it up and I kept your secret!" Liberty was crying. She was crying because of me. My heart was breaking, if it wasn't broken already. I buried my face in Conner's chest and sobbed. He was crying too. "Naija, you were only Sixteen! And when ma tried to correct you, you claimed she hated you, when she was only looking out for you! Ma knew what she was saying; she'd grown up with friends like you and she'd seen how they'd ended up and she didn't want that for you!

"And having sex with Tremaine's frat brother, for the love of God, what were you THINKING?!" She forced herself to look away and took a deep breath. "You don't deserve my tears. Or ma's forgiveness. Or God's love. You don't deserve anything. You just waltzed into the house claiming Mami good shoes. You didn't know how much damage you'd caused in the house. Ma cried herself to sleep over you. Pa was sick for months. Because of you selfish bitch, I was neglected and left to fend for myself. Days I'd go to school or bed hungry, or days I'd have to take care of them myself. At thirteen."

I was a selfish bitch.

" But you know what? I'm not you. I'm not selfish. I gave them love and peace. And they soon forgot about you and all the heartache you'd caused. You ruined a woman's marriage, you know. Kathleen Bates? Your lesbian lover? Remember her? I know you do. That's what she came home to tell ma." I sobbed into my palm, shaking profusely. "I just waited for the right time. Until I was the same age you started doing shit. I know you were hurt. Disappointed, even, seeing yourself in me. You thought you had seen the Light and you'd been saved and so everyone should accept the new you and forget all that you'd done?" She laughed. "Bitch, you thought.

"I want you to feel what I felt. The pain. The heartache. The guilt. Everyone who knows you thinks you're so perfect and happy and shit. I put all your secrets in the open, and i do not regret it. You will, however. You'll live with Regrets all your life, questioning why you're still alive, and I will drain you of every single piece of sanity, until you can't take it anymore.

"This isn't the life for me, Naija, make up and attention and boys. God forbid. I'm going home to be the daughter my parents raised me to be. I hate you. With every fiber of my being and I will never forgive you for everything you did." I looked at her, sighing and hiccuping. Her green eyes were dark with hatred. I could feel it from where she stood. She wiped her face with a wipe and put on her ski mask. Then she ran off into the woods.

Conner rocked me back and forth slowly, whispering words in my ear, but I was already passed out from the heartache.

∆

Liberty.

Liberty hated me. And I deserved it. Everything she'd said echoed in my mind, like a tape on repeat. It played over and over again, sometimes clear, sometimes distorted. But the messages were clear.

I hate you with every fiber of my being.

I put your secrets out in the open, and I do not regret it.

You don't deserve my tears, or ma's forgiveness, or God's love.

You're disgusting.

You'll live with Regrets all your life, questioning why you're still alive, and I will drain you of every single piece of sanity, until you can't take it anymore.

I tried my hardest not to think about it, but I couldn't. I was nothing. Nobody. What was I thinking, accepting that I was strong and I deserved to live? That girl lied. Conner lied. The baptism was a lie. Naija was Naija, changed or not.

I dragged myself off the couch and went to my mirror. I looked terrible. But more importantly, I saw me. The me I was before baptism. "What are you doing here?" I asked.

"I never left. I was always inside you, just... Asleep." I blinked. Was I really having a conversation with myself? Did my reflection just talk back to me? She put her hand on the glass. "Come back to me. You were happy, remember?" She sounded somber and sad. Without thinking, I raised my hand and moved it towards my reflection in the mirror. I froze, my fingers a few inches from the glass, then I pulled it back. This was why i didn't want to stay too long in front of my mirror. It was too tempting.

I went into the bathroom and took off my clothes, turning the hot tap shower on and sat. The hot water on my skin was a good distraction from thinking, but soon the water didn't burn anymore. I had gotten used to the hotness. Then I stood and scrubbed myself clean. Just to make Gold and Conner happy.

******

Ik ik it's too short a chapter, but... Sigh. My heart is breaking for Naija. She's gone through enough to last a lifetime. Do you... Do you believe she'd ever live through it? It's killed her enough— she lost thr identity she built for herself, she's lost the boy she loved, she's lost her sister and now she's losing her sanity.

Anyway,

Please vote, comment and share.

Love,
AJ xx