Mirrorless

Chapter 13

Thinner and thinner,
She's vanishing.
Will you miss her
When she's gone?

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Lilian perked up at the sight of Aaron exiting the emergency ward. Lilian had given up on pacing after a few minutes, opting instead to sit down in an empty chair and chew on her lip. Aaron approached her, and motioned for her to sit down. Lilian did so, her gaze zoning in the sadness in Aaron's eyes.

"Hey what's wrong? Is William alright?"

Aaron nodded.

"He's awake and talking now."

"What happened to him?"

Aaron shrugged.

"Lucille asked, but he shooed me out of the room before responding to her. I have no idea what happened or why."

Lilian slumped in defeat.

"I think William's upset because of me."

Aaron looked at her.

"Why do you think so?"

Lilian shrugged.

"Earlier, when we were all studying together, William looked at me really strange. I was zoning out or maybe I said something that didn't mesh with him, but after that he started acting really weird. Maybe if I'd checked up on him, he wouldn't have ended up like this."

Aaron shook his head, patting Lilian comfortingly.

"Don't blame yourself. We all saw him leave. If we knew something was wrong enough for him to drink until he blacked out, we would've all tried to stop him. You couldn't have possibly known that something like this would happen."

Lilian nodded miserably.

"I guess so."

Aaron sat silently beside her. Lilian wondered how he remained so poised all the time. While she couldn't help but fidget, he sat beside her, perfectly still, one leg crossed over the other. She checked her phone again, wondering if William would ever want to see her, when her phone pinged with a text from Lucille.

Luce: Come in. He wants to see you.

Lilian immediately jumped to her feet. When Aaron made no move in response to her sudden movement, Lilian pointed vaguely in the direction of the emergency ward.

"Um, William wants to see me. If I find out anything, I'll let you know."

Aaron nodded.

"It's the third room to the left."

Lilian barely got out a thank you before running towards the ward. She found herself almost afraid to walk in, afraid to walk in and see the same blank expression that she had last seen on William's face. Taking a deep breath, she stepped into the room, her gaze immediately landing on William. He was usually a well-built, sturdy person. He may not be the tallest in the room, but he was usually the most well-built, thanks to the muscles he built while dancing and just working out in general.

But lying in the hospital bed, drowned in the pristine white sheets, Lilian had never seen him look so small. At her entry, William cracked her a smile. Lilian smiled back, tentatively, before pulling up a chair closer to the bed he was on.

"Hey."

William's smile wavered a bit before returning to it's original brilliance.

"Hey."

Lilian blinked back tears before speaking.

"I'm sorry, Will. I saw how you looked when you left that day and I should've known you weren't feeling alright. I should've talked to you instead of just letting you leave."

William's smile dropped, and he glanced at Lucille nervously.

"You.. knew?"

Lilian frowned, glancing between Lucille and William before shaking her head.

"I knew you were upset, I just didn't know why. I was going to talk to you about it later, but before I could.."

William released a slow breath before shaking his head.

"It's not your fault, Lils. I didn't need to almost drink myself to death. I was just.. being dumb I guess."

Lilian shook her head.

"Whatever you were feeling, it's not dumb. It clearly affected you a lot. That doesn't mean that you can do this to yourself every time you feel this way, though. Just, for now, focus on getting better. Physically and emotionally."

Lucille nodded.

"He's so much better now, physically. When I first came in, he was slurring so much, but it's gotten a lot better."

William nodded, smiling gratefully at Lucille. But even though William was smiling and talking to her normally again, she just couldn't shake the feeling that something was still wrong.

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William sighed and cut the call, tired after having spent an hour reassuring his mother that he was alright. He was back in his dorm, locked away in his room. He was lucky that he hadn't gotten into any legal trouble, especially with him being underage. The nurse had told him that the hospital generally let off first time offenders with a warning.

William gazed at Aaron who was currently spread out on the dorm floor on a fluffy blanket that the sophomore next door had been only too happy to lend to them at 2 AM. From the safety of his blankets, William thought about everyone's reactions, feeling guilty for dragging them out of their beds in the middle of the night for a dumb decision he'd made. But it couldn't be helped.

The alcohol wasn't entirely out of his system yet; the nurse had told him as much. Someone had to be there to take him home and make sure he got inside safely. Aaron had insisted on staying the night to make sure that William was alright, and in general just to make sure he didn't do more stupid things.

Though it wasn't Aaron's fault, William couldn't help but feel some resentment towards him. William still loved his friend dearly, but envied the effortless popularity that he had. Not a single person on campus had anything bad to say about him. Not even the salty trolls who tried to bring everyone down.

No matter how hard William tried, he'd never be able to pull that off. He tried his best to be cheerful and bring everyone's moods up, but he often heard people comment about his nature, saying that he could never be serious and was just an overgrown child. In the light of recent events, William couldn't help but wonder if that was true.

Groaning quietly, he sank under his covers, curling up in an attempt to fall asleep.

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uh so

I was like hey I haven't updated in so long, lemme go write!

Then realized that I had this whole chapter written out, but my dumb ass forgot to publish it *major face palm*

Just to make myself feel like I did something, I did edit it and read through it. I'm sorry that this is a really dumb chapter T-T 

I'll make it up to you guys in the next one I swear <3

ALSO PLEASE DON'T DRINK WHEN YOU'RE UNDERAGE AND EXPECT TO GET AWAY WITH IT THIS IS FICTION AND THIS ISN'T HOW THE REAL WORLD WORKS PLEASE BE SAFE AND SMART!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!