Blame it on me' ~ Post Malone

18.

"Madison." His voice was hoarse, and his blue eyes were worried. His hands suddenly felt warm, in low chills, and produced a different kind of shiver on my back. Everything about his posture indicated that he was tense, that he blamed himself for what happened. He started apologizing; he would say things that I didn't want to hear. I shook my head, knew what he was going to say now. Something I had heard a thousand times from my friends; "everything will be fine after a while. You have to put it behind you; you should move on." All nonsense that I was completely unhappy with. They usually just wanted to help me with my grief. They couldn't handle that much pain. In the meantime, they just hoped that I would soon be the old one again. "At least let me take you home." His eyes begged, but I turned away and started walking — ignoring his question. He wasn't easily kicked off and started to follow me.

He walked past me, and for a while, we walked in silence. The sound of the soft summer wind was the only sound. I stared in front of me, trying to put my poker face back on. So, I didn't have to surrender to him again. So, he could comfort me for the umpteenth time. But it didn't work. Not crying was something that demanded a lot from me. So, you could see the pain on my face, and I often saw Austin's eyes looking at me with concern. We came close to a bench, which was in front of two houses. Instead of walking past it, Austin pulled me down. I could not fight back, didn't bother, and surrendered. "Please say something." "What can you say?" Pain prevailed. "That I am a sad person, a girl who has lost her best friend and is still in pain every day. That I still cry every day, that I am a cry baby?"

I felt the anger that went through me, impossible to stop. "That there is nobody but nobody who understands me. That they all want me to forget her, th-That... they all... pretend... she... doesn't exist?" I squeezed out my last words in the sobs. And before I knew it, I lay in his comforting arms. Again. "May I ask something else?" Austin's voice was hesitant, which I understood. He didn't want to force himself but still couldn't control his curiosity. "Well, you know everything now." That was true. He knew everything from Riley's death to my arrival here. If you could call it like that, the fact that my impossible love for him made matters even worse, I had, of course, left out; I don't think he would take it that as well as the rest.

He didn't start a whole speech about how to forget her. He didn't say, "ooh" and "aah" and "how pitiful!" No, he listened. Something not many people did. They would listen, but not well. They only heard the superficial things, not the pain. The pain that needed to be remedied. Pain that only went away through support. And Austin did that. He supported me. He paused and only said something when necessary or when a question arose. It was good to tell him everything; it relieved like a burden that fell off your shoulders.

It was weird. It helped to tell problems to people you just got to know and who you were in love with. I was taken out of my stream of thoughts when Austin coughed. "That's why you were crying in the bathroom on your birthday." The icy feeling took over again. My body seemed to be experiencing an ice age. I knew I was a bad liar; nobody would believe it if I lied. But how the hell were you going to tell the boy you secretly fell in love with that, you were crying for him? What impression did that make? Would that mean the end of our short friendship? Love that breaks a friendship. You heard it so much, but you thought it never happened to you. Now it was. "No, not about that." He grimaced. "You have far too many concerns." "A bad — things — attractor." The enthusiasm in my voice was sarcastic. "Do you want to talk about it?" That confused me. "About what?" A strange feeling came over me as if something was about to happen. Something I didn't want. "About what you were crying about in the bathroom." There you have it. "I don't think that's such a good idea." I lowered my eyes and tried to stay nonchalant. While a tear silently made its way down, I fiddled with my T-shirt. His hands stopped mine, and I felt a strange feeling go through my stomach.

Just at that moment, the tear ended its way and fell right on Austin's hand. We both looked up. He was surprised; I was startled. "Why are you crying?" His voice sounded worried again, seemed genuine to care about me. Why did he do that? Did he not know he hurt me with that? Now it went well, but as soon as his back turned, it turned against me.

Because everything in me would say, it was wrong.