S.M. ✦ Gin & Juice

XV.

***warning: a panic attack***

–Rapid, pounding heart rate–

You laid your hand flat against the door, feeling the lock click into place, unable to hear it over the sound of your heart beating hard against your ribs. Feeling it in your palm, a fluttery, uneven rhythm through the door, calling him back, begging him to stay, even as you shut him out. The blood pumped fast and furious through your veins, hard against the valves struggling to control it in your chest. You didn't know if the beats were pounding out seconds ....minutes ....hours.

Time stood still.

All you knew was that he was gone and he wasn't coming back after what you did. After what you said. You leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor.

–Numbness or tingling sensation–

Instead of fire, the pain trickling down your spine was like ice, drenching you in a cold so intense you couldn't move. The numbing sensation crept up your arms and down your legs, locking you into an upright fetal position. Your fingers clasped around your knees. Your forehead pressed against your thighs. You squeezed yourself so hard you thought your lungs might collapse and held it there for seconds ....minutes ....hours.

Shortness of breath or tightness in your throat.

Your chest expanded and contracted with each labored breath, catching in your throat and threatening to crack you open. You felt bare, exposed, like your skin was flayed and your organs were on display for everyone to see. Except no one was here. You'd pushed away the only person in your life that might actually understand you, might respect you, and be willing to love you despite all the fucking bullshit in your brain. You drew in a harsh breath, trying to fill your lungs but feeling something blocking the air, something squeezing your neck tighter and tighter, pulsing seconds ....minutes ....hours.

–Fear of loss of control–

You thought things were fine. Everything was going perfectly. Shawn was perfect and he wasn't drinking and you were trying to be okay with being with him and then suddenly this article and the game and the interview and everything just came crashing down. But why?! It was easy to blame it on him. What he said. What he didn't say. What he stood here in this room and spat at you. So I'm damned if I do and damned if I don't? You knew that what he said after was true. You knew he would wait as long as you needed to. But you didn't know how long that might be and he deserved so much more than that. He deserved a girl who wouldn't crawl into her bed for two days at the mere thought of him telling a reporter that he has a girlfriend. He deserved a girl who wanted to hold his hand and walk to class with him. He deserved a girl who would not only press her lips against hers in the sunlight but would relish the moment, would throw her arms around his neck and hold him to her and hope the moment lasted forever. But you were never going to be that girl. You could never be that girl. In this room you could lock the door and hide yourself and him from them, the people outside who might see you, curse you, hate you for loving him and being loved by him. All of those eyes. And questions. And tweets. The weight of the entire campus and their eyes. They were so heavy that you collapsed. They pressed your shoulders to the floor, your cheek against the tile. Your lungs could barely hold the oxygen begging to enter your bloodstream.

It reminded you of the sweet burn of Shawn's body holding you down after he came that first time, when all the walls between you shattered and you welcomed the shards of his broken facade into your heart. Those pieces of him shook inside you now, rusty from disuse. You had thought that when you let him go things would feel far away, empty, removed from you, like the world was before you met him. But now, in this moment, laying here on the floor, you realized that you had been mistaken. You hadn't accounted for the joy in those seconds after, when you'd laid in his arms and felt such overwhelming intimacy, more intense than ten waves of pleasure. You hadn't accounted for the way he took your breath away when he ran ahead of you in the dawning light, his passion and thirst for life overpowering the demons of expectation. You hadn't accounted for those quiet moments when he held your hand in the car and looked at you like you were the only person in the world that knew him, that felt him, that could ever be present with him. All of that joy, passion, and knowing was now imprinted on the fragile fragments of his old life and they were never going to let you forget.