He Saved Me

Chapter One

I was expecting the knock.

It always came at the same time, every day. In some ways it was comforting, knowing that there was at least something that I could depend on. There’s not a lot of that feeling anymore. Knowing, deep down, that no matter what happens that it will always be there, regardless of how many mistakes you make or how many times you make it mad.

Now that I thought about it, you couldn’t really depend on a knock. A person makes the knock after all, don’t they? And one thing in this world that you definitely can’t depend on in this world is people. They’ll leave you, no matter how hard you beg them to stay...

Knock, knock.

I wasn’t even going to try to convince myself that getting up and letting them in was the right thing to do. I never actually answered the door. They figured that I wouldn’t, knew the routine by now. They would wait outside for about thirty seconds then walk in. The only time they wouldn’t come in until I actually invited them in was the first time. They just didn’t get why I didn’t invite them in-I didn’t want them there.

When he walked in I was curled up in a little ball under my sheets, my head pressed against a hard pillow. I was in nothing but shorts and a baggy t-shirt that was all bunched up so it showed some of my stomach. My hair was everywhere. I used to have really pretty hair, long, silky, and the prettiest auburn hair but I’d stopped caring enough to go into the salon to get it deep conditioned or to even brush it for the matter, so now it was just frizzy waves. A month ago I got so annoyed that I went down to the kitchen, took a butcher knife, and cut it off so that it was just below my chin. Mom had been furious. Funny, seeing her like that, all red in the faced and screaming at me actually made me feel better.

Dr. Samuels was a nice man, I guess. He was about thirty, so pretty young, with short gelled black hair and kind light blue eyes. He was pale, but in a healthy looking way and always wore jeans, collared shirts, and a black jacket that ended up a little below his waist. I’d never tell him, but he actually kind of comforted me. The familiar smell of his gel and hand-washed coat was nice, to say the least.

“Hey Karly,” he said as the door peeked open and he lingered into the room. He took me in and sighed, clearly disappointed. You’d think that after eight months of no progress he would give up, but he never did. He always came in every Sunday morning as if he was expecting to see the old Karly. A pretty girl sitting at her desk, music blaring from her phone, her beautiful hair bouncing around her happy smile.

He walked over to me and sat down on the bed, making it creak. I sat up and immediately felt dizzy until Dr. Samuels cold hand was on my arm steading me. “Woah there girl,” he said in his thick southern accent. I’d always wondered why an ex-cowboy wanted to be a therapist, decided that it was rude to ask. “How’re you feeling?”

“Like shit,” I answered. I hated Sundays. Sundays were the day before Monday, and on Monday I had to get up and drag my feet to school. And I had this stupid therapy session on Sundays. My mind started to wander there, to school, but I shoved it back into reality before it could get very far. I tugged the covers up higher until they were covering all of my body, not because I cared what Dr. Samuels thought or saw but because I was cold.

“That’s unusual,” he teased but I didn’t smile. “How’ve you been? How’s school going?” He always started like that, with the easy questions and I stiffed, my walls shooting up faster than anything.

“Fine,” I said flatly.

He nodded, “That’s good.” We sat in silence for a second before he bit his lip and I could practically his mind working, wondering if he should just spit it out or wait.. “Have you been thinking about Cody?”

I snarled at him, an almost in-human sound. He really should’ve kept his mouth shut.

This happened every time too. The first time he’d say Cody I’d get mad and growl, or snarl, or spit and a horrible pain would explode behind my heart and invade my skull, but he never acted afraid.

He stared at me, waited for me to calm down. My chest was rising and falling rapidly and I could feel my heartbeat raging against my rib cage like a caged animal, wanting to get out and run away. I closed my eyes and listened to it. Bum bum bum bum bum bum. Cody would never hear that again. He would never hear anything again.

I squeezed my eyes shut tight. I didn’t like to cry. Not only does it leave you feeling numb and cold afterwards but it makes you look weak. And even if I was weak, well, Dr. Samuels didn’t need to know that. My breathes came out short and shattered, and I could feel his eyes on me as he watched me, waiting to see what I would do and how I would react. I fell back against the pillows, eyes still closed, and watched as memories flashed and danced behind my eyelids without my permission. His laugh and his smile and his shaggy blonde hair.

His life.

It happens every time I close my eyes and his name brushed my lips,a soft and whimpering sound, “Cody.”

I shot up, the name giving me fuel and adrenaline. “What the hell do you think?” I spat, knowing that Dr. Samuels didn’t deserve my bitchy side but not caring.

His face hardened. “You know I’m just trying to help you Karly. Most people get over this by now. There’s stages to grieving: and your stuck. It usually only takes a couple of months but, Karly, it’s been a year. You should be past the acceptance part by now but you’re still stuck in depression.”

“How dare you?” I asked, sitting up and shoving the blankets out of the way. I must have looked ridiculous, with my hair a frizzy mess and my eyes glassed over with tears that I wouldn’t let escape my lashes. My skin pale and blotchy, me shaking and weak yet still trying to look fierce, intimidating, and mean. “How dare you!”

Dr. Samuels didn’t move he just looked at me, studied me as if I was just another one of his stupid experiments that could shatter at any moment. “Other people have lost loved ones, Karly.”

I narrowed my eyes at him, rage filling my chest and spreading through my veins. “Did those other people kill the person that died too, Doctor? Because you know, I did. I killed Cody.”

I inhaled sharply and it burned my throat, and when I tried to hide it I just started to cough like a mad-woman. Christ, he probably really did think that I was crazy. I didn’t blame him. Shit, maybe I really was crazy. It’s not like sanity hadn’t left the train station and left me sitting on the bench in a crumpled mess long ago.

He stood up, “No, no, most people don’t have that situation.”

“Yeah,” I spat, but the rage had left me and now it was pretty much just the same horrible, empty gut-wrenching feeling. “So get the fuck out.” It was the shortest and probably rudest session we had ever had, but I didn’t care. Why care if he liked me? He’d just leave soon anyway.

Cody, Cody, please stay. You can’t leave Cody! You can’t!

Dr. Samuels got up and left and I collapsed back onto the pillows and freely let the tears fall. I wanted to close my eyes or to blink, but I was afraid of what I would see when I did. Sometimes it was his neck, messed up and shredded against the pavement, and sometimes it was just his smile.

The smile was actually worse, because it reminded me of what he would never be again. A happy beach blonde boy with shining blue eyes and a laugh that was so contagious it gave any illness a run for it’s money. A boy who everyone loved, a boy with a heart the size of the moon itself, a boy who would say my name like Karlaayyyy drawing out the aaaay so much that it would sound down-right immature and stupid on anyone else but on him it sounded sweet and cool. A boy who loved to swim and ski and who went to kindergarten with me and always used the purple markers and crayons and used to argue with me about who would get the cool remote when we played Halo or Mario Cart together. A boy who was always positive, no matter what the situation, and if someone was fighting he would say something so horribly yet beautifuly stupid and funny that everyone would just have to stop yelling and start laughing until they were on the floor with tears in their eyes or had peed themselves. A boy who was now dead.

Thanks to me.

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