Stained

Chapter 117

His eyes turn regretful and my heart sinks as tears begin to pool. He slept with her. I try getting up from under his body before he can see my tears but he pushes me back down by my arms.

"Nothing happened," he says sternly.

"But you went to her house?" I ask incredulously, trying so hard to swallow the massive lump in my throat. I will not break down in front of him again.

"I... but nothing happened, I swear." Does he actually expect me to believe that? Is that how naive he believes I am? I can't believe I thought he was different. He's just like every other guy; don't get one thing from one girl, move on to the next.

'You're frigid, that's why.'

My bottom lip trembles and an ugly tear escapes. I divert my gaze. "Let me go." My voice, thankfully, is hard, a total opposite of my exterior.

"Rose—."

I look back at him, my eyes harsh despite the tears threatening to fall. "Let. Me. Go." I mean that in more ways than one.

He listens. I'm quick to scramble up and fix my shirt back into place. I can't believe him. Regardless of him not touching her, he still went there fully intending on doing something. I mean he left his goddamn hoodie at her house. And me being the stupid cow I am, I've been falling asleep every night hugging his hoodie, even after his scent left.

"Nothing happened. I didn't fucking touch her." Liar.

I scoff, glad my back is to him as more tears begin to escape.

"We're not fucking exclusive Hazel," he snaps, annoyed. "The last I fucking remember you were calling us a mistake."

To think I disregarded that and believed we weren't makes me feel so stupid. I know the voices are always right. Yet I believed otherwise anyway and look at me now — once again suffering the repercussions.

Part of me knows he's right. We're not anything. Aren't anything. We kissed a couple of times and groped each other a little.

"I didn't touch her," remorse tinges every letter.

My composure finally snaps at that.

Can he stop saying that! Frustrated, I'm about to scream the thought out loud but snap my lips shut when something horrifying occurs to me.

My tears instantly halt and I jerk to face him, wide-eyed. "You..." I can't even get the words past my lips. "You knew I was going to talk to Olivia about Billy. You offered to help me." The tears return at full force, falling fast now, down my cheeks and into my open, gasping mouth as the severity of his action pierces my heart so deep and so hard I feel like I can't breathe. "You knew she would- you knew when I- you knew she would- would brag about it to my face. And so you... you went there to hurt me?" my throat feels so tight the last few words come out with a painful squeak.

His hands drop from his hair, leaving it messier than before and half in his eyes. He vigorously shakes his head in shock. "No. No. Rose." He moves for me hands outstretched like he's going to cup my cheeks.

I press my eyes shut, unable to stop the tears as I take a step back.

"I didn't... I wouldn't ever do anything to hurt you."

Maybe he did it subconsciously then? I wish that fact helped the pain.

"Rose." I hear him take a step closer, and my eyes fly open and I almost trip over my foot in my hurry to scramble back away from him.

There is guilt written all over his face as his lips part, close then part again. The only words that escape his lips are, "I... I," before he closes them again in defeat.

He couldn't come up with an excuse because he realizes now, doesn't he? He knows he did it to hurt me.

I turn around."I want to go."

"Rose," he calls out.

I walk away. I can't even bare to look at him anymore. I don't want to see him or hear his voice ever again. And I mean it for real this time. Before I was hoping for glimpses and searching for him in the cafeteria but now... if I see him again after fifty years it'll be too soon.

I'm entering the little forest place when he catches up to me.

"Fuck Rose wait." He grabs my arm.

I jerk my arm out of his grip. It shakes strenuously at my side and his exterior further falls at the sight.

"Please don't touch me." I let him touch me again. Was going to let him touch me so intimately. If the voices hadn't reminded me I would've let him and I would've hated myself tenfold more if it weren't for them.

I have a weird love-hate relationship with them, don't I? Almost like I'm in an extremely toxic relationship I have no way of getting out of.

It's not lost on me how they waited to remind me of Olivia's remark. Let me have something almost beautiful and normal for a while only to destroy it all.

"You called us a mistake." His eyes are sadder than I've ever seen them and I hate the way it rattles the crumbling cage around my heart. 

'Fake. It's all fake.'

"Because it is." And it's all it's ever going to be.

I wipe my cheeks. How many times do I have to cry in front of him? How many times am I going to make a fool out of myself? Show how pathetic and weak I am?

"Rose," Damien takes a hesitant step toward me, his hand outstretched like he wants to grab me. "Nothing happened, I swear."

"It's none of my business."

He moves toward me but my pain-stricken eyes stop him dead in his tracks.

"Hannah's ringing me. We should go." Another lie.

"They can fucking wait, this is more important," he states.

A foreign bitter laugh startles me. More so when I realize it's coming from me. "This isn't important. Your sex life is none of my business." I don't even blush from saying sex.

His eyes turn into slits. "I didn't fuck her."

A sad but bitter smile morphs on my lips. "Like I said; it's none of my business. And like you said; I'm not your girlfriend, you didn't cheat on me and we're not exclusive."

"Don't do that," he pleads almost desperately.

"Don't do... what?" I'm so proud of my strong forefront.

"Don't push me away again."

My heart stalls and my fake demeanour cracks for a split second. I turn my back on him and heave in a massive breath. So much for being proud of my strong forefront. "We should go."

"You pushed me away baby. You kicked me out," he mumbles so low I probably wouldn't have heard him if my ears weren't already trained on every one of his movements, afraid of him getting too close physically. There's zero hope left for emotionally. Not after he tried to use Olivia to hurt me. Whether it was subconscious or conscious, either way the result was the same. To hurt me.

I know I'm not one to talk since my pushing him away clearly hurt him enough to want to hurt me back. However, I did it for his own good and I didn't do it maliciously like he has. Yes, I kicked him out but I did it kindly — I freaking fed him before I did.

My agony heightens as I remember how much he looked after me that day on my period. How sweet and kind and caring he was. I find it difficult to believe that that guy and the guy who tried to hurt me hours — maybe even minutes — later are the same people. How could he worry and care so much for my physical pain but not my internal pain?

'Highly doubt any of the care was real? Could have all been a tactic to get inside your pants.'

"I should have never let you back in," the words leave my lips in a daze and of their own volition. Though, all true. I pushed away the sweet caring guy who cared for my pain. I let back in the one who tried to cause me pain.