Say You'll Remember Me

Chapter Thirteen

I woke up and I knew that it was still the same day. The light was still shining through the window, and I was wrapped up in Hunter’s comforter. I was still wearing the clothes I had put on earlier, and I knew by the headache that was throbbing behind my eyes I was more than hungover. I stood up and the room tilted just as my stomach did a backflip. I ran towards the door, almost falling over Hunter who was sitting there staring at his computer. I didn’t realize he was sitting there until I was running towards the bathroom.

My stomach emptied again for the second time and I winced as it burned my throat once again. There were tears in my eyes as his hands wrapped around my hair and held it back away from my face. At least he wasn’t still angry at me, or he wasn’t so mad that he didn’t want to be around me. I took in a breath, leaning on my arms as I braced myself on the toilet. 

After a moment I stood up and washed my mouth out, feeling more than tired. My head hurt every time I moved it, and the light was too bright for me. Hunter could see it in my face how painful it all was and he picked me up and carried me back to his bedroom. Once he set me back down on his mattress he closed his door and looked at me.

“What do you remember?” he kept his voice low, which I was very thankful for. I pulled his blanket up around me and then let out a slow breath. I remembered his mother telling me I was a whore. I remembered finding my way to the bar and the stranger sitting next to me ending up being Chris. I remembered the whiskey, it still burned the back of my throat. I remembered it all, even the fighting before I passed out on him.

My eyes found his, “too much,” I answered.

He sighed, “Charlie, what happened? I feel like there’s so many things I don’t know about you, and yet I know you better than anyone else. I’m so confused and worried about you, about us.”

I sat up with tears in my eyes, “don’t worry about us,” I said reaching for his hand and then pulling him onto the bed, “we’re fine. At least I hope we are.”

“You have to tell me the truth,” he said his eyes staring into mine and I knew what he was talking about. I sighed, “I want to know the truth about whatever it is you meant when you said you’ve been lying to me.”

I closed my eyes and a tear slipped down my cheek. He wiped it away gently and I knew then that he was still in this. I sighed and when I opened my eyes he was still staring at me, “I never want you to stop looking at me the way you do,” I whispered softly, my voice catching.

“I never will,” he said quietly, smiling slightly as he pushed my knotted up hair over my shoulder.

“You will,” I said taking in a big breath of air and looking down at my hands, “when I tell you what I’ve done. You’ll rethink everything, because your mom was right.”

Hunter picked up my hand and squeezed it gently, “no,” he said brining my hand up to his mouth and kissing my skin gently, “she’s not right. Nothing you did before matters now because you did what you had to do to survive. I promise you it won’t change a thing.”

I pulled my hand out of his and stood up. I didn’t say a word as I walked to my room and pulled up the floorboard. My head was killing me and all I wanted to do was go back to sleep, but I knew I had to do this. I had to tell Hunter the truth and I had to do it before I lost my nerve. I grabbed the bag full of cash and went back to his room. I tossed the bag at him as I shut the door and sat back down.

“I stole that from Jimmy. I thought he owed it to me for what he had taken away from me that night,” I watched as Hunter opened the bag and his eyes went wide. There was a lot of money in that bag, I knew it because I had counted in not once but three times to make sure I was sure of how much was there, “but I didn’t just take that. There were a few bags of coke in the safe, I grabbed them too. I sold them on the streets and fled.”