Grayscale

Chapter Nineteen

        As fast as the shadows and the hallucination had come on, they left, and I was sitting against a wall in the alley, sobbing uncontrollably. My hands were covering my ears, and I was rocking back and forth, whimpering, “No,” over and over again. Gabriel was crouched down, his hand on my shoulder, begging me to explain what had happened, but I didn’t even know where to begin. My mind was so broken. In every crack and crevice of my consciousness, there was something wrong. How was I supposed to explain that to him? How was I supposed to tell him that even the voices in my head didn’t like me?

        At some point among all of my sobbing and my rocking back and forth on the dirty ground, ruining my pants, I realized I couldn’t breathe anymore I was crying so hard.

        “Calypso, sweetheart, what happened?” Gabriel asked, for what I imagined to be the millionth time. “What’s wrong? Did I do something?”

        I shook my head. “Not . . . you.” I managed to get out. I buried my head in my legs, the rocking coming to a slow stop. 

        “Okay, so it’s not me. If I didn’t do anything, what was it?” He paused for a moment, allowing me to try to gather myself a little, I imagined. “Caly, I just want to help.” I could feel him switch positions beside me, and a soft thud let me know he had joined me on the ground. He wrapped his arm around me and pulled me into his body, a big move for a guy who had known me for less than twelve hours. I didn’t mind though. The solid contact, the reminder that he was really still here and he wasn’t just another figment of my imagination was a good thing.

        I un-balled a little and buried my face in his chest, still unable to stop the flood of tears. Flashes of the battle, of Reed’s cutting words, kept bombarding me. All I could think about was the betrayed expression he had worn before blowing half a dozen holes into Gabriel. The way he had looked at me, even though it was one hundred percent my imagination taking our break-up and running away with it, literally made me want to die. I never wanted to make anyone feel that way, and honestly, it would make sense if he really did. If I were in his position, I would feel totally betrayed. I’d told him I loved him today. We were supposed to be in it together for the long run, and I threw it away, even if it was over my soulmate. I was supposed to be the one to hold him together, and I’d left him a mess, without even a goodbye. I was a terrible person.

        “Caly, stop crying, please.” Gabriel took two fingers and gently lifted my chin up so he was looking me in the eyes. “I can’t even imagine what must be going on in your head to cause a meltdown like this, but I promise you, whatever it is, it will be okay.”

        I shook my head vehemently. “You don’t have any idea what’s going on in my head. Don’t tell me it’s going to be okay.” The idea that anything at all would be okay after something like this was completely ludicrous. What I had just experienced was the stuff nightmares were made of. But lucky me – my nightmares almost exclusively occurred while I was still awake.

        Gabriel closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry. It’s not my place to assume I have any idea what’s going on. But we can’t just stay here in this dark, dank alley. The place I was going to take you to is perfectly safe, but I’m under no illusion that this is. Can we at least take this to the car?”

        I nodded, and he stood, helping me up after he did. With no hesitation, he laced his fingers with mine and gave my hand a tight, reassuring squeeze as we began to walk. Tears were still streaming down my face, and as we made our way back to the rental, I couldn’t help but think what people passing by might think of us. Even this late at night on a school night, the town was still heavily populated in the downtown area, so the sidewalks were busy, and I could feel the stares on me. I was attracting the attention of every passerby in the area, and I hated it. I just wanted to be alone.