There it is. My favourite smile. Tiny, but there. “Friends?”
“You’ll always be my best friend,” I said, dropping my head to hers. “It’s just the world’s greatest bonus that I get to fuck you, too.”
Now she laughed…and hit my arm.
This was nice, talking to Helen. Effortless. Comforting. Exciting, too. We talked about her store. I got to watch her share her progress, her hands animated and eyes glinting. She had so much passion. Drive. Knowledge. Her enthusiasm was infectious. I couldn’t wait to leave here, see her in action, watch all her dreams come true. I just hoped I wouldn’t become a hindrance, that I could really do it, be a normal fucking person who didn’t need to keep pulling down the woman I loved just to hold myself up.
She had to leave too soon. I kissed her softly, slowly, cementing the feel of her lips in my memory. I felt a little hollow without her. Arms cold. Chest bare. It’s not for long, I reminded myself. I’d be home soon enough, another few days, holding her while she slept, skin to skin, my face in her hair.
Or…I would’ve been if I hadn’t gone and fucked it all up.
Again.
Seventeen
Hugo
I should have seen it coming. Hell, I did see it. I just couldn’t stop it. I didn’t have Helen here to cup my cheeks, to whisper one, two three. Ezra wasn’t available to tear me a new arsehole. I didn’t have my guitar. I was alone, and I couldn’t fucking function alone, which meant this whole programme had been pointless. What had started as a sickly nervousness in the pit of my stomach, sprouted and spread through my veins until it’d boiled into a violent, hot rage. It became too powerful to contain, my muscles too weak to hold it inside.
The lamp took the first hit. I grabbed the ceramic base, ripped the cord from the wall and threw it across the room with a scream that almost ripped my throat. I knocked over the nightstand next before tearing a portrait off the wall. Someone came in when I started clearing the sideboard, swiping the contents onto the floor with one long swish of my arm.
“I’m going to need you to calm down for me, Hugo,” a voice said. I didn’t know who. The pulse in my ear was too loud.
I went for the bed next. Tossed the duvet, those annoying fucking cushions that served no purpose other than decoration and inconvenience. And then I collapsed on top of it, strength waning, mind folding.
“One of those days, huh?” I recognised the voice now. Arnold, one of the counsellors here. I hadn’t really spoken to Arnold before, other than exchanging obligatory remarks in the communal areas. “Do you need anything?”
“No,” I said, voice muffled by the mattress. “Thanks.” I must’ve looked ridiculous, face down on the bed, arms flat by my sides, surrounded by chaos of my own making. The worst part was I knew I’d need to explain myself at some point. Phoebe wouldn’t let this one slide. But, as I lay there, struggling to breathe through the memory foam, I wondered how I would possibly explain when I didn’t have a fucking clue what had happened. I hadn’t lost it that hard since I was a kid. It didn’t achieve anything. I still felt like shit, only now I looked like a prick, too.
I’d never really experienced the stern talking to from a disappointed parent. The kind where the teen who’d stayed out too late, maybe smoked a couple of cigarettes, had been backed into a corner, mother glowering opposite. My next session with Phoebe felt an awful lot like that, though, except Phoebe wasn’t glowering and I was the only one disappointed. On top of that…she’d invited Helen to watch the show.
“Think about when you first felt that shift,” Phoebe said after I’d explained that I didn’t know what had led to my little ‘outburst’. “It will have happened somewhere if you go over yesterday’s events in your mind. Was there a point when something hit a little differently? You saw Helen yesterday. Can you remember an interaction there that stirred an emotion you weren’t comfortable with?”
“No!” Was my instinctive reaction. Defensive. Protective. Until it hit…the memory. The recognition. I glanced to my left, saw Helen watching me with her gentle, encouraging smile. I turned away, afraid to see it fall. “Yeah. Yeah, maybe.”
Phoebe waited, patiently, silently, for me to unravel this particular thread of yarn.
“It possibly started as soon as I saw her, when we spoke about how much we’d missed each other.” I started to nod, agreeing with myself.
“That’s natural. You haven’t seen each other for a week.”
“Or spoken,” I added, rolling a small ball of Blu Tack between my fingers. Phoebe had suggested it to keep my hands busy. Seemed a little weird at first, but I’d grown to like it. The skin of my palms appreciated it, too. “That’s what started it, I think, the no-contact thing. We’re supposed to work on helping ourselves, right? Being independent? But then I felt Helen in my arms and this need I feel for her overwhelmed me. You know, I keep telling myself I didn’t come back for her so she could save me…but it’s bullshit. I knew where I was heading. What happened that night, ending up in the fucking pool…I saw that coming months before, and it’s when I started missing Helen the most. It’d been years, but I’d never forgotten how safe she made me feel. She was the only one who…who…ah, shit.” The words were stuck, lodged beneath the lump that’d formed in the base of my throat as I started to cry.