Take Me With You

by Melyssa Winchester

  She’s going to get better without me. She has too.

  “Dillon,” I say, changing the subject and completely ignoring Cadence’s words. “Can you help me with something?”

  This is a huge step for me. There’s no love lost between me and him. I’m still not sure I trust him completely even with all the changes he’s making, but right now, knowing how close him and Amelia seem to be again, he’s my last hope.

  “Yeah, anything.”

  “There’s something I need to do when she gets out and I don’t think I can do it alone.”

  “Then you’re not doing it alone. Whatever you need, Eric. After what you did for me,” he admits, squeezing Cadence into him even more. “Anything you need, it’s yours.”

  Amelia

  Sometime between Eric holding me, telling me to hang on and stay with him and where I am now, I passed out. Considering what I went to my dad’s to do, it’s not surprising, but where I expected to wake up and see him sitting beside me, he was nowhere to be found.

  He might not be here, but I wasn’t alone.

  Catching sight of my bandaged up arms first, some of the burns visible and somehow brighter than before, and swallowing down the sadness that seeing it brings, I look up at the sound of shuffling feet and am shocked into silence by the two people I see. One standing, the other seated in the chair close to the door.

  Isabelle and Cadence. Two people in the long list of girls that I’ve taken into the bathroom at school and attempted to beat and burn for my own sick and twisted purpose.

  Two people that should want to be anywhere but where they’re standing now.

  It didn’t take long for them to explain what they were doing here, though neither of them could tell me for sure the one thing I really wanted to know.

  Where Eric was.

  ~*~*~

  “I don’t understand.” I admit as Isabelle backs her body off the wall and walks closer to the bed, sitting gently on the end, her pity evident in her eyes when they meet mine.

  “What don’t you understand, Amelia?”

  The way she says my name stuns me even more into silence. It means everything Eric told me before I ran out of the bathroom was true. He did tell her about us and even more, about me.

  “Why are you here? Why are either of you here?”

  Cadence’s hands start moving, signing but not directly at me. She’s facing toward Isabelle and from what I can tell, the other girl understands her clearly. Something I never knew.

  Something that until now I never cared enough to want to know.

  “I thought she could talk?” I ask quietly and Isabelle nods toward me as Cadence finally places her hands back in her lap.

  “She can, but when she speaks, people aren’t usually kind, so she’s afraid of how you’re going to react.”

  I earned that response. Taking her into the girl’s bathroom that day and attempting to burn her the way I did with Belle, I don’t even deserve to have her signing to me the way she is.

  “Can you tell her that I’m sorry? I know it doesn’t make up for what we all did to her, but I mean it. It wasn’t about her. It was me.”

  My voice is hoarse and I can hear the hitch and cracks in between some of the words and I really hope that Isabelle can see that it’s not intentional. That I do mean what I’m saying. They weren’t the problem. It was always me.

  I watch as she signs back to Cadence and that’s when I see it. The girl sitting in the chair, the one that when I hurt Hannah over a month ago, I wanted to put the blame on, she’s smiling at me. It’s weak, but it’s a smile nonetheless.

  It’s like Hannah’s dad all over again. It’s her way of believing me.

  “I still don’t understand why you’re here. After everything I did to you guys, this is the last place you should be.”

  “You wanna know why we’re here? Well, at least why I’m here?” Isabelle asks and I nod slowly. “What you did to us, did to me; I wanted to hate you for it, but if I did that then it would make me no better than the girl that dragged me into the bathroom and burned me. It would make me no better than you and I’m better than that.”

  I can’t argue with her because she’s telling the truth. She is better than me. Only someone truly twisted would do the things that I’ve done and justify them the way I did for so long.

  “You’re right.”

  “Do you wanna know what Cadence signed to me?”

  “Sure.” Caught up in the moment, I completely forgot that she had been speaking before Isabelle. Even though I know it probably isn’t anything good, I do wanna hear what she’s got to say.

  I can’t believe how different everything is. I feel like I’m dreaming right now.

  “She wanted me to tell you that she forgives you, Amelia. We both do. It doesn’t make what you did right, and we won’t ever be able to forget that it happened, but you’re forgiven.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t understand what you mean.”

  “Why do you forgive me?”

  “At first, I thought I was doing it for Eric, because whatever it is the two of you share, it makes him even better than he was, but it’s not him. I’m forgiving you because everyone, even someone who does the things that you do, deserves it.”

  I’m not gonna argue with her, but I definitely don’t agree. It’s just another way that it’s obvious what kind of person she really is once you get past her diagnosis. She’s like Eric and Hannah. She’s a good person.

  “When we were waiting for you to wake up, Cadence told me something. It’s another reason why I can forgive you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “If we can’t forgive you for what you did, how are you ever going to forgive yourself?”

  I’m not sure how to answer that, so I just smile weakly and shrug in her direction. That feeling I had earlier of this being a dream, it’s feels like it even more now.

  “Isabelle, where’s Eric?” I take the chance and ask. I know that I haven’t exactly earned her telling me anything about him, but waking up and not seeing him here, it’s eating at me and I won’t be able to focus on much else until I get answers.

  She laughs and where before I could see myself getting annoyed with it, now I think I understand. She’s not laughing at me, she’s laughing because of who I’m asking about.

  Me asking about her friend, it’s funny to her.

  “Honestly, I don’t know. He was here when I got here earlier, but after I left him to talk to your mom, I lost track of him. I think he might have gone home with his mom. What happened was a lot for him.”

  I know what she’s getting at. Eric found me, saw things that I’m pretty sure he’ll never be able to forget and with everything he told me about how easily he can visualize things in his mind, this is the last place he needs to be. I’m the last one he needs to be around.

  It doesn’t make it hurt any less though. I wanted him to be the first person I saw when I opened my eyes.

  “He’ll be back. I’m sure of it, but in the meantime, how do you feel about hanging out with me and Cadence for a while?”

  Considering that I didn’t think I’d be breathing for much longer, let along lying here in a hospital room surrounded by these two, it sounds like the best thing I’ve heard all day.

  “I’d like that.”

  ~*~*~

  Epilogue

  Amelia

  This has been the worst week of my life and the last thing I want to do is go out with Dillon.

  I know what he’s trying to do and I appreciate it. It took a really long time but I’ve finally learned what it means to be a real friend and that’s what he’s attempting to do with me now.

  I’m just not sure that it’s what I want and I definitely know it’s not what I need.

  It’s been a week since I’ve seen Eric. A week since he showed up at my dad’s, saw me at my worst and held me until the blood loss made me pass out. When I woke up, I was in the hospital and he was nowhere to be found a
nd it hurts. I need him, but I don’t have the first clue how to let him know that because I still believe he’s better off without me.

  Everything’s changed since that night, but where I expected it to change in a bad way, it hasn’t.

  My mom knows everything now. I used to think she knew all about the sick things my dad was doing to me, but she didn’t. She wasn’t blocking out what happened under her nose all those years, she was just as clueless about it as the rest of the world because I didn’t have the strength to stand up and tell her.

  I kept it to myself because I thought she needed to be protected, but after spending the first two nights in the hospital talking things through with her, I found out that I didn’t have to do that after all. Somewhere along the way I became the mom; the adult that needed to protect the child, never giving her a chance to do it. I can’t go back and change it now, but knowing that if I had opened up and told her what was going on, she would have believed me, it means a lot.

  We don’t have a perfect relationship and I’m not sure we ever will, but we’re getting there. Just like I’m learning how to be a better person; to be Amelia again, she’s learning too. We’re both a work in progress, but as long as she’s here and not walking away, I’m not either.

  Along with the stuff happening with my mom, I’ve also found out who my true friends are. Dillon and Cadence, both together and separately came to visit me during the five days I spent practically tied to a hospital bed and Kayden and Belle joined them.

  After everything I put them all through, they still sat there, talked to me and let me know that they didn’t hate me for everything that happened. It’s spending time with all of them that made me realize that they really aren’t that different. They’re different from me because I think they’re somehow better, but with how easy it was talking to them, it was hard to see actual differences at all.

  They both like the same things as me, find the same stupid jokes funny and even share the same opinions as me about the most random things. They’re different, not less. For Cadence, Belle and even Eric, I’m starting to see that different might just mean more.

  It takes a pretty strong person to forgive the things I’ve done.

  “Are you gonna tell me where you’re taking me?” I ask again, probably the fiftieth time I’ve asked since I got in his car earlier and just like every other time, he grins at me but says nothing.

  Asshole.

  “You’ll see when we get there.”

  “Because that’s so helpful.”

  “I was wondering how long it would take.” He laughs and catching my eye roll he does it again, even louder than the first time.

  “How long what would take?”

  “For my bitchy ex-girlfriend to make an appearance.”

  He’s joking but any reminder of the way I was before, it hurts. I don’t want to think about any of that. I can easily remember how I was all on my own, I don’t need the reminder from anyone else. I was the biggest bitch, a monster. A person I never want to be again.

  With my dad finally paying for everything he did, finally breaking down and telling the truth about all of it, even telling them about Tim and what happened with us, the wheels started moving and he was taken away. That’s another thing that happened around the same time my dad confessed. Tim’s paying too, but not for the things that happened with us as kids. He’s paying in the way Daniels wanted me to in the beginning.

  What he did to me and Eric that day in the hall, what he’s been doing for years, he’s paying for it all. The way I think I should have, even if everyone sees it differently.

  I can talk about it now, open up without fear of the way people are going to react. Eventually, I’m hoping I’ll get to a point where the flashbacks will stop and the reminders of them and the nightmare I’ve lived will vanish forever, but I’m not stupid enough to think it’s gonna happen overnight.

  I’m prepared for the long haul. One step at a time and the control he had, it will be mine again.

  “You know you missed her.”

  “Yeah, about as much as I miss getting beat on by random guys.”

  I’m not the only one that’s changed. He has too. It’s something we’re both learning about as we go. He can joke about what his father put him through now. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to do it, but its nice hearing him able to.

  If Dillon’s happy and surviving his own nightmare, then it gives me hope that I’ll be able to do the same thing eventually.

  He pulls into the parking spot and turns the car off and looking up, taking in where we are, I’m not sure how I feel.

  Edgewood Bluffs.

  The place where Frank took video and pictures of me. The pictures that he then posted online, giving the police even more to use against him. Not only was he going to pay for everything he did to me privately, but now he had child pornography charges to add to the mix.

  It’s not just the place where bad things happened to me though. It’s become more than that and Dillon bringing me here, I don’t feel right about it. The only person that I want to be here with wants nothing to do with me.

  Eric.

  “In a week, will you come back here with me and release the butterflies?”

  It’s hard to believe that happened a little over a month ago. We never did come back here and release them and thinking about that just makes my heart hurt. It’s something that I wanted to do, but will never get the chance to now that things are so different.

  I wonder what happened to the butterflies. Did he come back here and release them on his own? Will I ever get to ask him about it or will it be like every other thing inside my head about him and remain a regret?

  “You gonna get out or are we just gonna sit in here all night?”

  “Why did you bring me here?”

  “You want the truth?”

  “No, Dill. I want you to lie to me.” I roll my eyes and he laughs. “Yes, I want the truth.’

  “Eric told me what happened to you here. The memories you have of the place. A few weeks after that fight in the barn that Cadence and Kayden found me in, I went back out there. I had to confront what happened. It’s the only way I could move on.”

  “So, you brought me here to do the same?”

  “Yeah, in a way, but not exactly.”

  “So why then?”

  “To make better memories.”

  Better memories. Another reminder of Eric. I need to just come to terms with the fact that everything that happens is going to come back to him. Nothing else before he knocked me down in Dr. T’s office that day is worth remembering. Everything else is what matters.

  “Come on, let’s go for a walk and watch the boats come in or something. I know my car is awesome, but this will be better.”

  Going along with what he wants even though it’s the last thing I’m in the mood for, I close the door behind me and wait until he makes it around to meet me. Walking side by side all the way through the near vacant parking lot until we’re near the trees I walked through the last time I was here, I stop.

  This is too much. I’m going to come out on the other side, onto the rock pebble path and remember even more of what happened the last time I was here. Watching Eric from far away as he put caterpillars into the bag, one after the other, not a care in the world. The way everything about him looked so natural and peaceful that coming up behind him and interrupting seemed wrong.

  I can’t relive this. I’m not worried about reliving the stuff that happened with my dad. A million different flashbacks of that time could hit me right now and it wouldn’t matter. It’s the time with Eric that I don’t want to think about. What I want to run from because I know I’ll never have it again.

  I ruined it the way I thought I would and I hate myself for it.

  “Ames, are you alright?”

  “I can’t do this.”

  “Yes, you can. I promise you that you can. Just a little further.”

  He seems so sure and I wonder why. Is t
his another thing that because he’s gone through it, he just knows will work out the same for me or is there more to it? With Dillon, this version of him, I don’t think I’ll ever know and I’m pretty sure if I ask, he wouldn’t tell me anyway.

  “Unless there’s a guy standing on the other side of those trees putting caterpillars into bags so that he can take them home and watch them change, I can’t do this.”

  His face lights up as he smiles and there’s something about how easily he did it that makes me think there’s more going on here. He didn’t bring me here to help me confront the past. He did it for a different reason. One that he needs to tell me about before I take another step forward.

  “What’s the real reason you brought me here?”

  “I told you.”

  “You mean you lied to me.”

  “No Ames, I didn’t. I really did bring you here to make better memories. So stop stalling and come on.” He says with a small laugh before grabbing onto my hand and dragging me the rest of the way through the trees until we’re standing completely on the other side, the rocks of the path under our feet.

  It’s when we finally stop and I look up that I see what he was getting at and why he was in such a hurry to bring me here.

  He was telling me the truth after all. He really did bring me here to make better memories and the person standing on the rocks about five feet in front of me, his eyes straight ahead and locked on me proves it.

  Eric. He’s here.

  Eric

  I’m so freaking scared right now.

  There was a point last week where I didn’t think I’d ever get to do this. Even after spending every waking minute locked away in my room, watching all ten of them break free and begin flying around, their change complete, I still had doubts I would reach this moment.

  I’m standing on the rocks where she found me the last time we were here together. I’m waiting for Dillon to show up with her, returning the favor from a few months ago when I helped him with Cadence and I’m doing everything I can not to shake from the sheer anxiety I feel over what’s going to happen when she shows up.