“Say what?”
“I don’t know if I’m going to stay in Atlanta,” she repeats as she opens her own car door because I’m rooted a few feet away.
“I heard you, but why?” I ask again when I finally get in the car. My hands shake as I crank my engine. She’s going to run again, bolt from me again—from us. Fuck that.
“I may want to travel, I may want to sign up for Nurses Without Borders, or I may just want to leave. I don’t know what the future holds.” She turns the volume up and halts all discussion, like she didn’t just throw a damn bomb in the car. But I’m not doing this shit any more. I’m bringing it all out. Communication in the past sucked between us. We hid shit that we both didn’t like and pretended it would go away, only it never fucking did, and that’s not ever going to happen again. Trust and friendship. This shit right here is what she wanted, and she’s going to get it.
I flick the volume down. “Why do you really want to take a lease that short? And don’t think about lying to me, Hads. Friends don’t lie.”
She glances out the window, her shoulders jumpy, and pulls in a deep breath. “The trial is coming up, and after that, I may not want to stay anywhere I lived before.” She loses all the animation in her voice.
“Hads, don’t let those fuckers have any more pull over you.”
“It’s easier said than done.” She stares down at her hands in her lap. She’s biting the inside of her cheek, nervous and humiliated about what she just admitted.
I pull her chin up, pushing her hair behind her ears. “We all got shit we live with, mistakes that haunt us, but you are bigger than anything they did to you. Hads, you’re a damn fighter, more than me. So fucking fight them.”
“Reed, I’m working on it.” She may have said those words but her damn brows pulling together prove otherwise. Whether she believes it or not.
“If you are working on it, then why the fuck run?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then if you don’t know, don’t go. You’ll be cheating yourself. You got me?”
It takes her a few moments for her eyes to show understanding, but they do. “I got you.”
“Now which shithole do you want to lay your pretty head in now?”
And a small-ass laugh comes out of her mouth, but it’s a fucking laugh at me, not with me. Either way, it’s the best damn music to my ears I have ever heard. “Can we go look at better places? That I can pay by the year?”
With each new day I’m back, I know my judgment to come home was the right one. Therapy is pushing me forward, and my family—minus the whole Mark fiasco—has been supportive in each step I take. But Reed is the piece that makes this whole thing right. The doubt if Reed and I could make it just as friends vanished the day he turned up at my brother’s to look for places with me. Our friendship was cemented with each night, chatting over nothing during dinner. Every new item I bought for my apartment, I had him by my side to make fun of or give a snide remark on each and every purchase made.
We spend each early sunrise jogging in sync next to each other with no words spoken between us. I have a new love for a joke of the day, and I have to text it to him when the clock strikes midnight and a new one shows up on my phone. That way, he has something to look forward to when he wakes up.
We’ve shared too many laughs to count, too much time being stupid and silly together, too many new memories being created. In my wildest dreams, I wouldn’t think it possible after I spotted him a month ago in the kitchen at Courtney’s.
But the things we don’t say still remain among us, the things we both ignore like they don’t exist.
When he focuses a little too long on me to deem it as just friendship, and I can see what he really feels for me, or every time my fingers accidently graze him and it sends a shockwave through my system, it can be difficult to bear. Or every time he gets in his car after dropping me off, I want to scream and shout out never to leave me, because the shadows of the love we have are always going to darken the good times.
But that’s not where we are at, not where I need to be.
Reed showed up this morning at Matt’s before the sun even rises, his arms loaded down with enough coffee and doughnuts for everyone, and behind him stands five of his biggest guys from the gym ready to move the rest of my stuff out of my storage unit and into my own place.
He set me up because he knows I hate the actual moving part but after three hours of my ass glued to the kitchen counter, with nothing to do but point and boss where I wanted everything placed, I became stir-crazy and I kicked them out.
I was left alone, I had my own place, my own home, and I loved it.
I tilt my head to the side, the hammer still in my hand, and stare up at the picture over my sofa. It dawns on me I’ve never truly lived by myself, ever. I went from my parents, to the dorms, to my place with Reed, to Atlanta with Courtney, to Bennett always at my place, and back to Reed again. Only to live with James in Columbia and back with Matt when I came back here. As I look around my place, I know this is right, a step in a great direction. I have one hundred percent control over where everything is going, not one compromise on where my sofa’s is positioned, no arguing if a picture is right in this place or that place, if the cups should be above the dishwasher or by the fridge, and not one single fight over what to watch on television, or if I want to fall asleep with music or the fan on—it’s my decision. Every single one of them is what I want. No compromise over any of it, no give or take, no push or pull.
It’s all me, all mine. And I like it—I love it.
My back hits the hard metal chair and a cold chill runs through my body. I’m in a room, in the basement of a church, staring at the old cement wall, anxious and waiting. I’ve drunk my coffee so fast the cup still feels warm in my hands, waiting at my first group meeting since my time in treatment. Graham suggested it would be good for me to go, and somehow, I don’t think it was really an option for me not to come. In our sessions together, Graham pulls more out of me, stuff I didn’t know I still had buried.
But tonight I think some things need to be buried as I’m surrounded by all different people from all walks of life. They look nothing alike, but yet all of them talk with each other like they are best friends…but I’m not included. My lips are zipped shut, because if I open them, I’ll puke all over the tile. I stare at the clock on the wall, the broken clock that gives no sense of time. The anxiety doesn’t just root in me, it grows damn trees inside with each word spoken from strangers waiting.
Graham walks in, more casual than I’ve ever seen him, wearing just jeans and a t-shirt. The chair he sits in slides against the floor as all conversation stops, waiting for him to speak.
He clears his throat a couple of times before he talks. “I’m Graham, and I’ve gotten nine years clean under my belt and have been running this group for about five of those years. We have some new faces here, so I wanted to go over the rules and what we are about first. Then we’ll start with the sharing part so everything is clear and out in the open. We are a sober support group, not NA, not AA, so we don’t follow the steps here, but we share our stories, or troubles. Whatever you want, whatever you feel comfortable with, we will take. Rules are simple—no judgment, no talking with anyone about what happens in here when you’re outside this room. It’s a safe place. And the last rule is—we support each other. Everyone agree to these things?” A few nods, and a few yesses are spoken. “Who wants to start?”
A younger man across the circle from me raises his tattoo-filled arm. “I’m Xavier. People call me X, and I’ve been sober for almost two years, but yesterday, I wanted to slip so damn bad. I went to my daughter’s chorus performance and I was so fucking excited. I mean, she is taking after what I love to do. What father wouldn’t be proud of that? When it was over, I had the biggest smile waiting for her. I had this huge bouquet of flowers for her, and I couldn’t wait to give them to her. But…as soon as she ran into her stepfather’s arms and screamed ‘daddy’ wi
th her face buried in his neck, so excited about the one single daisy he gave her, I was gutted. I went over and handed my ex my daughter’s flowers and kissed my daughter on the head—the one tucked on ‘her daddy’s’ shoulder, and she only glanced up and said a simple ‘Thanks, X.’ That’s all. I couldn’t get out fast enough. The urge was calling to me that if I went and got high, I could forget it all, that I could forget that the reason she calls him daddy is because of what I did. It would have been my life; my daughter would have been doing that to me if I got my shit together sooner than later.”
“What did you do afterward?” Graham asks.
“I hopped on my bike and drove around for hours, and somehow I ended up at my sponsor’s house.”
“X, that’s good. You remembered your problems will still be there after you get done with your high. You just have to keep showing up at the events, keep proving to your daughter you are there to stay. And stay sober,” Graham says, and I nod with everyone as we all agree.
After Xavier, one by one, people start to share their stories, too. Some are god-awful and make me want to jump over and hug them, and some are just plain sad, to the point I’m glad they’re alive. And then some are just like mine. But I found that in this room, we all have one thing in common—our inability to cope with things normally. For a long time I was consumed with what I was going through and was curious to see if others’ stories could help me, but not anymore. Maybe I need it, maybe I could help someone, but I’ll never know for certain if I don’t open myself up to people.
Everyone shared something except me, and right when I think I’m forgotten, Graham looks over at me with an encouraging smile and the nail hits me when he speaks. “We have one more tonight. Hadley.”
I straighten my posture, the cup in my hands long crushed, and clear my throat before I speak. “Okay, yeah. Hi, my name is Hadley. But I guess you already know that.” A tight grin forms on my face. “Mmm, not really sure what to say, or where to even start.”
The blonde girl next to me, Beth, touches my arm then whispers softly in my ear, “Really, just whatever, girl, we all had to do this.”
I shift in my chair, but no matter which way I move, I can’t get comfortable and a chill goes down my spine as I speak. “This seems so silly compared to all of your stories. I grew up in a great home, with great parents, and I had everything. I mean everything handed to me I could ever imagine, including their love. Our house was filled with it. Yeah, okay.” I take a deep breath as Beth reminds me no judgment, but that thought does nothing to help the quivering in my stomach. “My boyfriend and I were two totally different people from two different worlds, but it worked for us—opposites attract and all that. Wow, did I fall fast and hard for him. It was perfect, truly…at least I thought it was. Till he left and I was okay—well, not okay, but getting by.”
I focus all my energy on a single dot on the floor and I let the rest of my story spill out. “After he left, I found out I was pregnant, and the very same night, I lost my baby. After that, I found something that you know…helped me fill that void that was suffocating me each damn day that passed.” I stop and tighten my fists together and my chest squeezes with the memories of what I truly lost. “One thing led to another and I started taking uppers with downers and I overdosed. I don’t remember much except the tube being shoved down my throat and that god-awful taste as my stomach was getting pumped and…I thought that was my wake-up call—but it wasn’t, and I was sadly mistaken. I went through life getting better, but in looking back, I was only pretending… I’m good at that pretending part.” I give a little laugh to break up the heaviness, but it has zero humor behind it because this part of my life isn’t funny. It’s downright hideous.
“I met a guy, Bennett, and he gave me a high in himself, and yes, we did drugs together, but it wasn’t just that though. It was the hold he had over me that I really craved, that was really my drug. Each fight we would get into was my own personal high. Each time heated words were exchanged it would numb and bring me alive at the same time. We were the definition of toxic. I would even pick the fights instead of running from them to curb the urge. I was deep in this self-destruction hole, but my mom got sick and that’s when things started to change in me. I felt the want to stop, and I did…but only after one really bad argument with Bennett, that left me with a broken wrist, did I really leave.
“Then Reed came back into my life and I felt…whole for the first time in what seemed forever. Who wouldn’t want to have the one back who’d made it all better?” And God, did he. I take a jagged breath into my lungs. “But one thing led to another and things were done between us. Over. I didn’t understand. And instead of handling it like, you know, talking or fighting…like a normal couple, I ran off, and the first thing I searched for was that damn high and I got it handed right to me—only it was by my ex. But fucked up or not, I knew it wasn’t a good idea, yet that feeling I craved was the only decision I needed to make, and all other judgment calls went out the window with the first hit I took.
“My ex and Reed’s ex played all of this out to try to get money from Reed and kill me.” I puff air out, tensing all my muscles. “Anyway, I stared into the eyes of what my death could have been, by the hands of people that truly hated me, and I couldn’t do it anymore, the escaping, the urges. I didn’t want it. That control that slipped away when I got high. It disgusts me how I could have ever thought of wanting to come close to that again. So yep…that’s my story.”
The heat of the people around me, sharing my story, causes beads of sweat to form on my forehead. I wipe away the perspiration from my cheeks and glance down and see it’s not sweat but tears that cover my hand. My emotions literally poured out of me, and I didn’t even feel them.
Everyone hears my words and locks their gazes on me, and I glance around the circle, seeing no pity on their faces, no judgment in their expressions. I only see and feel the understanding of what I went through, what wrong turn I took to end up here, because we’ve all been there in one form or another. And we’ve all made some kind of triumph over our demons at least for the time being, and sometimes that time is only for a minute ahead of us, sometimes a few hours, and sometimes a day. Yet it’s still fighting, being the best we can be.
A few minutes pass and words are spoken from Graham, but it just goes in one ear and out the other. People shuffle around. I’m stuck in my chair, in shock that I feel lighter. I’ve replayed it over and said it in my head millions of times, but not once out loud, never—not the whole thing, anyway. Not to Reed or Courtney, nor has James ever heard it all. Still, here I am in a room full of strangers and the weight of my story is lifted from my heart. And somehow, I think this is just another step in the journey of healing.
My legs shake as I stand to toss my coffee cup away and Graham comes up to me. “Do you see why I wanted you to come?”
“Is it to understand that I really do need help?” I ask, shifting from one foot to another.
“We all need help, even ones that have never used it before. But that’s not why. Your story is what happens when people listen to their instincts.”
“No, not mine.” I shake my head. If I’d listened to them then my life would never have gotten this far off course.
“Yes it is. Don’t doubt it. In every drug user’s life there’s a bath scene—a crossroads of some type, and some choose the path where the being out of control part isn’t ever what they want again and they fight their demons without the use of the drugs or the alcohol. They go on and live normal, healthy, happy lives without the urge to get high. And some like me and most of them here picked the path—the wrong path—and kept searching for the high to numb themselves. Those are the ones that will always crave it, and they end up hitting below rock bottom. But if we crawl out of that damn bed of rocks, we can have one heck of a happy life, as well. It’s all about perspective, Hadley. I’ll see you tomorrow at seven o’clock.” He leaves me with a soft pat on my back and thoughts rushing around in my
brain.
My perspective is still cloudy. Things still aren’t right with me. I continue to feel held down by the past, no matter what I shared ten minutes ago, because the heaviness returns, holding me captive to really move beyond my past.
Until I face what happened, I won’t really be free. Will I?
My hands are loaded down with a vanilla milk shake, a bag full of fatty cheeseburgers, greasy fries just waiting to be eaten, and a movie under my elbow. A lazy night at home with Lucy never sounded so good. I drop everything on the table except the milkshake, when a light knock sounds on my door. My Lucy, being Lucy, trips me going crazy causing the milk shake to fall over my chest and down my black shirt, and a loud F bomb leaves my mouth.
The minute I crack open the door and spot the damn boots that used to sit near the end of my bed, Lucy goes even more insane.
“Only for you does she do this. Come on in, I’m going to go change real quick.”
He laughs loud and closes the door. “That gives a whole new meaning to money shots and pearl necklaces.”
I roll my eyes and smile. His mind is always in the damn gutter. “Ha-ha, Reed. I do have to give you credit. It didn’t take long to come up with that one. Anyway, make yourself at home, I’ll be right back”
I’m anxious with him only a few feet away, a single door separating us as he waits. We’ve done pick-ups at each other’s places, but him being in my space with not another person playing buffer mixes up all sorts of feelings in me. The nice outfit I first changed into lays on the bed; it sent too strong date vibes, so I went the complete other way with an old OSU sweatshirt, a black pair of yoga pants, and my hair piled on the top of my head. This is how I would look if Courtney came instead, so it’s what I’m going for.
I step outside my door. The floor is now free of milkshake and Reed made himself at home by sitting on my sofa, feet propped on my coffee table, and his lap now Lucy’s bed.
Fighting to Stay (Fighting Madly Book 2) Page 9
