by Vera Hollins
I pressed my lips together, ravaged by pain that festered in the depths of me.
“That night, everything happened so fast, and when he died I felt like I entered a new reality,” he said. “It was like a bloody dimension surrounded with darkness, and everything hurt. Each breath. Each thought. Each movement ripped me apart, and the whole world was so fucking black. So many disgusting faces, all of them ignorant and selfish, continuing their lives peacefully and pretending they cared and understood when they fucking didn’t.”
His breaths came out harsh, his eyes growing colder. He looked like he was losing himself in that old darkness again, and everything in me tensed. I caressed his hand, and he flinched, like he’d already forgotten I was holding his hand. He glanced at it, and it was clear that he was not completely here. He was in his dark memories.
“That day was the worst day of my life,” he continued. “Not the day of our accident, but the day of that funeral.” He hissed and swerved around the car in front of us, passing it. “I wasn’t completely aware of what happened that night, and I still expected Kayden to open his eyes and come back. I even convinced myself it wasn’t real. I convinced myself I was delusional and made everything up. Kayden was okay, and he would be back. Then I woke up that morning and I just... I just...” He took a harsh breath, shaking.
I was afraid for him to continue. This affected him too much, and I didn’t want him to relive all of that again.
“It’s okay,” I tried to say it as calmly as possible. “You really don’t have to continue if it doesn’t make you feel well.”
Suddenly, he pulled to the side of the road and shut the engine.
“Hayden?”
“I just need to stop for a while. I can’t keep paying attention to the road when I’m saying all of this.”
“You don’t have to—”
“I need to. I need to say it. All of it.” He closed his eyes and leaned his head against his headrest. He balled his hands. “That morning the reality finally sunk in, and I thought how wrong everything was. How that should’ve been my funeral. Not his.”
Oh my God. Chills passed down my neck, and my hands grew cold.
“It was too much, and something just snapped in me. It was like I was somebody else. I felt like a walking shell, empty, without emotion. Now when I look back, being that way scares the hell out of me, but back then I felt nothing. There were so many faces at that funeral. Everybody was crying and mourning, but all I was able to think about was how this world was just one big show. Nobody cared. I wanted them all gone. They all stood there like that could change anything, like it meant something, but it couldn’t and it was meaningless.
“And then there was you, right in the middle of it, and when I saw you I just felt...” He gritted his teeth, and I could see his veins pulsating furiously in his neck. “I felt like you were the reason why the world was so fucked up. You forced him to give his life to save me. Because of you, I had no reason to live. Because of you, I didn’t want to live. You were cruel, and you brought pain. I couldn’t stand seeing you live your life normally while everything was falling apart.”
My chest was burning; my whole world was shaken to its very foundation. He kept his eyes shut, and his chest rose and fell rapidly.
“Then I saw you in his room and that was it. I broke into thousand pieces, and all I heard was noise. All I saw were Kayden’s dead face and lifeless eyes that caused me an unbearable, hammering pain each fucking second...” One tear slid down his cheek. “I couldn’t breathe. I didn’t even know what was right or wrong anymore. All I knew was that I wanted you hurt, gone, broken, anything that would bring sense and make the pain stop.”
He finally looked at me, and his bloodshot eyes revealed guilt, regret, and shame. I dug my nails into my hands, crumbling inside.
“You said you were sorry, and it just made things worse. I thought you were like the rest of them: hypocrites, who would never feel real pain, but they pretended they knew shit. You were going to continue your life like nothing happened, and I didn’t want to let you get away with it... I was far gone when Natalie showed up. And when you fell down it made me feel... Better.” His voice became shrill. He turned his face away from me and pressed his fist against his mouth. “It felt right...” He whimpered. “I was able to breathe again and everything had sense... Your pain made sense and gave me purpose. I wanted you to really feel Kayden’s death, to suffer just like me, and it was the only thing that felt right. That was justice.”
Neither of us said a word for a while, the sounds of downpour surrounding our bubble of heavy silence. It hurt so much. He opened the old wounds and reminded me of the darkness I’d wanted to escape my whole life. I was scared of the unknown. I was scared of all the dangers that loomed in Hayden’s black world.
He looked at me, a cold smile twisting his face as tears slid down his cheeks. “Do you see now? I’m a monster. You could have died, but I didn’t care in that moment.” He shook his head. “There is no justification for that. There will never be any justification for that.”
I looked at my clenched hands. I felt like I was in a nightmare and would wake up anytime soon. I actually knew that—I always knew he hadn’t cared about consequences—and that was why I couldn’t forgive him. Deep down, I knew there was nothing he could say that could make me understand it and get over it. Now he just confirmed it.
“So that’s why I always knew,” he said. “A small part of me always knew that what you did in the hospital two months ago was right. You made the right choice.”
I snapped my gaze up at him, pain coursing through me. He was just looking at me with completely desolate eyes.
“I’m so wrong for you, Sarah,” he said. “And I’m afraid that sooner or later... I will break you.”
Chapter 19
AS WE STARED QUIETLY at each other, it finally dawned on me. I’d never trusted myself. I always thought the worst of myself, not trying even once to believe I could make things right. I thought I was weak, so ashamed of myself, and believed something would break me eventually.
Now I knew how wrong I was. I was the one who created my path, not others, and only I could decide when I was going to fall and never get up again. That was on me, not anyone else.
Hayden was the same. He never trusted himself and had low self-esteem. He was so sure he was going to fail or break me eventually that he didn’t even consider any other possibility. He’d written us off just like Carmen, thinking from the start we were going to fail.
Everything started with trust, and I had to trust myself first so others could trust me.
“You don’t trust yourself at all,” I said. “It hurts me that you think so low of yourself. You need to trust yourself before others can put their trust in you. I was always too hard on myself, especially when I made mistakes, and I never fully believed I could make things right. You don’t think about yourself as anything else but that darkness, forgetting all the good things you’ve already done.”
He looked away. “Those things are nothing compared to each bad thing I’ve done—”
“Please don’t devalue your worth. I’ve told you before about all the great things you’re capable of. Did you already forget that you rushed into my house to save me from Josh? You were ready to... You were ready to die for me.” I pressed my hand against my throbbing chest.
“That doesn’t change anything. I’m still a monster for doing all those sick things to you—”
“Do you regret them now?”
His eyes sliced into me. “Of course I regret them. I hate myself every single minute of my life for everything I’ve done to you. I want to rip my own throat out because of this. I regret everything.”
I believed him, but I felt so conflicted. I still couldn’t forgive him, yet I was aware he wasn’t that Hayden. The darkness was still in him, but even though he never admitted it, he was fighting against it.
“Then you’re not a monster, Hayden. Monsters don’t regret. You made mist
akes, cruel mistakes, but what you do after your mistake is what defines you.”
All of a sudden, I felt like a huge weight was lifted off my chest. I realized I’d never forgiven myself for my mistake, and my black and white way of thinking influenced the way I regarded myself. I made such a terrible mistake the night Kayden died, so I was a bad person and I deserved to suffer. This was why some part of me always believed I deserved every awful thing Hayden and others had done to me.
I never stopped to think out of that black and white frame. I never thought we were only humans, and we were bound to make mistakes. I finally understood we should learn from them and forgive ourselves. We should use them to become better people.
“Strangling you in my house was more than a simple mistake, Sarah.”
“But you already explained why that happened. It wasn’t intentional.”
His expression was bitter. “That doesn’t make me any less guilty. And to think you thought I wanted to kill you...” He rested his head against the headrest, growing tense. “It hurts. I can’t blame you for feeling that way because I’ve really fucked you up, but it still hurts.”
I wrung my hands together. “I know, but at that time, I expected the worst from you. I was terrified of you, and when you strangled me... I really thought... I thought you wanted me to die.”
The look he gave me sent shards of pain straight through me. “I never wanted you to die, Sarah. Never. Even after all that pain and hate, even when I hated you the most, I needed you in my life. I needed you to exist so your suffering could fuel my existence. Sick, right? Only later, I realized how wrong it was of me not to feel anything when you fell, and it hurt more than anything. It was a new pain that was killing me on the inside. Losing you just like Kayden... Shit.” He cried out and hid his face from me, pressing his forearm against his eyes.
I felt terrible seeing him like this. “Hayden—”
“I’m a horrible person. I’m the worst.”
“That’s not true—”
“It’s true. I’m a disease that only makes everything worse. I destroy everything—”
“No! You—”
“I deserve to die. I—”
“Enough!”
My heart shattering, I snatched my seat belt off and brought my arms around his shoulders. He stiffened, but I didn’t let that discourage me. I buried my head into his neck, inhaling his smell that I loved so much.
“Stop devaluing and blaming yourself! You and I always blame ourselves, but we have to stop doing that. It’s just a waste of time. It doesn’t lead anywhere.”
The artery in his neck pulsated madly against my skin, and I took another inhale of his scent. His body relaxed, but he still didn’t move. I turned my head and pressed my lips against his neck, lost in the moment.
“Sarah...,” he breathed out, his pulse getting even faster, which was encouragement enough. I moved my lips over his skin, reaching his throat, and stopped there. “You...” He shifted on the seat. “That feels good.” He wound his arm around me and held me close to him.
“You like when I kiss you here?” I whispered, my lips lingering over his skin. I was so hungry for this, for his skin against my skin.
He moaned and tilted his head backward. “I love you kissing me there.” My breathing hitched. I closed my eyes, kissing his neck slowly as his breathing accelerated. He brought his other hand to my cheek and caressed it. “Fuck. If you keep doing that...”
I didn’t stop. I continued over his jaw and cheek to his scar, leaving a butterfly kiss on the silky line. I leaned away to look at it and smiled.
“I’ve wanted to do that for a long time,” I admitted quietly, tracing it with my fingers gently.
He was still, very still, his eyes black with desire. In a heartbeat, his lips were against mine, savoring me. I held onto his shoulders as our kiss grew heated, reveling in the feeling of his taut muscles beneath my hands. All my numbness disappeared, and all I could think about was how good and right this felt. My whole body tingled as we molded together, and I needed his nearness...
His phone rang, and I flinched. Our moment was ruined.
He groaned, drawing back. “Just great.” I turned away to put my seat belt back on, breathing heavily. He took his phone and answered. “Blake, you have a really bad timing.”
“Man, where are you? I thought we were going to meet before classes,” I heard Blake say.
Oh no. I was so absorbed in Hayden that I completely forgot about school. I looked at the time on the dashboard and saw that we had only five minutes until first period.
Hayden looked at me. “I’m busy with something.” I blushed, glancing away.
“Are you coming at all?”
“Yes, dad. Do you want a full report?”
“Fuck you.” I grinned. Someone had a short fuse.
“Fuck you too. We’ll talk later.”
“Suit yourself.”
The line went dead, and Hayden stuffed his phone back into his pocket. “He’s annoying sometimes.” I stared at him with a smile plastered on my face, surprised he would say this to me. He was being friendly, and I wished it could always be this way. “No. He’s always annoying.”
He started the engine and returned us to the road.
“But you can’t live without him,” I said.
“Says who? He can go to hell if he wants. I wouldn’t miss him.”
“Yeah, right,” I replied with a chuckle. I was stunned at how things progressed in this direction. I could still feel his lips on mine, his kiss forever embedded in my skin.
But then I remembered what he said earlier about me living my life normally after Kayden’s death, and my smile fell.
“What?” he asked, picking up on the change in me.
“You know... I never lived my life normally after Kayden’s death. I’ve always hated myself for making such a stupid, careless mistake. That is why when you... When you strangled me in that hallway, I felt... I felt like I deserved it. I felt I should’ve died, and it would be justice.”
He glanced at me, his face completely serious. “You didn’t deserve it. You didn’t deserve anything. Don’t ever say such a stupid thing.”
I nodded at him, a sprout of gratitude replacing the heaviness that had lodged in my chest.
“I told you how I felt then,” he said. “I told you I never went into his room again after his funeral. I couldn’t. And when I did, I felt so powerless. He wasn’t there—he would never be there again—and I couldn’t cope with my emotions. Everything was screaming in me and...”
His knuckles were white as he clenched the steering wheel. He turned into the school grounds and headed to the parking lot, his arms shaking with tension. We reached his parking spot, and he shut off the engine. He didn’t look good.
“I’m so scared that one day I’d really mess something up, and you would be terribly hurt. That’s how fucked up my mind is—”
“No, don’t think like that.” I took my seat belt off and hugged him. “You won’t do that. You’re stronger than that.”
“You don’t know that! You don’t know me.”
“I know you enough to say it. You fought against it then. You stopped. I believe in you, Hayden.”
“You do?” he asked with a mixture of suspicion and hope in his voice, and it resonated right through me.
I pulled away to look at him. “I do.”
His gaze softened. He cupped my cheek with his hand. “Thank you. Thank you for believing in me. I need this.”
“You’ll always have it.”
The heavy rain had ebbed into a drizzle, and the dark clouds had slowly drifted away. It was like the storm within us that was temporarily coming to a standstill. I enjoyed this time spent with Hayden, and even though hearing his truth hurt, I was glad I finally heard it. I just needed some time to think about it and deal with all my emotions. I took my backpack, when he caught my hand.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “My apology is worthless after everything,
but I want you to know I’m sorry. I’m aware of my mistakes, and I’m trying my hardest not to repeat them.”
I nodded with a smile. “Thank you. Thank you for telling me all of this. I understand how difficult it is for you to open up like this, and it means a lot to me. It helps me understand our past better.”
He didn’t answer, taking in each inch of my face. His intense gaze made me blush, and a pleasant tingle settled in my chest. I was so close to him that I could see every tiny spot and line on his face. The bruises on his face were far from fading, but all I saw was how attractive he was.
“We’re going to get wet,” he said, his eyes lingering on my lips, and I blushed.
“What?” I croaked.
Noticing my discomfort, he burst into laughter. “Shit, this hurts.” He clutched his stomach, trying to ease the pain from his ribs, but he didn’t stop laughing. “Wet from the rain, Sarah. We’re going to get wet from the rain.” He laughed harder, cursing at the same time.
“Yes. Of course we’re going to get wet from the rain. It’s raining,” I mumbled in a bid to cover my embarrassing mistake and pulled the hood of my jacket over my head, but he didn’t want to let it go that easily.
“You have such a dirty mind, you know that?”
My eyes grew wide. I hid my face behind my hoodie, totally ashamed. Why my blush wouldn’t go away? “No, I don’t,” I bit back.
He moved my hood inches aside and whispered into my ear, “I love that.”
Pleasure flicked low in my stomach, and I felt unusually hot. I had to get a grip on myself. “I think we should get going.”
His eyes shone with amusement. “Why are you in such a hurry? We’ll get to class right on time.”
“I’m not. I’m just making sure we aren’t late,” I mumbled, embarrassment coating my words.
“Who cares? It’s just one class.”
“Yeah, well, some of us care about their attendance and all.”
He rolled his eyes and snorted. “Right, because attendance is the most important thing in the world.”