Their Downfall

by Skylar Heart

  I just want to curl up and cry all day, preferably for the rest of the week, or the month, or the year. But I’m staying strong because I can’t break down right now. I have to stay strong for Elly and for the guys, because they depend on me. If I break down, then everything falls apart. Only, I’m hanging on by a thread as it is and today is going to get a lot worse... The worst is that it won’t just be today, it’s today and tomorrow, two days of this.

  I stand up, clearing off the breakfast table, trying to give myself something to do, but it’s over way too soon and I just need to be doing something. I need to keep moving.

  “Tom.” Dylan’s voice is quiet, but there’s a warning in it, not of danger, but a tone like I won’t want to hear what’s coming next.

  “Yeah?” I don’t turn to him, instead putting my hands on the counter, straightening my back. Bracing myself for his words.

  “Mal. He...” Dylan stops, and then he stands up. “You know what. Nevermind. It’s not important right now.”

  I turn around, not used to him doing this. “What is it?” But he’s already walking out of the kitchen.

  He shakes his head. “Not important. I’ll tell you later.” He goes into the living room and Elly follows him. He turns the TV on and puts on some kid’s show, pulling Elly against him as he sits on the couch.

  I glance at Jake, who also looks confused. What was that about? I sit back down at the table, looking at the one guy here who has no idea what we were like when Poppy was still with us, who hasn’t seen us during our better times... “You must be tired of all this drama.”

  He slowly shakes his head, then meets my eyes straight on. “You’ve all been through so much. I can’t even imagine the pain you feel. But you’ve always managed to survive because you were all together. That’s... That’s a level of friendship I’ve never had before. It may not be happy all of the time, but you’ve got people who care for you a lot.”

  “You had Mia.” I’m not even sure why I say it. I don’t try to be mean, I don’t even feel anything negative towards him because of it, but he does have someone in his life who cares about him a lot, just like he cares for her.

  He thinks for a moment and then shakes his head. “It’s not the same. We’ve always been...” He takes a deep breath, running his teeth over his lower lip, biting down, bringing himself pain and I automatically reach out to him. That seems to pull him back out of it. “We’ve always been dependent on each other. Not because we wanted to, but because we only ever had each other. We didn’t become friends because we liked each other, we became friends because we were the only people around who always had the wish to go to university. That set us apart, not in a good way, so we stuck together. That was the only connection we had, two poor kids who had a dream of getting into a university.”

  “And Oliver.” They have a kid, that’s a pretty significant connection.

  His face falls and he shakes his head. “No. That only pushed us apart, it never brought us together. She blames herself for getting pregnant and it just... No matter how much I try, she won’t let me back into her life. You’ve seen it. You’ve seen how much she pushes me away.” Then he shakes his head quicker, like he’s trying to clear it. “But that’s not... It’s not something we should be talking about. Not right now. It’s... That’s just not important today.”

  Why is everyone telling me that today, when they obviously have something to say, something to share? “But you keep going back to her. She pushes you away and you go back. There has to be some connection between you, or I don’t think you’d be sitting here.”

  He pulls up a shoulder. “She doesn’t see me as a threat, more like an annoying little brother.”

  “An annoying little brother she wants to have sex with.” Which, you know, obvious. She obviously wants him, sexually, what happened between the three of them should clue him in on that.

  “That was... That was the first time I’ve been with her since the summer she got pregnant.” His voice starts to sound like it comes from far away and I don’t know how to react to him for a moment. “Once I went off to uni, we didn’t do anything like that anymore. I’ve not even kissed her since then. None of that. So, yeah, apart from a lapse in judgement last weekend, she’s put me squarely in the ‘platonic’ category.”

  Platonic? I almost laugh at how ridiculous that is. Hell, the girl has the hots for him, but apparently, she’s been able to convince him that she doesn’t. Also, he seems to be the only one she’s been able to convince of it. But nothing I tell him right now will change his mind on that. So I get up. “Still, I’m glad you stayed, for her.”

  He nods, but his mind seems to have gone elsewhere, not really here with me anymore. He can say that we’ve been through hell all he wants, but there’s a pain in him that he doesn’t even want to look at, doesn’t even want to acknowledge... And that may be even worse...

  At least we can mourn and cry and yell out in pain, but I don’t think he even believes that his pain is allowed to come out. Or maybe he doesn’t even realise it’s there, just too used to that darkness, not knowing there can be light in his life too.

  At least we can name our pain, share it, depend on each other, but I don’t think he even knows to do that.

  I hold Elly against me as we cross the road over to the cemetery. It’s not a big cemetery, and it’s at the edge of the town, but still easy enough to reach. There are mostly old graves at the front part, but newer graves to the back.

  Mal is walking behind me, I feel his fingers on the back of my jacket, he’s holding it like he’s some little kid, and Dylan is next to him. Behind them are Mia and Jake. We’re all walking in silence, until we reach Poppy’s grave.

  I put Elly on the ground and give her the flowers I was holding. “Can you put that on Mummy’s grave?”

  She nods, her face so serious, and she puts the flowers near the headstone. Then she leans to the headstone and kisses right next to Poppy’s name, before coming back to me and wrapping her arms around my legs.

  Tears are burning in my eyes, but I keep strong, not letting them go yet, there will be time for that later.

  Mal kneels down next to the grave and puts flowers on it too. “Hello, sweet sister.” His voice breaks and he lets out a sob before wrapping his arms around himself. He rocks side to side slowly, before Dylan goes over and holds him.

  Then Mia steps closer and when I glance at her, my own tears start, as they’re streaming down her cheeks, her lower lip wobbling, and even though she opens her mouth, no sound comes out.

  I reach out to her and pull her against me, hiding my own face in her hair. There’s so much I want to tell Poppy, so many things I wish I could have shared with her. I wish I could tell her that Mia is back. She’s back, she’s back here with us.

  Poppy loved Mia so much, and just watching Mia here at her grave, I remember that no matter how much Poppy loved me, I was always her second love, Mia has always been her first.

  I wonder if it was the same for Mia, if everyone else will always be secondary to Poppy, to the girl who was always making her smile the most. The two girls who looked like a single organism, like they always understood each other even without words. It was creepy sometimes, we used to joke about it all the time, but now... Now it feels like Mia is losing her all over again... Or maybe losing her for the first time.

  “She’s always loved you. She’s always loved you the most,” I whisper into Mia’s hair, not able to get my voice any louder than that.

  “And I failed her.” Mia breaks from my arms and runs off, back to the front of the cemetery.

  Jake meets my eyes for a moment, not looking very surprised, and then dashes after her. Catching up with her before she can get off the cemetery, out into the road, into traffic.

  I want to tell her that I was the one who failed Poppy, I was the one who couldn’t help her out even though I was right at her side. I was the one who failed her. I’m the one who keeps failing everyone.

  My legs wobbl
e and I quickly sit down, taking Elly in my arms. It’s so hard. It’s so hard to be here, to keep living when Poppy isn’t here with me anyone. It’s so hard to keep going.

  I’m not totally on my own, I’ve got Mal and Dylan, and our parents, and the guys from work, but I feel alone, I feel lonely. No matter how much I love my friends, they’ve got enough shit going on in their own lives that they don’t need my crap on top of it. They don’t need taking care of Elly, or the house, or any of the other things, on top of everything they’re juggling by themselves.

  But I’m drowning. I’m slipping away, drowning in my responsibilities, and I don’t know who to reach out to for help.

  I miss you, Poppy. I don’t know how much longer I can keep going without you. This life was never meant to be just for me, we were supposed to share it together, share the responsibilities and also the good times.

  Somewhere, somehow, I had this spark of hope that Mia coming here would make things easier. But it’s only gotten harder... Because I know that saying goodbye to Mia when she goes back to the city, when I’m still not over having had to say goodbye to Poppy is going to be hell.

  I can pretend that I’m okay, that I’m doing well. But I can’t do this on my own, and it feels like the reality is starting to look more and more like I’ll be on my own, forever.

  I need help, and I feel like I’ve got nowhere to turn...

  12

  Jake

  I pull Mia against me tightly, dragging her away from the road. No matter how much she struggles against me, I have to keep her safe. There aren’t many cars that come down here, but it’s better not to take the chance.

  “I can’t.” Her voice is rough, broken, and her hands tighten in my jacket. She’s shaking all over, sobs rattling her body.

  “I’m here.” Tears slide down my cheeks, my breathing rough. To see their loss so raw, to see how lost they all are right now. It’s hard to fathom, it’s hard to even grasp. “You don’t have to do anything. I’m here.” And I’ll be by her side for as long as she needs me, no matter how tired she gets of me sometimes.

  She shakes her head against my chest and then pushes away, looking up at me. There’s an agony in her eyes that I don’t know how to make better. She’s been through too much. She’s been through so much and it’s... I have a feeling that it’s not going to get better any time soon.

  “I’m not supposed to be here. I shouldn’t have come here.” She looks behind me, to the guys, and when I turn around, they’re barely visible over the headstones, all sitting on the ground, close together. “It was wrong of me to come here. I don’t belong here.”

  I want to tell her that she does, that she belongs with these guys, that this is the one place in the world that she belongs, but the words won’t come out of my mouth. I don’t even know how to tell her anything, when I know that my words won’t make a difference right now.

  So many things would have gone differently if we hadn’t started messing around all those years ago, and maybe so much pain that she’s been through, that the guys have been through, could have been prevented.

  Tom was wrong, she doesn’t belong with me, she never belonged with me, and me staying at her side has only brought more problems.

  “I’m going back to the house.” She steps away and turns around. “I just need to think for a while, alone.”

  I want to offer to go with her, but she shakes her head.

  “I need to be alone.” Her voice is stricter than I’ve heard her in a long time, a hidden strength coming to the surface, locking me out, pushing me away. “I’ll see you back at the house.” And she starts walking, her steps measured, a strong stride. I hate it when she pulls that wall down between us, when she locks herself inside, and tries to protect herself from the world around her, when I can’t reach her anymore.

  I take a couple of steps after her, but then stop. Maybe she’s right, maybe she just needs some time on her own. It’s not like me being around her has done her much good in the last week, I’ve seen the pain in her eyes too much to think that me going after her right now would be a good idea.

  She disappears around a bend in the road and I turn back to the cemetery. Even though I’m even less welcomed by the guys, especially right now, at least I can do something when I’m with them, even if it’s just looking after Elly.

  Dylan is the first one to look up when I come over, and as his eyes dart behind me, he starts frowning more. “Where’s Mia?”

  “She went back to the house. Wanted to be alone.” I carefully come over, but even Dylan doesn’t seem particularly upset with me right now. Even though I wouldn’t blame him if he still was. Dylan and Mal may be fuck buddies, but that doesn’t change the fact I went down on the girl he likes and the guy he’s been involved with for years, in a single night. Yeah...

  Mal reaches out and tugs on my jeans. I sit down between Mal and Tom and without even saying anything, the little group comes closer, Tom and Elly on one side and Mal and Dylan on the other and I wrap my arms around them as best as I can.

  No matter how much I’m the reason for some of their problems, I can’t leave right now. I can’t leave them alone anymore. They used to be the guys Mia hung out with during the summer, but in the last week, they’ve almost become like a family to me. A really weird and dysfunctional family, but a family all the same.

  And I can’t leave them alone when they need someone to care for them, and they obviously do, they all need someone.

  They keep trying to help each other, but it’s so obvious that they can’t do it by themselves anymore, that they need someone else with them. They’ve been slowly falling apart for years, and no matter how strange it sounds, it feels like I can maybe help them out right now, even if just a little.

  I’m not sure how long we stay at the cemetery, but when it starts raining, we all get up and stumble out of there as well as we can, our whole bodies stiff. I’m holding Elly, the little girl clinging onto anyone who will hold her today, and we all make our way to the closest place we can stay at. Which turns out to be Dylan’s place.

  He lets us inside and we collapse on and against the couch, all cold and frozen, and Dylan turns the heat up more.

  “I’ll make us something warm to drink.” He goes over to the kitchen, but I also get up, stopping him.

  When I put my hand on his arm, I feel how he’s shaking. “I’ve got this.” Of all of us, I’m still the most alert person. “Maybe you can get everyone some towels?”

  He nods, his eyes dark, pained, almost like they’re a black hole, a pain so deep that it almost looks empty, but it isn’t, there’s just too much.

  I take a couple of deep breaths as I fill the electric kettle and then start grabbing mugs and everything.

  Dylan’s place is so sparse. It’s obvious that he lives here, it’s very ‘lived in’ but it’s not very personal. He’s got all he needs, the bare minimum, but apart from two mugs, which look like they belong to Dylan and Mal, the others are bog-standard white, the plainest ones you can get at the stores. The same goes for everything else I find, plates, cutlery, everything. It’s like he’s living here, but it’s not his home, it’s just a temporary place that he’s been staying in for way longer than he’d originally planned.

  I don’t have as much stuff at my own place, but everything I have is mine, and the place feels like a home, this feels like a temporary solution. Not a home, just a house, just a roof over his head. A place to eat and sleep, nothing else.

  Tom’s place is a total opposite of this, it feels like a home, a real home, but it barely looks lived in. It looks like a place where time stopped, a home that has hit ‘pause’, and has turned into a shell of its former self. He’s got the perfect home, the perfect place to live, but he’s not living in it, he’s surviving, borrowing the time, getting through the days and going through the motions, waiting for something to hit the ‘unpause’ button for him. A temporary state, waiting to return to life, while Dylan is living in a place that was neve
r supposed to be more than a short stop on his way to something better.

  Both their lives are on halt, they’re not able to continue without something changing again, unable to pull themselves out of it. Are they even aware of what they’re doing, or do they not even see it?

  The smell of stale beer hits me even before I feel Mal’s head against my back. “Thank you.”

  “For what?” I make a big pot of tea, pouring the hot water over the bags.

  “For caring.” His voice is soft and his fingers curl up in the back of my jacket, holding on tight. “For caring about us, for caring about Mia.” The last word is little more than a sob.

  I turn around, but he’s not letting go of my jacket, so I awkwardly wrap an arm around his shoulders and try to pull him against me. “It’s hard not to, when you all make it so easy.” I try to make my voice sound light, but it’s not really working. I didn’t want to admit those words to him, they feel too big, too raw, too true.

  “I bet you make a great boyfriend.” It almost sounds like he’s smiling against my shoulder, but ice runs through me, making me still, which makes him move back, looking up at me cautiously. “What’s wrong?”

  I shake my head slowly, trying to not look like I’m breaking apart inside, and then turn back to the tea, dunking the bags under a couple of times. He doesn’t need to know. None of them need to know. I don’t do relationships, none of it. Sure, I have sex with people, I pick them up whenever I feel like I need someone, when I want to satisfy a craving. But I never stay with the same person for more than just a couple of orgasms.

  These guys have no idea about my life back home. Not even Mia knows. She thinks I’ve got a girlfriend or boyfriend once in a while, but in reality, I don’t. I’ve never ‘officially’ had a girlfriend or boyfriend. Before the summer with Mia, I was never into those things, I had other things to do, like getting into university, and my parents were very strict, telling me I had ‘better things to do’ than ‘fooling around’ like the people in my class. That’s why they liked Mia, because she also wasn’t into those things, she was a ‘serious girl’, as far as they knew...