36. Brielle.
Chapter thirty-six
Brielle.
“ A ubs?”
Aubrey's voice was groggy. She was obviously still sleeping. She was only an hour ahead being in Connecticut, after all. “Bean, what's wrong?”
“He's drinking.”
Silence
“Aubs…are you still—”
“Yeah, I'm here. Um. Why? How? How did you find out?”
I told her the entire story, and from how she sounded, I could tell I was now on speakerphone.
“I don’t know what to do,” I cried. “I love him, but I can't… I can't fucking do this again.”
I didn’t even know if she could understand me; I was sobbing. Breathing between every word because I just couldn’t get the words out any other way.
“Brielle.” Link’s voice took over. I could hear Aubrey lightly crying in the background. “Can I talk to him?”
“I left. I am in Aubrey's room.” It’s not really Aubrey’s, but it's where she stayed when she was here. But I knew he would know what I meant.
“I am booking a flight and coming to get you,” Link said.
“No, I don’t know if I want—”
“It wasn’t a question,” Link said sternly. “I will tell you when to pick me up at the airport. I want to see Mom and Dad and talk to Elijah, but we will leave as soon as possible. So be ready.”
I heard Aubrey whisper, “Thank you.”
“Anything for you girls,” he whispered back to her. “Brielle, am I clear?”
“Yeah. I have to help your mom this morning, but I will be ready after that.”
“Okay. See you soon. Aubrey loves you.”
“I love her too,” I whimpered.
“Bean. We will be with you through this.”
With that, we hung up, and I curled into the bed and brought the blanket up to my face. My phone began to buzz. I couldn’t look at it. I knew who it was. But all I could do was cry.
I never went back to sleep. I got dressed and went to the kitchen so Liza and August wouldn’t know anything was up, or so I thought.
As I was placing the name tags at each seat, Liza leaned into me. “Do we need to talk? I heard you come in this morning. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I heard some of the conversation you had with Link.”
I gave her a grateful smile. “I don’t think so.” I paused momentarily and sat down. “But I won't be staying. Link is coming today to get me. I don’t know what will happen from here.”
She took the rest of the tags out of my hand and gripped our hands together.
“You don’t need to talk to me, but your mom would slap me silly if I didn’t push a little.” She rubbed her hand over my cheek. “Tell me what happened, sweetheart?”
Tears burned my eyes as I looked up at her. “I think I need to let him figure this out on his own.”
She pulled me into a hug. “Oh, sweetie.”
She hugged me for what felt like forever, not even attempting to pull away until I did.
“You will both come out of this better. I just know it.”
I looked down at my hands in my lap. “I hope you are right because he is an amazing person. He deserves to beat this illness. He really deserves the world and more.”
She lifted my chin, and my eyes found hers. “Oh, beautiful girl, so do you.”
Elijah
I knew I couldn’t hide it forever. When she wasn’t there, it was easier to hide, because as much as my brother loved me and wanted me to do better, he just didn’t pay enough attention to notice. Not that I wanted him to.
After my accident, a lot of shit went on, and everyone made all these decisions for me—go to AA, go to physical therapy, do your community service work, blah, blah, blah.
I knew all of those things were necessary, but I didn’t even get a minute to myself to think. Brielle set most of it up for me, and whatever she didn’t, my brother or Link did.
I just wasn’t feeling like myself anymore with all those changes. That was, until I met Ryan. She was the one person I could be myself around, and she didn’t judge me for wanting a drink. It was like I had a real friend again.
I hadn’t lied when I told Brielle there really was nothing between Ryan and me. There was zero attraction on both sides. I just wish Brielle would try to understand where I was coming from.
My phone began to buzz on the side table. Of course, it was Link calling. I watched it ring until it stopped. Then my phone buzzed again, but this time it was Aubrey calling. I knew she would be harder on me than Link, so I declined her call and hit Link's name to call him back.
“Hey.”
“You’re drinking again? I thought you had a handle on this?”
I huffed in annoyance. “I do have a handle on it. Brielle just doesn’t understand.”
He was trying to calm himself down. He took a few deep breaths and muttered something I didn't hear. His voice dropped with what he said next, “Elijah. She caught you drinking at four in the fucking morning. What sort of handle do you exactly think that is?”
“I just didn’t want to upset her and didn’t want her to know. Why is that so hard to believe?”
“Jesus fuck, Elijah. It isn’t hard to believe. You are a fucking addict. The issue isn’t—well, okay, it’s part of the issue—but the biggest issue is that you have been lying to everyone. Does Owen know?”
“No. I hid it from him, too.”
He was yelling now, “That’s the fucking issue, dude! You have a huge fucking drinking problem, and you don’t want to fix it.”
“Link, you are not even here. You don’t know what I’m going through.”
“Oh, so your drinking is my fault now?”
“I never said...” I ran my fingers through my hair. “I never said it was your fault. I just…I like drinking. I should be able to do it without feeling bad about it.”
“Not when you are an addict, Elijah. You used to have a hold on it. I don’t know when it changed, but you can’t continue fucking drinking if you want to live a happy, healthy life. It will consume you, ruining all your relationships, in case this situation wasn’t enough proof for you.”
I sat up as a pit began to form in my stomach. “What is that supposed to mean? I didn’t ruin anything.”
“Are you fucking drunk right now? What do you mean you haven’t ruined anything? I am sitting here scolding you like a child, and Brielle left you. What part of that do you—”
I cut him off. “Brielle didn’t leave me. We just had a fight. She will cool down and come back.”
Link huffed. “I am flying back out there today, and Brielle is leaving with me. I am going to drive her back.”
“Like fucking hell you are. She isn’t your wife, Link. Take care of your own shit.”
Without missing a beat, he said, “You and Brie are my shit. You are my best fucking friend, and she is my sister now. I will protect her from anyone and everything. Including you. I will also protect you from anyone, including yourself, Elijah.”
A sense of emptiness filled me. This couldn’t be true; she wouldn’t leave. I wasn’t sure how to respond right away. He didn’t have to protect her from me. I would never harm her.
“I know she isn’t my wife or anything, but I can protect her. That’s my job,” I stated.
“If you took that job seriously, you wouldn’t be drinking.
” He paused. “Elijah, she is inside that house crying her eyes out because she is so scared of losing you. You didn’t see her at the hospital when she didn’t know if you were going to make it out alive.
Seeing you like that absolutely broke her. ”
“I fucking apologized to you all. I promised I wouldn’t do it again. I am doing everything you all wanted me to do. What more do you want?”
He yelled, “How about stop fucking drinking, like you promised? Apologize to yourself and fucking do better, so you can get better.”
“I can’t talk to you anymore. I don’t want to continue having this conversation.”
“That’s the biggest problem of all, Elijah.”
“What is?” I asked.
“You don’t see anything wrong with what transpired this morning, and until you do, you will never get better.”
I hung up without saying goodbye. I couldn’t let her leave. I just had to make her understand that I could handle this and everything would be okay. I could get better. I knew I would get better. I just needed to do it on my own time.
She would see where I was coming from. I knew it.