42. Millie
CHAPTER 42
Millie
I don’t run. But I couldn’t think of anything else that would take my mind off the way I’m feeling right now. If I have to turn my lungs into a heaving, deflated mess just for a fraction of peace in my mind, then so be it.
I keep retracing my morning, wishing that I’d just taken a little longer in the shower, or that my toast had burnt and kept me from looking out the window at that exact moment.
The tenderness in his embrace, the kiss on the forehead, the familiarity as she walked into the main house after him.
Realizing that the ‘something’ that had come up with Caden was another girl nearly broke me in two. I wish I’d never had to see her face, to know how beautiful she is. I’m already lost in the comparison of all of the things she is that I’m not.
I’ve fallen way too deep, hurt myself in ways I promised myself I wouldn’t.
“ Motherfucker !” I check my fit watch, realizing it hasn’t captured the last two hundred metres between here and the staff house. I’m not putting myself through the torture of exercise without at least getting the victory of hitting my step goal.
I start to feel the burn in my calves as I pick up a steady pace, my feet thundering against the asphalt as I make my way towards the trail. Heat sears through my chest. I beg for more of it, figuring that the physical pain will at least do a good job of pushing down the poisonous mixture of emotions tangled up in my gut.
The terrain changes to tree roots and dusty earth as I round the corner and slow to a walking pace, pressing my right hand down into my abdomen, holding back the stitch that’s formed.
“Uch!” I let out a scream, hitting my fist off a tree just off the trail. “Why did I have to be so fucking stupid?”
The first tear falls, and I can’t hold back the ones that follow.
“All I wanted was to be chosen.” I let the broken words fall out into the open air, not knowing who they are for or if anyone is listening. “Why am I never the one that gets to be chosen?”