2. Harden
A urora Gray is like the sun. Too big, too bright, too fucking beautiful .
She’s the kind of person that people like me should avoid.
I’m tainted in so much darkness that even she isn’t enough to enlighten me, no matter how hard she tries.
I wish I could forget her, erase her stains of goodness from my soul where she forcibly imprinted them, but it’s impossible.
She’s just too fucking perfect, and as I lay next to her, watching her sleep, I can’t help but wish she’d have withered away in the year we’ve been apart.
A year. Three hundred and sixty five days, it’s nothing in hindsight, not after a decade of friendship.
Especially when I’ve spent nights in the dark where ten-minutes felt like a fucking lifetime, but I try not to think about those.
Instead, I think about her, just like I did during those dark nights, and every other fucking night too.
Except for the last year where I tried to force myself to forget about her, yet she plagued my mind for every fucking god damn second of it.
I knew I wouldn’t get over her, Aurora Gray isn’t the type of girl you just get over.
No, instead she is the epitome of hope, and I’m fucking hopeless.
She has given me nothing but sunshine from the moment I first met her, and when I spent my entire childhood molded in the dark, I can’t help but be fascinated by her bright burn.
It’s why I’m here, it’s why after almost a year of no fucking contact, I followed her home under the guise of making sure she was safe.
A thought that’s laughable really, because how safe can she be when I am laying by her side?
I couldn’t even protect myself, so how could I ever hope to possibly protect her?
She was already half asleep as I helped her out of her dress and tucked her into bed, thanks to all the vodka she drank.
An unusual feat for her, but sometimes going toe to toe with Everest requires some liquid courage.
I should have left, I know that, I should have turned around and walked out and kept this dark, barren hole between us, but like I said, sometimes the warmth is just too tempting.
Now here we are, her tucked into my side yet still not touching me, as if even in her unconscious state she can tell I can’t bear it.
And me pretending this small slither of time with her is enough to cure the heavy ache of emptiness inside of me.
Her head rests on my shoulder as my fingers dance along her arm, stroking the smooth expanse of skin she has on display and committing it to memory, because this is all I can ever have of her.
Not because I don’t want her, and not even because of my loyalty to my best friend and his once drunken admissions and demands.
No, I can’t have her because the light and the dark were only ever meant to coexist, not collide, and I refuse to drag her down to hell with me.
Not when I’m already there in every sense of the word.
Once the sun starts to filter through her curtains it isn’t long before she starts to stir, a hazard of all her early mornings spent volunteering over the years, and I quickly snatch my hand away and settle back onto her other pillow.
I know the moment she senses someone else in her bed, because her body tenses as she stretches out, her panicked eyes flying open to meet mine.
“Harden,” she whispers in surprise, no doubt trying to remember how we got here, she never was a good drinker, and I have to fight against the feelings my name on her lips evokes.
Like it means something, like I matter.
I walked you home . I quickly sign, her eyes rapidly following the movement like always, as the tension slowly leaves her body.
Sign language is my main form of communication with everyone, choosing that over speaking ninety nine percent of the time, and for the most part it’s easy.
Everyone close to me learned to sign at the same time I did, making it easy for us to still talk without actually talking if we need to.
I can talk, like physically I am able, there is nothing wrong with my vocal cords, but I’ve learned the hard way that physical injuries don’t always cut the deepest. So for the most part I remain silent, more than comfortable in hiding in the background and being overlooked, except when it comes to her.
Aurora has always crossed the boundaries I set, choosing to take it a step further, leaving me notes that quickly turned to letters as we got older.
Our own secret way of communicating, and I don’t think she will ever know just how fucking silent my world has been without them.
It doesn’t matter how many times I read the old ones that I keep in a box under my bed, my mind still yearns for more.
“Right, yeah, of course you did,” she sighs, scrubbing her hands down her face, as if trying to pull the memories of everything that happened last night to the forefront of her mind.
“Well, I’m sorry I fell asleep on you.” She adds as an afterthought, as she takes in our proximity and pushes away from me instantly.
She doesn’t realize that lying beside her, with her head on my shoulder, is the safest I’ve felt in years.
“But you shouldn’t be here,” she rushes out, her tone a little sharper, as she pushes off the bed and quickly grabs a robe from her chair, giving me her back.
I follow suit, pushing off her bed and rising to my full height, as she continues to avoid my gaze, and it hurts more than I should allow, especially given how used to pain I am. I move until I am back in her line of sight so I can sign to her again.
We’ve had sleepovers before, Aurora, it’s no big deal.
She scoffs at the reminder. “I think we are a little past the midnight movie marathons we once shared, Harden.” She shakes her head as if that version of me doesn’t exist anymore, when the truth is, I’m not sure any part of me exists outside of her, or them.
Before I can sign anything else she moves to her door and holds it open.
“You should go, I’m sure my stepbrother is wondering where you are. ”
It’s the first time she has ever referred to Everest in that way before and I know his words from last night have cut her deeper than she will ever admit, and she isn’t wrong.
Everest has been blowing up my phone all night, with Griffin even texting me too, to try and do his dirty work, but I left both of them on read.
I don’t care about him right now . I sign furiously, suddenly feeling desperate not to leave her, not after not seeing her for so long, but of course I forgot that even though the moth loves the flame, they still get burnt when they get too close.
“And based on the last year you don’t care about me either, so just go home, Harden, I am not in the mood for any games today,” she snaps, glancing between me and the door, and I have no choice but to walk through it, the void feeling even bigger than ever, especially as she slams the door behind me without a second thought.
Not that I should be surprised, we were just as quick to leave her out in the cold.
Campus is quiet as I make my way back over to Hockey Row, where I live with Everest, Griffin, and our friend, Bishop.
We all went to high school together and outside of Everest, Griffin, and Aurora, he’s my only real friend.
Of course given the early hour the streets are quiet, and I expect the house to be the same, except when I push inside, I find Everest sitting at the bottom of the stairs, sipping from a bottle of liquor.
Drunk, unforgiving blue eyes snap to mine, and it’s as if the weight of the world lifts off his shoulders in my presence.
“Is she okay?” he asks, the words sounding almost desperate, as if they could ever be such a thing coming from him, and it reminds me of the night he told us to stay away from her.
Is she okay? Is she fucking okay? That’s his question?
I’m not sure if he’s stupid or just delusional, but anger churns inside of me.
We stood by her side for ten fucking years, helping her through every stage of her life, protecting her when she needed us most, and then abandoned her because he couldn’t fucking handle what all that meant. Of course she’s not fucking okay.
“Do you even care?” I spit out, startling us both, but the fury inside of me is too much to contain, to try and focus on why I allowed those four words to slip out.
No, she’s not okay, Everest. I sign, and if possible his shoulders slump even further.
We did what you asked and stayed away, but we can’t fucking avoid her forever, not when she’s here now.
I add, and he nods solemnly as his eyes track my hands as they move.
“Don’t you think I know that?” he snaps, throwing back more of the whiskey, his knuckles turning white from how hard he is gripping the bottle.
“Hell, I have my mother on the phone almost every fucking day asking why I haven’t been home, and my brother knows there is something up, but can’t work out what it is, and what do you suppose I tell them?
” he laughs with a shake of his head, reminding me so much of Aurora that it causes me physical pain.
“Avoiding her is the only thing I can do to save my family, so I don’t need your fucking bullshit right now. ”
Griffin appears at the top of the stairs, no doubt pulled from his slumber by the volume of our friend's voice, and I watch as he takes in the scene before him.
“Is everything okay?” he asks, always the one to both encourage and tame our good friend here, but Everest only shakes his head, pushing to his feet and shoving past me, storming right out of the front door without looking back.
When Griffin looks at me I shake my head. Don’t fucking ask . I sign, moving up the stairs toward him until I can head to my room. Of course he follows me, slapping his hand on my door as I try to shut it, not letting it close until he is on the other side of it with me.
“How’s Ro?” he asks, following me as I strip off my shirt and undo my jeans, before shoving them down my legs.
Sad. Mad. Upset. Pick your fucking adjective .
I sign, pulling back my covers and sliding into bed until my spine hits the wall.
It’s the only way I can get any sleep, knowing no one can sneak up behind me and with my eyes on the bedroom door.
A habit I haven’t been able to shake since I was six years old, no matter how hard I try.
“And more fucking beautiful than ever,” Griffin grumbles, throwing himself onto my bed beside me and folding his hands behind his head.
Griffin has been my best friend since I was five, no one in this world knows me better than he does, and even though he doesn’t know my deepest, darkest secrets, the ones too terrible to share, it’s as if his instincts sense them.
He’s always here when I need him, silently offering me the support I am too weak to ask for, and I will forever be in his debt for it.
Do you think she will forgive us for pushing her away? I force myself to sign, even though I’m afraid of the answer, and Griffin turns on his side to meet my stare.
“I think she’s too stubborn for her own fucking good, just like her brother,” he sighs, still looking tired, as his eyes dance between my own and my fingers, and I can’t help but nod in agreement.
I miss her. I tell him, knowing he’s the only person in the world I can admit that to, and he smiles softly, except unlike his normal smile, it’s stained in sadness. I don’t bother adding that I miss what we could have been, but I’m almost certain he can read it in my mind anyway.
“Me too, Haze, me fucking too.”
We don’t speak after that, Griffin falling asleep first beside me, and as I wait for my own slumber to take me, I can’t help but think about what would have happened if we didn’t abandon her.
Would we still be friends? More than friends?
Or would we have still found ourselves in this inevitable stalemate, with the jagged pieces of our hearts making us all bleed?
The thing is, I know about pain and heartbreak.
I know what it’s like for someone to love you and still hurt you, sometimes it feels like that’s all I know, and the problem with that is you always hold out hope that they are going to change.
The reality is that love is toxic, but when you are left out in the cold, it can feel like a thousand hell fires, and well, I’m just too used to the blaze.