Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
Ifeel sick and my throat’s raw. Like something has been stuck in it. I try to swallow but it hurts.
“Oh, honey, you’re awake. Thank God. It’s okay. Don’t talk. I’m right here.” My mum appears over the top of me.
My brows furrow. Where am I?
Turning my head to the side, I see my dad. His face is hard and filled with worry. “Here. Sip at this, not too much.” He holds out a plastic cup of water and places the straw against my lips.
I take a small mouthful and cough as the liquid slides down my throat.
“Careful.” Mum runs a hand over my hair.
“What happened?” I can see I’m in a hospital bed, but how did I get here?
“That’s something we’d like to know, Zara,” Dad grunts.
I turn to look at him.
“You took a handful of sleeping pills. Why would you do that? Why the hell wouldn’t you come to me, come to us if you needed help?” He sounds hurt, frustrated, and scared.
“I…” My eyes well up with tears. I can’t stop the flood once it starts. “I’m s-sorry,” I tell him.
“So am I.” He sighs. Leaning down, he presses his lips to my forehead. “I’m so fucking sorry I didn’t see it. I’m so fucking sorry you’ve been going through all of this alone.”
I haven’t been alone, though. Not lately. I’ve had Ares. Oh my god!
“Ares.” I look to my mum as I try to sit up. “Where is he?”
“Don’t you dare fucking move.” Dad’s voice rises. “You’ve just had a procedure to pump the drugs out of your system, Zara. You need to lie down.”
“I need to see him. I need Ares.” I’m starting to panic.
“No, you don’t. What you need is your family and proper medical help, which your mother and I are going to make sure you get. We will get you through this. I’ve already spoken to the doctor you’ve been seeing. We’re finding a more qualified one.”
“I like Dr Finn.”
“Well, whatever she was doing with you wasn’t working.”
“It was. Where is Ares?” I plead with my mother.
“I’ll go get him for you,” she says.
“He’s not coming in here,” Dad cuts in.
“Dominic, a word. Outside.” My mum uses her don’t mess with me tone.
“I’m not leaving her.” My dad points to me. “We could have lost her.”
“And we would have lost her if it hadn’t been for that boy knowing her better than either of us did.” Mum has a pained expression on her face. “We are the ones who failed her, not him.” Mum wipes at her eyes.
I didn’t want this. I didn’t want my parents to blame themselves for my failures. They didn’t do this to me.
“You didn’t fail me,” I whisper.
“Yes, I did. I will never forgive myself for not seeing this. I’m your mother, Zara. I should have known how you were feeling.”
“I didn’t want you to find out,” I tell her. “I didn’t want either of you to know.”
“Why?” Dad asks. “There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you, Zara. If you would have come to me, I would have found you the help you needed earlier. We could have worked through it together. I have never denied you a single thing in your life. Why wouldn’t you trust me to help you with this?”
“Because I didn’t want to admit it to myself. I didn’t want to be a burden any more than I already was,” I admit.
“But you told Ares?” He’s hurt.
“I didn’t. He just knew. He watches me and catches me when I’m not pretending.
He noticed when I’ve been really low and he’s helped me.
He’s the one who found Dr Finn and encouraged me to go to the first appointment with her.
Ares takes me to every single appointment and waits for me to be finished.
He’s not the bad guy you think he is. Please, can you let him in? ”
The door to the room opens and Uncle Marcel walks through it. “You’re awake.”
“Where is Ares?” I ask him. “Can you tell him I want to talk to him? Please?”
“He’s outside. He hasn’t left since he brought you here,” Uncle Marcel says. “I can go and get him.”
“I will,” Dad grunts.
“Thank you.”
“That boy is my nephew, Dom. Remember who he is before you treat him like shit for falling in love with your daughter,” Uncle Marcel warns.
“It’s because of who he is that I don’t want him near my daughter,” Dad retorts.
“Fuck off. You’re not squeaky clean, McKinley. You’re forgetting who’s been the one to help you bury more bodies than we can even count.”
“Okay, you two, out. Bring Ares back in here.” Mum pushes both my dad and my uncle out of the room. Once the door closes, she comes and sits on the edge of the bed. “What can I do? How can I help you?”
A fresh wave of tears falls down my face. “I don’t know.”
“Did something happen? To make these feelings come on? I’m trying to work out what’s caused this? Why would you go to such extremes to try to end your life?”
“Nothing happened. It just started. It wasn’t that bad at first. I’d just feel sad and couldn’t figure out why.
I thought it was hormones, you know. I thought I had it under control.
” I know I took those pills. I really did just want it to end and it would have.
I look up at my mum again. “Who found me?”
“Ares did.”
I close my eyes. “He’s going to hate me. He’s going to leave me.”
“No, he’s fucking not.” The sharp tone has my head snapping towards the door. Ares. He’s here. He looks… tired, worried, heartbroken.
My eyes widen. His heart. I broke it. I sit higher on the bed. “Are you okay?” I ask him.
“No,” he says, walking over to me. “How are you feeling?”
“Like shit. Like I messed everything up. Like I failed,” I reply honestly.
“You didn’t fail. It was a setback maybe. But it’s not your fault. You haven’t messed anything up.”
“Is your heart okay?”
“It will be,” he says. “I was scared. Finding you like that… I never want to see that again, Zara.”
“I’m sorry.”
“It’s… We’re going to figure it out,” he tells me.
“I’m going to grab a coffee. I won’t be long,” Mum says. Then she looks to Ares. “Can you stay? Don’t leave her alone, please.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” he assures her.
As soon as my mum walks out the door, I pull the covers off me, crawl on my knees over to Ares, and throw my arms around his neck. Sobs rack my body. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened,” I tell him. “I’m sorry. I really thought I was getting better.”
“You are.” Ares runs his hands up and down my back. “You’re talking about it. That’s a huge improvement, P. And now that your parents know, maybe you’ll get better help.”
“My dad is going to lock me up in a padded cell.”
“I’ll see if he’ll lock me in there with you,” Ares jokes.
“They’re fighting with each other. My mum and dad, blaming themselves.” I sigh. “I didn’t want that. They’re good parents.”
“I know.” Ares kisses the top of my head. “But they should have been able to see how much you were struggling, Zara. I could see it.”
“You stare at me a lot, though.”
“I appreciate beauty when I recognise it.” He smirks.
“I’m sorry you had to find me like that.”
“I’m glad I found you when I did. I’m sorry I wasn’t there earlier,” he says.
“It hurts. I hate this feeling. The sadness. I want it to go away. I just wanted it to all go away.”
“I know,” he tells me. “I have something for you.”
“You do?”
Ares pulls a small pink box from his pocket and hands it to me. “Happy birthday, P.”
“What is it?”
“Open it and you’ll find out.” He chuckles.
I remove the lid of the little box and a beautiful rose-gold butterfly pendant on a matching chain stares back at me. There’s a pink stone on the left wing of the butterfly. “It’s so beautiful.”
Ares picks up the chain, opens it, and puts it around my neck before securing the clasp. “Promise me you’ll always wear this. Never take it off,” he says.
“I promise.” I smile up at him. “Thank you. I really don’t deserve this.”
“You deserve the entire fucking world, P. You’re the most generous, kind, loyal person I know. There isn’t anything I could give you that you don’t deserve,” Ares says. “Now tell me one thing you’re grateful for.”
I blink. He remembered the question from my journal. “I’m grateful that I’m loved by you.”
“I’m grateful you’re alive,” he counters. “I’m grateful that we still have a chance at our future together.”
“What if I can’t?”
“Can’t what?”
“Can’t get better?” I explain.
“Then I will spend the rest of my life trying to help you find a way to either get better or we’ll have to learn to live with your depression. There isn’t an alternative, Zara.”
I know he says he loves me. I believe he does. But forever is a long time to live with the burden of someone else’s broken mind.