Chapter 25
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Dean
I f I thought my existence was agony before, if I thought my suffering was more than I could stand then, it's nothing to what I feel now.
The silence in my apartment used to be something I craved to feel safe. Now the silence has become a den of nightmares, screaming at me in the thunderous silence that she's gone, that I lost her, that my own fucked up hell swallowed her whole in the end, too.
At this point, I understand now that Whitmire didn't just want to kill us. He wanted us to see the world as he saw it, as it truly is: a cruel, sadistic sack of misery and shit that wouldn't stop until everything good in our lives was gone.
Mission accomplished, fucko.
I've been carrying on drinking since she left to try and smother the memory of her stricken face, the pain in her eyes, there because of what a fuckwad I am. But it's not working. It's not even touching the sides.
So I'm just slumped on the living room floor, smacking the back of my head against the wall to see if that helps, welcoming the pain as a punishment. Thank god Eli and Emily are out, or they'd hear me and come up and try to stop me. And I don't want to be stopped. At all.
I want to go further.
I want my skull to shatter into a million pieces so I can just forget my entire life since I was 18.
I want out.
The thought stops me in my tracks.
And, for the first time since the door clicked shut when she left, I do what I had thought was impossible: I smile.
Because this is ridiculous. All this suffering, so much drama, so much trouble.
Everyone in my life having to tiptoe around my PTSD all the time.
And for what? So I can live a long and happy life?
Fuck that. I'm a burden to myself and others. I’m sick and tired of my own whining.
Why haven't I just ended everything, once and for all?
My loved ones might grieve, as a token gesture, but they'll be glad to be rid of my over the top bullshit needs.
And I don't have to suffer anymore. I don't have to struggle through every day, already handicapped by my mental health, now dialled up to lethal levels from missing her and hating myself for ruining things with her.
Spelling her name out with my fingers won’t do jack shit this time, except break my own heart even more.
I don't have to have her tearful face plastered to my brain every second of every day of the rest of my miserable life.
I can just...go.
Sweet, warm relief floods through me, and I get up to head to my medicine cabinet. To the secret stash of various pills I've been building up these many years because I always knew this day would come.
I stagger a little. Guess the fireball whisky I picked up was actually doing something, after all. Hopefully mixing it with the sleeping pills and painkillers waiting for me can only help me on my way.
At the very back of the cabinet is an old Chinese takeout container I kept to one side several years ago. I feel weak kneed as I look at it, not with fear but with joy. Thanks, past Dean, you’re the MVP tonight.
I open it, and there are piles of half used packs of zopiclone and tramadol and cocodamol and even some expired venlafaxine and zoloft. So many meds that well meaning doctors have prescribed over the years, now finally helping me the way they couldn't before.
I take it into the kitchen and pour myself a pint glass of water, almost shivering with anticipation for the glorious oblivion I'm finally reaching for, after all this time.
I’m just a receptacle to you, aren’t I?
I shake my head against the memory of Liaden’s voice cracking as she hit me with just how much of a scumbag I'd been to her. Using her to ease my own pain, losing myself in her until she felt lost, too. Don't worry, sweetheart, I think to her. I'm going to make it all go away. Just watch.
So it feels like she's watching over me as I pop the first pill out.
I'd like my final thoughts to be of her, so as I pop the small blue and green capsule in my mouth - one - I think of the moment I first saw her, the gorgeous smile that instantly gave me so much unexpected joy.
Two - the first appointment, the first lines of my ink on her pure white skin. Someone else will finish it. She wouldn’t want me to touch her again, anyway.
Three, four, five - her singing to me at the karaoke night, her voice pulling my soul apart and glueing it back together in a better shape.
Six - the first time I made love to her - no! That was bad, wrong. That was the first step to me defiling her, defiling us, with my compulsion and my addiction to the peace her cunt offered.
Ok, try again...
Six - the way my family warmed to her when...
Mom. Dad. Eli.
Oh, fuck.
I spit number six out into the sink and stand there, trembling as I hold on to the basin.
Eli's wedding is in six weeks.
I can't do this to him. I can't ruin what's meant to be the best day of his life with the pain of grief. Because, whether I like it or not, and however much I lie to myself on this score, he will grieve me, long and hard.
I can't. I can't do that to him, not after everything we've been through together.
Six weeks.
I can make it six weeks.
Fuck it. I'll cut loose at his wedding. One last hurrah with my family, so their last memory of me is of their son, brother, cousin, friend having fun. Having rea l fun, not shuddering and puking and pissing himself and panicking in a haze of mental illness.
And then I can check out.
Shit, what a waste of six pills.
I get myself to the bathroom and shove my toothbrush down my throat, hard, deliberately making it hurt, until I vomit up the tablets into the john.
Flush.
Six weeks. I don't want six minutes of this miserable world, but for Eli I can do it. And the fact that finally, finally there will be an end to my pain eases the weight of it a lot.
I can do this.
And then I'll be gone, and everything will all finally be over.
Liaden
I don’t know how to get through this.
I can’t read. Can’t write. Can’t even think. I’ve never been unable to think, never experienced this fog for even a nanosecond in my entire life, but it’s as though I’ve forgotten how.
All I can do is feel, and it hurts. My chest physically aches. My throat is tight and my eyes are burning and tender.
Is Dean OK? What is he going through right now? Does he miss me as much as I miss him, or is he relieved to be rid of me?
How did this happen?
My entire chest feels like it’s been tenderised from within. Breathing feels weird, kind of raw.
What could I have done differently? There must be something. I try to consider this, to learn from it like I learn from everything that goes wrong in my life. But all I can do is hug my knees and regret ever getting out of bed this morning.
I couldn’t have just let him use me…but I can’t help loving him unendurably right now, and wondering just how much my self-respect is really worth to me if it means losing this once in a lifetime human? But then again, I can’t let anyone treat me that way, least of all a romantic partner.
Usually my path is clear, but I am so confused and broken hearted that I would almost throw everything away, my pride, my dignity to be in his arms in this moment. To let him soothe away my hurt, and tell me it was all a bad dream.
If you were in these arms… I will never be able to listen to Bon Jovi ever again.
There’s only one person I can think of who may understand how I’m feeling.
So I pick up the phone and text her.
Liaden: Sadie, everything has gone wrong…
From the WhatsApp channel started by Leo Mills called DEAN HAS A GIRL WTF SINCE WHEN??????!!!!!!!!! (Members: Leo Mills, Sadie Stewart, Eli Gastright, and Emily Cole)
Sadie Stewart: Oh fuck you guys
Sadie Stewart: He broke up with her
Eli Gastright: Shit
Emily Cole: WHAT
Emily Cole: Why?????????
Sadie Stewart: I just called her - she’s kind of a mess, but from what I can gather he’s decided she’s better off without him
Leo Mills: FUCK
Leo Mills: Fuck, fuck, fucking fuck!
Leo Mills: What do we do
Emily Cole: Eli’s gone upstairs
Sadie Stewart: Em, should I pick you up so we can go over to L’s?
Emily Cole: Please
Leo Mills: What should I do? Gimme something
Sadie Stewart: I’d head over to Dean’s, Eli might need some help
Leo Mills: On it