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I let it out. I let it all out as I wander around the empty house, littered with bottles and piles of sick and the lingering scent of weed. The urge to find something, to take something to push the pain back under the surface, riddles my veins, and I search, pushing over cups and opening drawers, but there’s nothing here.
A copper tang hits my tongue, and I lick my broken lips.
I find the door and squint at the light.
I walk until I see something that looks familiar.
I keep walking, the tears running down my cheeks and blurring my vision in waves of grief.
There’s a street I finally recognise, and I drag myself down it and up the path to the house. I knock on the door and wait.
“Oh, baby.” Mum’s there, standing at the open door.
“Mummy,” I crack and burst into tears all over again.
Her arms pull me into her, and I go freely.
Safe.
Broken.
It’s the only word that resonates with me. Every part of my body hurts, but none more than my heart.
I’ve got no fight in me, so when Mum says she’s cutting me off, I don’t argue. I’m aware enough to know I’m in a scary place. It feels terrible, and all I want is another drink or another high to get through it.
She forces hot soup and wholesome food down my throat. It tastes like home, and I want to push everything away, but I can’t. There’s nothing left in me to rebel.
Until he turns up.
“Let me in, Becca. I know she’s here. Why won’t you let me see her.”
“She’s sick, Jeremy. And you’re no help to her. I’ll let you know when she’s better, but you need to leave.”
“I’m not leaving. I need her, and it’s killing me that she won’t talk to me.”
“You should have thought about that before you left her.”
The thud at the front door makes me jump. I’m perched on the top step of the stairs like a little girl, eavesdropping on a conversation she shouldn’t be listening to.
“Go away, Jeremy. I mean it.”
“Anna, I love you. I don’t understand. And I know you can hear me. Tell me what happened, and we can work this out. Please. I’m begging you.”
Mum ignores him but looks up at me.
Every part of me wants to rush down the stairs and into his arms because I love him, and my instinct is for Jeremy to make everything better. But every time I close my eyes, I see the girl and what happened.
I don’t even know if he remembers that. And in my more sober mind, I wonder if he understood what was happening to him. It makes me feel sick, but I can’t deal with it at the moment. I’m not strong enough to have that conversation with him, even if it beats inside my heart like something is physically trying to pull me towards him.
Jeremy didn’t leave. He stayed outside the house for hours. I couldn’t help but see it as a grand gesture — evidence that he loved me and didn’t know what happened at the party.
The longer I didn’t speak to him, the harder it got to keep the story straight in my mind. The haze of the last six months was lifting with Mum’s help, and I didn’t like what was left.
The plans we had and the vibrancy of first love now looked washed out and faded, and it hurt more than what happened in that room. It was all leading to that point. We just couldn't see our behaviour and what we were doing to each other.
We had grown into something toxic for each other.
But my heart still hurt when I thought of him. It still skipped when I awoke from a dream — where we were in Cornwall, ready to take on the world together. He was still who I wanted to be with, and I hated that I wasn’t strong enough to move past that.
