Aprils pov
I wake up and instantly regret it.
I have a pounding headache, and it feels as though my skull will crack any minute now. A pair of hands are wrapped around my waist, and a slight smile makes its way across my face.
He didn’t leave.
I could feel the panic rising in my chest again like it always did when things spiraled out of control. I had been fighting it for what felt like hours, trying to push back the tears, but they came crashing in, uninvited, uncontrollable. It had been a day of too much-too many mistakes, too many broken pieces of myself that I couldn’t put back together. The weight of it all crashed down on me, suffocating, and before I knew it, I was sinking, drowning in a sea of guilt.
I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think.
The only thing keeping me from falling apart was his presence. I could feel his heartbeat, steady and real, pressing against me. It was the only thing that grounded me in a world that felt like it was constantly shifting beneath my feet. He was here. He hadn’t left. But I couldn’t understand why.
“Dylan? We have to talk,” I whisper.
“That we do,” He replies instantly.
Really? He was awake this entire time?
“I’m sorry,” I choked out between sobs, my voice barely a whisper. “I just… I don’t know how to fix this. Everything I’ve done… all of it-it’s my fault. It’s always my fault.”
The words spilled out of me like poison, bitter and sharp, as if admitting the truth would somehow make the weight easier to carry. But it only made it worse. I blamed myself. For everything. For not being enough, for the bloodshed, for screwing things up in ways I couldn’t even explain. I felt like I was losing myself, like I was losing him too, even though he was holding me tighter like he was afraid I might disappear into the dark spaces I was falling into.
“You have nothing to apologize for; what happened last night?” He says.
“I felt guilty and sad at what happened,” I reply. I don’t have the energy in me to lie.
“Why?” He asks, worried.
“It is my fault that those people died, If I had not gotten rejected, my parents would still be alive. If only I had been good enough , I would not have been rejected. If it was not for me, your friends would not be dead, and you would not have left the only home you knew. Also, I may have killed a person in cold blood, and I actually liked it. Not only that but the people you thought were your parents , well turns out they were not actually your parents and they only decided to tell you when they were about to die. My parents, well my biological parents abandoned me at the pack border and now I have to look for them and find out the truth. Did they love me? Or did they abandon me because they never cared? Lastly, I have to find my parents alone, Do you know how much it pains me that I have to leave you? That I have to leave you ? That is why I am sad and feeling guilty… Now do you understand? “I scream.
I feel as though a huge weight has been lifted off my chest, and before he can say anything, I run to the bathroom and try to lock myself in there.
Before I can turn the lock, he kicks the door open, and I fall due to the impact of the force.
He pulls me up and into his arms but doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t need to; being here is enough. It’s silent except for my sobs, which are the only thing that can be heard.
He holds me and doesn’t let go.
I fall asleep to the sound of his heartbeat.
When I wake up sometime later, I’m still in his arms, but only I’m sleeping on a bed.
He must have carried me to bed.
The only thing that runs through my head is he stayed.
He actually stayed with me through the breakdown, and I couldn’t help but feel grateful. I didn’t understand how anyone could stay through the storm of my brokenness, but there he was, his arms around me, his presence solid and unshakable.
He was the only one who stayed.
____________________________________