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Just Before You Go

Chapter Sixty-Nine: Catastrophic Mind Pollution

I hardly slept all night. Jimmy’s bloodshot eyes had permanently stained my thoughts—his insistent screams about his love for me had taken their toll on my spirits. I was a wreck.
Only two other souls had made it back to the bus before I’d fallen into a defeated slump. No one had disturbed me, much to my relief. However, just passed seven, I jolted awake. The anxiety had resumed its gnawing dance in my guts—I ran for the tiny bathroom and made it just in time to release the contents of my entire being into the toilet. Fuck Jimmy.
I cleaned myself up, giving my reflection one hardened glance as a sort of pep talk. Assuming that I was done with sleeping for the foreseeable future, I hunkered down on the couch with a coffee, a blanket, and a book. It was Tyler’s favorite, and so far was not a disappointment.
The bus was comfortably quiet, a rogue snore resounding through the cramped space every now and again. Other than that, though, it was just me and the voice in my head reading me into peace. Any time Jimmy’s voice would creep its way in, I’d push myself to focus harder on the words scrawled out in the pages before me. I couldn’t keep letting myself get caught up in Jimmy’s grasp. I was done looking for meaning where it didn’t exist.
As I turned the page and took a sip of coffee, the bus door creaked open. Blair was looking over her shoulder as she stepped inside, her jacket draped over her tattooed arm. She pulled the door shut and turned around.
She nearly died.
“Jesus fucking Christ!” she blurted, startling herself back into the door.
I hid my laugh with my hand, “Morning.”
“Fuck, Aria,” she half-laughed. “You scared the shit out of me.”
She looked rough. Her makeup had run from her eyes and her hair was an absolute mess, sticking out in every direction. Her clothes were all wrinkled and she absolutely reeked of liquor.
“Sorry,” I snickered.
“No problem,” she breathed a heavy sigh, setting her jacket down on the back of the table’s bench seat and taking it upon herself to pour a cup of the coffee I’d brewed.
“And where were you?” I grinned knowingly.
She didn’t even flinch. She pushed the pot back onto the burner and leaned against the counter, savoring the scent of caffeine.
“Can’t sleep?” she asked, completely dismissing my curiosity.
Given that we felt more like acquaintances than friends as of late, I allowed her to move past my question. I set my book into my lap, careful to leave it open so I wouldn’t lose my place.
“No,” I said glumly.
She squinted at me in a way that suggested she might need glasses. Or to wash the eyeliner from her retinas. It was hard to say for sure.
“I heard Jimmy was in fine form last night,” she said oddly. “You okay?”
“You heard?” I caught defensively. “You were there. I’m sure you saw.”
He tilted her head to the side, “Not really…I mean, I wasn’t really hanging with Jim last night. He was a little too…antsy…for my taste. But Matt told me what happened—I looked for you but you’d left already.”
“You didn’t look very hard,” I noted quietly.
She shrugged at me, “I’m going to bed.”
As she made moves to detach herself from me once more, I couldn’t help but voice my confusion.
“Did I do something?”
She turned on her heel, a curious expression tied with to her pretty face.
“What do you mean?” she asked coolly.
I cleared my throat, sitting up straighter, “Did I do something to you?”
“I understood the question,” she smirked. “It’s the context that’s tripping me up.”
“You just don’t seem to like me much these days,” I finally said.
She laughed, shaking her head and setting her mug onto the counter, “You really are sensitive, huh?”
That’s what I needed. To be antagonized. I was so tired of having my feelings be belittled by people who weren’t so burdened by emotion. It was entirely reasonable to having feelings about things—or suspicions when suspicion was wildly warranted.
My face must have given me away.
“Aria,” she half-smiled, “don’t take it personally, okay? I don’t, uh…I don’t know, there’s probably a reason why I don’t have a lot of friends.”
“You have tons of friends,” I argued lightly. “The Avenged guys are obsessed with you.”
She rolled her eyes playfully, “I should have worded that more carefully. I don’t have many female friends. Women are always looking for hidden meanings in things. I promise I’m not being any particular way toward you.”
I ran her sentence through in my mind but came up short.
She swiped her cup from the counter and plopped herself down on the couch across from me. Even as a mess, she was fucking stunning. Curse this damn unrelenting girl crush.
This girl had accidentally, and unintentionally, cost me my relationship…and yet, I wanted her to like me. I wanted her attention. It only made me love her more that she was genuinely so cool that she didn’t mean to treat me with indifference.
I wished that I could be so laissez faire.
“I’m not good at the bonding thing,” she smirked. “I keep boys around because they don’t usually ask me to talk about my feelings. Other than Tyler but he’s a fucking psychopath.”
“He’s sweet,” I smiled.
She softened, her affection for her friend shining through, “He is.”
“Have you ever…you know…with him?”
Her laugh was infectious. It was also kind of insulting—poor Tyler.
“That’s gross, dude,” she told me as she pulled herself together. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not blind. Tyler is a good looking guy…but he’s like my brother.”
I shrugged, “Sometimes that can change, no?”
“Not for us,” she said seriously, pausing only to sip at her coffee. “We’ve been so entangled in each other’s lives for so long that it would just be weird to try and bridge some gap. I’m not into him, he’s not into me. Plain and simple. Besides, that’s a surefire way to ruin a friendship.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” I agreed, annoyed with myself for how hard that hit me.
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t even remotely attracted to Tyler. He was safe and he was kind. He was nothing like Jimmy, and maybe that was the appeal. And yet, he was also burdened—he had a darkness inside of him that he’d become an expert at disguising. That, I decided, was exactly like Jimmy.
Tyler would have been the easy way out. I could have just dated him and forgotten all about James Sullivan. But love isn’t easy. And I guess I was something of a masochist.
“So what about you and Brian?” I asked cheekily. “Is that friendship ruined?”
“Friendship?” she scoffed playfully. “Brian is…an idiot.”
“Is he a good kisser though?” I grinned.
She blushed. Ladies and gentlemen, Blair Peterson blushed. The untouchable and impervious to embarrassment Blair…blushed. I swooned.
God damn girl crush.
“Not bad,” she snickered.
I didn’t know if she knew about Claire’s imminent arrival…I wanted to tell her. But I also wanted her to not abandon our somewhat friendship again. It was better not to rock the boat, I decided.
“Did you,” I wiggled my eyebrows at her.
She laughed, burying her face into her cup, “You’re really fucking nosy.”
“Totally,” I laughed back. “But I’ve been dying for you two to get together since I met you.”
Her eyes widened a little and her whimsical expression faded, “Woah, woah, woah. Hold up for a second, I think you’re getting a little ahead of yourself.”
“I saw you guys last night,” I told her. “Looked pretty together to me.”
She shook her head, her high spirits dwindling in the wind. She looked like she wanted to say something but, for whatever reason, couldn’t. I wanted to be a fly in her brain, watching the way her gears turned and the sound of her inner turmoil.
“This is a female friendship,” I informed her. “Gossiping about boys is what girls do.”
“Eh,” she laughed. “I was never good at the whole gossip thing…or females…fuck, or friendship. Sometimes I think I might be a bad person. Or maybe just a bad human.”
“You’re alright,” I encouraged. “But you’d be better if you gave me some details.”
“You’ve been spending entirely too much time with Tyler,” she concluded with a sly grin.
I was impressed, and annoyed, by how guarded she was. There was nothing to be discovered when it came to Blair. If she didn’t want you to know, you wouldn’t know. I’d killed to have had that power over myself—and over others. I could have pretended not to have cared when Jimmy displayed his self-hatred to me. I worried about him all stupid night—praying to god that I wouldn’t wake up to hear he’d overdosed in his sleep. I couldn’t take the weight of that terrible thought.
“Did you stay in their bus?” I asked, hoping she’d think I was still on the Brian train.
She was too intelligent for that nonsense, “Jimmy’s okay.”
“Oh, I didn’t—”
She smirked, “I’d be worried, too. He was pretty ridiculous from what I’ve heard. Matt stayed with him though, so…he was in good hands.”
“Because Brian’s hands were busy?” I quipped, trying to hide the sadness that had overcome me once more.
“Something like that.”
She rose from her place on the couch and headed for the door, turning only to give me a confused look.
“Coming?” she asked like it should have been implied.
I furrowed my brows, “Where?”
“I’m going to smoke,” she told me.
Considering my choices were to continue reading my book or to go and spend more time next to Blair Peterson, I tossed the novel aside like it meant nothing. In that moment, it didn’t. I followed her out, my coffee still tightly gripped.
She lit a cigarette immediately, letting it dangle from her lips as she used both hands to try and flatten out the back of her hair. She grimaced at the feel of it.
“I feel super hot right now,” she joked, eying me for reaction.
“You’re always hot, Blair Peterson,” I said—way too seriously.
She threw her head back with a mighty laugh, “I thought we were passed the Peterson thing…and the creepy compliments. You can tell me I look like shit. I can take it.”
I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. This only made her laugh harder.
I had a sneaking suspicion that someone was still a little drunk.
But her laughter stopped abruptly and she quickly dropped her tone, “Shit.”
I turned to follow the trail left by her glances to find Jimmy headed my way. His hands were stuffed deep into his sweater pockets and he’d lazily thrown sunglasses atop his nose. His hair was messy as always—but god, he looked good.
God damn real crushes.
“Blair,” Jimmy nodded once he’d reached our camp.
She smiled at him, looking at me with awkward uncertainty.
“Can I talk to you?” Jimmy asked me quietly, like it pained him to speak.
Judging by how fucked up he’d been the night before, I guess it made sense. His hangover was probably real strong—I seriously considered shouting my response. Just to make him squirm.
Instead, I just stared at him.
“Please?” he said so pleadingly that I wanted to give him whatever he wanted.
I nodded, taking an uneasy step toward him.
“I’ll catch up with you later, okay?” I said to Blair, hoping she wasn’t totally judging me for agreeing to Jimmy’s whim.
She seemed fine enough, “Sure.”
“Brian asked me to give you these,” Jimmy said like it was a second thought, tossing Blair her keys. “You left them in his bunk.
A-ha! I knew it!
She thanked him so casually that I almost started doubting it all over again. Jimmy gestured away from the bus and I reluctantly followed him. He was at least on the same plane as me this time, so I wasn’t going to bust his chops just yet.
But I was ready to throw up all over again.
He couldn’t break up with me twice, right? Right?





Notes

Fuckin Bs.

Sober Jimmy.

Hmmmmm

xx

Comments

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RamonaFoREVer RamonaFoREVer
6/18/19

@kiss my sas
I'm sorry!!!! Didn't mean to kick you while you're down, I swear!!

fyction fyction
5/14/19

I'm so proud of you for finishing this masterpiece, but I am SO SAD!!!
WHY ARE YOU BEING MEAN AND UPSETTING THE SICK AUSSIE?!??!?!
WHAT IS LIFE??!???!!!!

kiss my sas kiss my sas
5/14/19

IT IS NOT OVER!!!
I REFUSE TO ADMIT IT IS OVER!!!!!!
PLAGUIA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

kiss my sas kiss my sas
5/14/19

Holy shit, holy shit, I am not prepared!!!!
Going to read the... last... chapter now...

kiss my sas kiss my sas
5/14/19