Just Before You Go

The next twenty-four hours were a whirlwind of panic and chaos. Brian had been practically missing in action since the roar of sirens had split the night in two. Both worlds had come together to revel in the madness that was Blair Peterson’s departure. It unnerved me deeply to find Haven hadn’t raced after the ambulance.
Tyler included.
Instead, everyone had camped out in the buses—which had taken up residence in a local grocery store’s parking lot. No one had slept. A few had taken turns at the hospital in hopes of visiting with Blair but had effectively been turned away. It was touch and go from what I’d heard through the grapevine. She’d nearly died on route to the local emergency room—but had pulled through. This, I learned, did not mean that everything was back to business as usual, though.
Just past eleven, Jimmy climbed into the bus and instructed me to grab my purse. I didn’t have to ask why. Instead, I followed him quickly into the world and then into a cab.
“Bri said she’s awake,” Jimmy told me as our cab headed for the hospital. “Coherent, too.”
I nodded my head awkwardly. There weren’t words to justify an appropriate response.
“It’s my fault,” Jimmy said quietly, pulling my attention from the window to his crystal blues.
I frowned, “No, it isn’t.”
“It is,” he insisted. “But do you know what’s worse?”
“What?” I asked slowly.
“That’s my fucking future,” he almost laughed, giving his head a disappointed shake. “And it’s yours, too. You’re going to be Brian Haner—lingering over my hospital bed as they pump my system full of drugs to reverse my bad behavior.”
My mouth ran dry with uncertainty. What could I even say to that? How can you walk someone off that ledge? He teetered with absolute surety. His gaze was somewhere away from me, far off from the life we were living.
“No,” was all I could manage to breathe from my battered soul.
He took a deep breath and let it out with a sigh, “I never want to do this to you.”
“Then don’t,” I shrugged simply.
His eyes found me, pulling his damnation back to reality. He tried to smile.
“I’m done, Aria,” he said seriously. “I know I’ve said it before but…I really didn’t mean it. I mean it now. I’m done.”
It was bittersweet to hear. I wanted Jimmy to be healthy—to make good choices. But…should it have taken his friend nearly dying to succumb him to the world as it was? I supposed I should just be grateful.
“Okay,” I replied oddly.
“I’ve been thinking about it,” he lamented, glancing back out the window as we passed a cemetery. “Blair doesn’t have anything to live for.”
I snorted a laugh, “That’s nice.”
“I’m not saying it to be a dick, man,” he smirked. “But she doesn’t. She doesn’t have a family, she doesn’t have a good circle of friends. She has one guy…and that guy’s toxic as fuck.”
“That’s not fair,” I argued as gently as I could. “We don’t know what that dynamic is. It isn’t right for us to judge them, Jim.”
“I’m not judging,” he retorted. “I’m callin’ it as I see it. Blair’s a mess. I know you think she’s some other-worldly goddess—and she is. But…she’s like the goddess of destruction. She has nothing tying her here. She has nothing to fucking fight for.”
My heart hurt. There were so many things about Blair Peterson that I obviously didn’t understand. I felt like I’d been offered a tiny sneak peek at her life when we’d walked into the Tyler/Blair showdown…but I didn’t know her at all. I didn’t know her hiding places or her pride. She was a total stranger to me, and through that estranged sense of persona, I’d judged her all wrong.
“She’s a marvel, man,” Jimmy laughed to himself. “She lets destruction reign and somehow is stronger for it. It’s fucking wild. I can’t even handle myself—and I have everything worth fighting for.”
He looked at me then and it was like seeing him for the first time.
“I have you,” he said seriously. “I’ll never let that go again. Not ever.”
I smiled. Those words seemingly sewing together the seams we’d spent so long ripping apart. Everything I’d wanted to feel was right there in front of me, certainty reigning supreme. This was love. This was what I needed.
“Good,” I replied, sliding my hand over to lace my fingers in his. “I won’t if you won’t.”
He nodded, dodging his glance once more, mumbling, “I’m done.”
When we finally got to the hospital, Jimmy called Brian to come down and meet us. Given that Blair was a bit of a public figure, the front desk had flat out refused to give us any information. They wouldn’t even confirm that she was a patient, despite the fact we knew she was.
Brian looked rough as he turned the corner and threw his hands out to the side. His normally lively eyes were now sorrowed and rimmed with blue, as if he hadn’t slept in a year. His complexion was pale, a ghost of his former self. The Synyster Gates spikes had fallen and solidified in a state of dishevel. This was what turmoil looked like if anyone had ever doubted it.
“Hey,” he sighed.
Jimmy pulled his brother into the world’s tightest embrace. For a second, Brian nearly fell apart.
“I’m so sorry,” Jimmy pleaded into Brian’s shoulder.
Brian’s hands rubbed at the lanky drummer’s spine, dismissing the apologies in favor of comfort. After a minute, Brian shoved his friend away.
“I told her you guys were coming,” Brian said as he led us down a long corridor.
Great, I thought. I’m sure she was absolutely thrilled to hear my name. Jimmy, though, I was certain was a welcomed distraction.
“Is she pissed at me?” Jimmy asked sadly.
Brian’s face fell, “No…why would she be?”
“You know why.”
“No,” Brian said again, more sternly. “But I swear straight to god if you ever give her a single other drug ever again, I will personally castrate you.”
Jimmy nodded vigorously, “Message received.”
We followed the guitarist up a few sets of stairs and into a brightly lit hallway. There was a small waiting room to our right fitted with ugly green chairs. A home renovation show was playing quietly on the television hung from the ceiling. There was a teenaged girl sleeping with her head in an elderly woman’s lap. The woman was knitting, occasionally glancing up to see the new cabinets that had just been installed.
I was depressed.
“So,” Brian said as he stopped us at door directly across from the desolate waiting room, “it’s probably worth mentioning that she asked for Aria…”
“What?” I choked.
“Do you mind going in alone?” he asked me. “She wants to talk to you…I’ll take the big guy to get a cup of coffee. I could really fuckin’ use one.”
“I knew she was pissed,” Jimmy grumbled with a strong pout.
“Don’t ask me, man,” Brian half-laughed, rubbing at the back of his neck. “She wants the female.”
“Go get Brian coffee,” I told Jimmy softly. “You can terrorize her after.”
Jimmy kicked at the floor, “Fine.”
I waited until they were gone, climbing back down the stairs they’d just journeyed all the way up. With an insanely large breath, I turned the handle to the door and stepped inside.
Blair Peterson had never looked so small. She was hooked up to several machines, the insistent beeping enough to make me want to hurl. She sat up a bit at the sight of me. If I thought Brian looked rough…
I pushed the door closed quietly behind me and cautiously approached the goddess of destruction.
“Hi,” she said simply.
I tried to smile, “Hi.”
“Come sit,” she told me, gesturing to the black chair pulled up by her bedside.
I assumed that had been Brian’s bed for the past day and a half. His sweater was hung over the back, staking claim no doubt. I did as she asked, unsure why she was being so pleasant with me.
As I sat, she spoke, “I’m so sorry, Aria.”
“Sorry?” I asked confusedly.
I couldn’t help but take her in as she was. She was without a single trace of makeup, all color pulled from her skin, her hair permanently stained with oil, and yet she was still impossibly beautiful. How? It was almost infuriating.
Her green eyes seemed so much purer without the liquid eyeliner.
“I hurt you,” she said.
I nodded glumly.
“I didn’t mean to,” she sighed, sinking into her pillows and casting her gaze upward.
And then she fell apart.
I didn’t know this creature was even capable of emotion. She was always so sure of herself—so sure of her world. And now it was out of her grip and she was reeling. She was half-dead and somehow better for it. Jimmy was totally right.
“I’m always doing this,” she told me, taking an unsteady breath to try and calm herself. “I’m always fucking up people’s lives. I don’t know what the fuck is wrong with me.”
“Blair,” I exhaled sympathetically.
She shook her head, running an IV-ridden hand through her black hair, and casting a pointed glance in my direction, “I don’t deserve that sympathy shit. Especially not yours.”
“It’s okay,” I assured her.
“It isn’t. But…I need to explain some things, I guess,” she groaned. “Because you deserve to hear it…Not because I deserve to get it off my chest.”
“Explain it then,” I said coolly.
She took a minute to compose herself before finally sitting up. She looked so damn tired.
“What happened…with Jimmy,” she said slowly, looking at me quickly and then away, “I didn’t do it to hurt you. I was so…You know what, it doesn’t matter. There’s no excuse. But what I was trying to do was hurt Brian—”
“I know,” I interjected slowly. “Jimmy was doing the same thing…”
“Yeah,” she swallowed. “But I…I needed to feel something, you know? I feel so much of nothing that it’s…really fucking consuming. Everything is out of control. My life…it’s out of control. I needed to take the reins…I needed to prove something to myself. I’m not really sure what I was proving other than that I’m a total piece of shit.”
The words came out before I could stop them, “You’re not a total piece of shit, Blair.”
Was this forgiveness?
“I’m so sorry for what I’ve done,” she said again, meeting my gaze. “You didn’t deserve it. I never should have done it. It…it meant nothing, I promise.”
“I know,” I half-smiled. “It’s probably better that it did.”
“Better?” she laughed awkwardly. “How the fuck do you figure?”
I shrugged my shoulders, “Because now I know. It’s taken the mystery out of the situation. I don’t have to worry anymore…And now I know you’re human.”
“Of course I’m human,” she scoffed. “You need to knock down that pedestal, Aria. I don’t know what I was doing up there in the first place.”
“You’re incredible,” I told her softly. “Despite what’s…happened…I’m still so in awe of you, it’s embarrassing.”
She smirked, shaking her head at me, “At this very second, I’m in awe of you.”
“I’m happy you didn’t die,” I told her because I thought she should hear it.
She just kind of nodded.
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” she sighed. “Brian’s been taking pretty good care of me.”
“I noticed,” I grinned, reveling as the rage as it slipped away and into my past.
Her eyes gleamed for a quick second, “I get it now.”
“Get what?” I asked confusedly.
She just smiled, taking a plastic cup of water from the plastic table beside her bed and sipping at it with a satisfied quench. And then she set it back down and moved on.
“Thanks for coming.”
I wasn’t sure what to say. It seemed obvious that I would…regardless of our issues.
She pointed at my eye with a subtle smirk, “Decent shiner.”
“Courtesy of Blair Peterson,” I laughed.
“Sorry,” she groaned at herself.
I raised my hands up to my chest, “Hey, I started it!”
“Did you, though?” she asked flatly.
“Doesn’t matter,” I decided aloud. “It’s done. And now we can be friends.”
“Friends,” she chuckled softly. “I don’t even know what that means anymore.”
I took her hand into mine with a reassuring squeeze, “It’s this. It’s what you deserve.”
“What a fickle word that is,” she noted grimly. “I think we all need to stop operating under the assumption that we get what we deserve.”
I tilted my head, furrowing my tired brow.
“It doesn’t matter,” she dismissed quickly. “I’m just glad you’re here.”
“I’m always here,” I told her and I meant it. “Whatever you need.”
She laughed, shaking her head a bit, “I still don’t know how you’re able to stand to look at me. You’re a better person than I, Aria.”
While I did not agree, I did not have the energy to argue with the legendary Blair Peterson. I decided to let her think what she must and feel what she knew, but I took it upon myself to change my devious plan. Brian had stepped in and made that scheme is own. So now I was without work.
I decided I was going to make it my job to teach Blair Peterson about self-worth. And it started with compassion. With mercy.
It started with forgiveness.

Notes

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