Meet Me By The Dock

Chapter 14

I ran inside and dry heaved over the toilet for a few minutes after watching his car drive into town and away, away, away. I stared into the bowl and watched the water ripple from my heavy breaths.

I felt like I was going to puke, so here I am. Humiliating myself by sprinting inside after saying everything but goodbye. I sank to the floor and leaned against the bathroom counter. I rested my head back and thought of how illogical it all was.

I've said goodbye to him before, and yeah it hurt. But it didn't feel like I was in physical pain. Like a dagger thrust under my ribs, tearing through the flesh and piercing my insides, just to learn that I was holding the hilt.

And I was so, so, so tired.

I haven't been sleeping at all these last few days, I've laid awake thinking of all the ways I couldn't do this anymore. This. This pain, this hurt, this torture. Which probably explains why Issac was so suspicious of me.

My heart felt sore, like I officially over worked it and it was taking its 2 week notice. My head was pounding from lack of sleep and I felt sick to my stomach and itchy all over. I just wanted to curl up in a ball on the floor and sleep. Maybe then when I wake up it will all be gone.

I'd be gone.

I was so exhausted, physically and mentally drained that my brain actually didn't have any objections to that idea.

So that's what I did.

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I crawled out of the bathroom in a haze after I peeled open my eyes and counted the blue tiles of the bathroom floor. 94 total. The only sound filling the room was the sound of my thrumming heart.

Then I swallowed and took my first steps.

I began to scale the stairs, gripping the railing, when I heard a sickening wail.

I sighed because I recognized it.

It was my mom's.

My mother's cries coming from the top of the steps.

A wave of guilt flooded over me when I thought about turning around because I couldn't face this. Listening to her sobs and feeling helpless. Because I was helpless. Totally, utterly, useless.

My headache had subsided but the sickness in my stomach hasn't changed.

I let out a breath but it ended in a sob that tore through my throat. I clamped one hand over my mouth and one over my stomach. I took a slow, deep breath of air until my lungs felt like they would pop, explode, collapse. I swallowed and continued my climb up the steps, the higher I climbed the stronger the pressure on my chest grew until it felt crippling.

Slowly, slowly, slowly, I drudged, crawled, pulled myself to the top of the stairs. It took everything in me to tear my feet from their place cemented in the ground. But I did it.

I glanced down the dark hall and saw my mother on her knees, shoulders shaking and both hands covering her mouth. In front of her was a box. A box. My mom was on her knees, begging, beseeching, pleading, to a box? Her shoulders shook like an earthquake was passing through. Maybe there was but I was too disassociated, floating above everything, everyone, to notice.

It took me a moment to realize I was hesitantly moving towards her. The closer I got the more I noticed. Like the way her eyes clamped shut revealing the groves in her forehead. The result of months passed. I was sure she didn't have these trenches from a long fought battle while my father was still here.

Still breathing.

Still loving.

Still living.

She wasn't drowning in these rivers running down her face. But she was now. Drowning. I had to save her, from the pain, the hurt, the torture.