Break In My Heart

20. Panic! At the Disco

*above is the song "Take Yourself Home" by Troye Sivan. Listen to it if you want because I think it goes with the chapter*

After Kyra and I's exchange, which was heated to say the least, I wordlessly trudged home and went straight to my room.

My body felt like jello, and my mind wasn't any better, just a messy cocktail of panicked thoughts, pain, and the same five words bouncing around my brain– how did I get here?

I locked myself in my room and laid in my bed, staring at my ceiling in the dark. My family came to check on me in cycles, first Azalea after I hadn't come down for dinner, then the two little ones to see if I'd play games with them, then finally, Padre and Papa. Each time I'd open my mouth to say something through the door, but no words would come out. Instead, a measly whimper would push past my lips and an immense sensation of self-hatred and dread tore through me with the fierceness of a tornado and the mercilessness of a shark.

And there was nothing I could do.

It wasn't like I could tell my family because realistically, what could they do? There was nothing any of us could do to make Kyra keep my secret, so telling them would only cause more panic, and I couldn't put my family through that.

I'd just have to figure things out by myself.

But as the days quickly started going by, the dark gray cloud that was hanging over my head made it apparent that it didn't plan on going anywhere, blocking any light or feeling of warmth from penetrating it and getting to me. Including Tyler. When he was around, I'd try to put on a strong front, not wanting to scare him with something that neither of us could prevent, but the more he held me and smiled at me and just with me, I felt the crack in the wall I was hiding my emotions behind grow at a faster rate than I could try to cover it.

So, I did the only thing I could– I started calling in sick.

I couldn't deal with the stress and fear of the possibility that every eye that met mine could know my secret. That every whisper could be about me, that every post could be an exposé. It was too much.

It was on my third day calling in sick, a bit over a week since Kyra and I's final falling out, that Tyler decided to come over, a bowl of warm chicken soup and saltines in one hand and canda dry ginger ale in the other. "They fix everything," he simply said once he saw my confused face as he stood in the threshold of my bedroom door. "Trust me. It works miracles, whatever's got you down, this will fix."

I found a grin tugging at the corners of my lips as I took the miracle-working food from his hands. "Thanks." My voice was light and scratchy as I spoke. I stepped aside and let him in. My room was draped in a blanket of darkness with the only light coming from my muted television. Before Tyler had knocked on my door, I'd been stuck in my usual cycle of trying to feel normal and succumbing to my inner sadness and panic. No matter how much I tried to distract myself with writing or television, I couldn't escape my rut.

We settled on my bed, though I resisted my urge to rest my head on his shoulder like I usually did, instead, leaning my head against the headboard and staring at the TV in front of us, not making a move to unmute it. My lap was growing warm as I held the soup in it.

We sat in silence for a few minutes, the only sound that filled the room was my spoon as it dipped into the soup, though I wasn't taking more than baby sips, my stomach, though borderline empty, was unable to handle any food without the risk of throwing it up.

"Addison, are you good?" Tyler asked after almost five minutes of silence, gently tugging on the hood of my hoodie I was wearing, causing me to look at him. His eyebrows knitted as he ran his thumb under my eye. "You haven't been sleeping, have you?"