When We Collide √

Chapter 79

Love can be so fulfilling, so spontaneously beautiful, so amazing, so crazy, so stupid.....

Love can be so blindingly reckless.

So wretchedly painful.

Love can make you so unbearably resentful or loving.

Love was an abyss, a dark endless abyss.

And I was falling into it, falling so fast I couldn't even feel myself anymore.

Love makes you safe or afraid.

I was afraid.

Afraid that I was falling.

Slowly loosing myself.

Piece by piece.

With each word uttered.

I fell.

That night.

Was my downfall. The epitome of it all.

________________

Kait's words resurfaced back into my head the same way an answer sprung back into your head right after you'd racked your brain shitless during a test. But unlike exam where answers usually floated around for ten seconds at most and let you drown in your misery for less than two, Kait's words were like shadows, haunting me, prying on me, following me. They resonated through my head and bounced of the walls of my brain creating an echo effect. This is actually way more creepier than it actually sounds. I don't know why after that night with Amell, I felt things had changed between us. No, I knew things had changed between us. And it wasn't just that ordinary U - turn that most subtle relationships are usually steered into. But needless to say, I had this crummy feeling deep within my stomach and Kaitleen's words just flared it up.

I know things between Kait and I were a little bit er - well there weren't any things between us anymore. For the past two months and a half, we'd been avoiding each other like plagues. Almost five years of an on/off  friendship thrown into the trash , well some things weren't meant to last. But today as I walked the packed - to - capacity halls of Brineview, the ghost of her voice - which I hadn't heard in like what felt like six years and was actually probably a month - was resounding in my head. Like an exorcized demon coming back to claim it's victim. "Stay away from him Tracy. You're too good for him and he's too toxic for you ." The words seeped through the crevices of my brains and the moment I reached my locker, I was on the verge of hyperventilating. I leaned on it and tugged frantically on my curls. They'd gotten so long and I needed to trim them short. It was morning and I was feeling more tired than a cow in labour. What did Kait know about me, I'd never told her anything more than my mom's death, and the story behind it she'd never even heard of it before. She didn't know I was broken, she didn't know I had bad dreams, she didn't know what Bob had done and that it haunted me every single day, she didn't know I went for therapy which was supposed to "help me get my shit together" she knew nothing. So she didn't know what was good for me. She had no right to tell me who to let in and who to keep out. I punched in the combination and removed the books I required, turning around I almost got a heart attack when a jovial looking Amell in all his utmost glory was staring down at me. His eyes danced with amusement, but the moment he saw me it all died in a flicker.

"Boots?"

I didn't even answer, just stared down at the floor like it was the most interesting thing in the world.

"Are you okay?"

No.

Keep your shit together Rae. You're titanium.

Or sandpaper - that could also do.

"Yes," I chocked out a whisper that ended up sounding like a bed ridden grandmother saying her last wishes before seeing the angels. My skin shuddered when Amell placed the pad of his thumb on my cheek.