The Red Thread (34 page)

“You d-d-don’t m-m-m-mean th-that. I-I l-love you, J-J-Jess.”

“Well, get over it. We’re done. Now fucking leave me alone.” He doesn’t listen as he takes a step near me and tries to wrap his arms around me, but I push him away. “We’re fucking over.”

I rip open his apartment door, and I race down those stairs, and I walk along the sidewalks, never looking back. Don’t look back. Don’t look back. This is for the best. I know it is. I can’t let him be with me. All he is going to do is get hurt. Or he’ll hurt me. I don’t see the point in this relationship anymore. He says he loves me, but is it real? Or is it just an illusion that we all create for ourselves. Maybe love is nothing more than a magic trick our minds perform.

I see the front door of my house. The walk home is nothing but a blur to me. Just an endless array of sidewalk, buildings, trees, and people. All blending in to a mess of a society. I enter my house, and Clara stands by the staircase.

“Jess, I called you three times. What is going on?” She has worry written all over her face, but there is a bite to her words. She is angry that I never responded. Good, let her be angry with me. Let her hate me. Let everyone hate me. I don’t even fucking care anymore. None of this is worth it anymore. It’s never been worth it. Hating me will make everything easier for them and me.

I ignore her, and I walk up my stairs, and I lock my door. I hear my sister’s footsteps race upstairs, and then Clara screams for me to open the door. I just want it all to stop. Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. I cover my ears, but it doesn’t stop anything. It doesn’t stop the world from moving. It doesn’t stop my sister’s cries. It doesn’t stop the thoughts inside my own head.

“
Shut up
!” I finally scream, unable to hold everything inside. Why won’t it just end already? I don’t know what happens as my right hand balls up into a fist, and I just watch it punch the wall over and over and over again until the wall starts to dent, and blood stains the light blue paint. Pain shoots up my arm, as I feel it in all my bones, and I fall to the ground on my knees. I am weak.

Please just make everything stop.

You’re pathetic. You fuck up everything. All you have ever done is fuck up everything and everyone around you. No one loves you.

The voices continue to scream at me, and no matter how hard I try, they never seem to stop. The little voice becomes louder and begins to drown out Clara until I can’t hear anything except for my own mind. Pathetic. That is what it tells me I am. I know I am. The tears fall down my face, and I feel weak. I am powerless to my mind.

“Jess, open the door,” Clara continues to cry out.

I hear her footsteps run, and I blast my stereo, drowning out her screams, but the voice remains.
Just kill yourself. Just do it.

Just do it.

My eyes go toward my many pill bottles.

Just take them all.

Sleeping pills.

No one will care.

Sleep sounds good to me. I can finally be at rest, and this will all be over. Sleep, yes. That sounds wonderfully enticing.

I open the bottle, half-full of pills. I close my eyes, and one by one I take them. One after another. I swallow every single one of them. My body feels like a weight, as I can’t stay up straight. I lie back on my bed, and my eyes close. I try to open them, but it just becomes too hard. I’m so tired. I think I can finally sleep.

I think I am.

I AWAKE
to a blinding white light, and my first thought is that I am in heaven and that I have always been wrong. But then the doctors and nurses around me become tangible, and I see the wires connected to my body. I watch the line on the screen that shows my heartbeat. I don’t know if I am more disappointed for surviving (yet again), or if I am more proud to know I am not wrong about heaven (yet). Unless heaven is full of lots of tubes and wires, that is.

A nurse notices my eyes have opened, and she whispers to the doctor. One would think I am already dead. I can hear you, I want to say… but my throat is so dry, and I am so tired. I don’t even feel like moving my lips to speak. I will have time to talk later. I’m sure I’ll have many nice words to tell everyone. The nurse leaves, leaving me alone with the doctor.

“Hello, Mr. Holbrooke. I’m Dr. Rantzen. You’ve been asleep for a day and a half. Your sister brought you in.”

I can’t find any words, so I just simply nod. Dr. Rantzen is an older man in his late forties. His hair is dark brown with patches of gray throughout and a matching beard is closely trimmed to his face. His hair reminds me of a jigsaw puzzle in pieces. His smile is soft, almost fatherly.

I try to speak, but my throat is so dry. “Do you want water?” I nod, and he brings me a small plastic cup of water. He helps me sit up, and my whole body feels exhausted. I down the entire cup, and I feel it go through my body.

“Where am I?” I finally ask in a husky voice. I mean I know where I am, but which hospital? I hope it’s not one of the more expensive ones that my parents won’t be able to afford. I’ve already done enough shit to them.

“You’re at Westview Hospital.” Fuck. That’s not cheap. “Your family is outside in the waiting area right now. They want to see you. Is that okay?”

I really don’t want them to see me like this. But what is the point? They’ve seen me like this before. I feel that my story is nothing but a tragedy only existing to repeat itself. Maybe I’m just the tragic hero of some teenage boy’s novel, and I don’t realize it as he is writing it. If so, he is writing a pretty lame story, isn’t he? Where is the action or the horror? Where are the sword fights and bloody deaths? I’m disappointed.

“Jess,” I hear my mom’s choked voice. I look toward the door, and she and my sister wear matching tear-streaked faces. Dad stands behind them, trying to keep his composure, but I can tell he’s not doing a good job when he brings a finger to one of his eyes.

“Hey, everyone,” I meekly respond. I don’t know what else to say. I feel like saying
sorry for trying to kill myself… again
is out of the question. “Sorry?” Again, what else can I say.

“Don’t apologize,” my sister speaks. “I thought….” She wipes away her tears. “I thought you were doing better.”

So did I. But I guess none of it ever really went away. My darkness was always there; it just was dormant for a while. But it would always come back to consume me. I knew it.

“I’m sorry,” I repeat, looking away from the three crying messes. Even my father’s tears are finally spilling out like a waterfall of emotion.

“I said not to apologize,” Clara says with a small laugh. They all take a step closer to the bed, and they tower over me, making me feel smaller than I have ever felt in my life.

“Why, Jess, why?” my mom asks.

I can’t look at any of their faces, as seeing all their tears just brings me guilt. I shrug. I just want to apologize, but how many times can I say that I am sorry?

“Are we not making you happy?” she asks me.

“Gosh, no, Mom. You didn’t do anything wrong. None of you did. I just… you know I’m sad. I just wasn’t in my right mind, and I wasn’t thinking… or no. That’s not true. I was thinking too much, and everything became too much. I just feel… I don’t know. I’m not doing too well with my words now,” I try to joke.

No one laughs.

“Sorry.”

“Stop damn apologizing.”

It feels nice to talk to my family, but it seems like something is missing. Or someone. Adam. I said so many terrible things to him, and I left him. The last thing he saw of me was my bout of insanity, and now he isn’t here.

“Where is Adam?” I finally ask. A part of me doesn’t want to know. He probably never wants to see me again.

“He’s in the waiting room,” my dad answers.

“What?”

“Do you want to speak to him?” he asks.

I simply nod. He wasn’t scared away? But why? How? Any normal human being would have run away after my antics, but he stayed? My family leaves the room, and in walks Adam. He wears a plain T-shirt that clings tightly to his muscles. His light brown hair is in a mess and he hasn’t shaved for a few days. His stubble is growing in. He even wears a pair of glasses over his beautiful blue eyes.

“Adam… you’re here,” I state in shock.

“I ha-ha-haven’t l-left,” he says with a small smile. He walks over to the bed, and I feel the weight of his body as he settles down next to me. I try to sit up, but I feel so tired that it almost hurts. He puts his arm around my waist, and he helps me sit up. He even fixes my pillow to make it more comfortable for me.

“Why?”

“I l-l-love you, J-Jess. When your s-s-s-s-sister called me, me, I w-w-was s-s-s-so w-w-worried. I-I-I don’t w-w-want anything b-bad to, to ha-happen to you.” That is when I look into his eyes and notice that tears are falling. Even crying, he looks beautiful.

“I love you too. I’m so sorry over everything I said and all that I put you through. I shouldn’t have done that to you. You shouldn’t have to deal with my shit, Adam.”

“Sh-sh-shut up. I w-w-w-want to b-be with you.” He touches his forehead against mine, and I close my eyes as he rubs his hand against my cheek. “I l-love you s-s-s-so much.”

We sit there in silence, and he holds me, and in this moment life feels good. Even though I’m lying in a hospital bed, after just having my stomach pumped, it feels right to be here with Adam again. After Adam leaves, the doctor tells my family they want to put me back into the mental hospital again. Hearing those words causes my heart to drop, as I really don’t want to return… but this time I really need to help myself. I want to be better. I
need
to be better.

Two months later

IT’S FUNNY
how when you’re away, it’s like the world just stops turning without you there. But it just keeps on spinning, and people continue on living, even if you’re not a part of it. I guess it was incredibly selfish of me to think everything would just pause when I was in the hospital—for a second time—but now that I’m home, everything is still going. Dad is back at his office job. Mom is still worrying about me. Clara is back at school. Tommy is still drinking, and Alex is still going to school to be a teacher. His relationship with Nick is great, he says. They are planning a vacation together to Nick’s family’s summer home. I’m really happy for him. Peter is still running the bookshop with Laurie and Jill at his side. It’s like nothing has changed. In the hospital Tommy visited me a few times, but he couldn’t stand the place, so I didn’t see much of him. When he did visit, though, he never acted differently. He cussed a lot and talked about girls.

Jill and Laurie brought me flowers and a really nice card, and they both made efforts to see me every couple of weeks. Hell, even Peter visited me while I was at the hospital. Yeah, it was only once, but I was shocked when he showed up. Obviously my family was there as often as they could come, especially my sister. Clara wanted to see me as much as she could before she left for school again.

And Adam…. Adam hasn’t left my side once. Even after all the terrible things I said to him, he had every right to leave me, but he didn’t. Adam visited me at the hospital every chance he could, and he made sure to let me know how much he missed me every time. He was there multiple times a week, and each time he visited me it felt like I was home again.

But now I am home for real again, and my doctors said I have been making incredible progress. I’m on a different kind of medication, and this one seems to really be helping, but I think the biggest change is Adam. Knowing he is there is making me stronger. I guess that is what love is. Love is strength. Love is finding that person who not only completes you but also makes you a better person and makes you stronger. Adam does that for me. He has helped me find the strength inside me I never realized I had.

And when I can’t find my strength, Adam is still always there, ready to help me. He always found it in me, while I had to go looking for it. Even on my darkest days, and I’m still having them, he was there. One of the nights after I got out of the hospital, I was feeling sick from the new medication. I felt like I was going to throw up, and I didn’t want to move from my bed. The new meds hadn’t taken effect yet. I was lying in bed crying. I just couldn’t stop the tears. I cried over my life and my fears. My past, my present, my future. What I knew and what I didn’t know. Each tear that I let loose was another anxiety of mine coming free. I had wanted to die in that moment. Adam was there, though. He was in my bed holding me close to his muscular body. His arms were strong as he held me to him and he just brushed my hair and told me everything would be okay. As I cried and wanted to die, he smiled and told me it would all be okay. Sometimes that is all a person needs to hear. That reassurance that there is something in life worth living for.

I’m back at the bookshop, and I’m living at home again. It feels nice to be with my family again and to be back in my world of books. Am I not depressed anymore? No. I’m still ill, and I will always be ill, but I’m learning to deal with my sickness in new and much healthier ways. I’m talking to people about my feelings now, and not just my doctor. I’m starting to let people in. Little by little, I’m allowing my wall to crumble down.

I’m thinking of even going back to school. I have no idea what I want to study anymore. I keep changing ideas, but I need to be the strong person I’ve always dreamed of being. I want to make a life for myself and maybe even make a life with Adam. I can’t think about the past anymore. I can only think of the present, and I can look toward the future. Because that is what really matters. A person’s past doesn’t define them, and my illness doesn’t have to define me.

While in the hospital, I truly learned that everyone’s life is like a novel. Each person’s life is made up of all these different chapters. And it is true. We go from birth to school to college to work to death. Each is just another chapter and another change. Our novels can’t be rewritten, but we are always still writing.