Will You Catch Me If I Fall?

Addison’s POV.

Fucking Appendicitis.

I mean, really? The first time I go to meet a boyfriend’s parents, I become crippled by an explosion of an organ I don’t even need in my body. What kind of luck is that? Maybe I should thank the big man we don’t eat grass anymore, the rumoured reason of the appendix in a human body. Because then I’d be fucked.

I wasn’t in an extremely good mood when I finally awoke, without being blurred by those delicious drugs and realised what had really happened. Trace had stayed with me of course, and I had stared at him, asleep in the bedside chair, his head resting on our joined hands by my side. I could have stayed like that for ever, but then reality had sunk in when I realised I was in a hospital.

I don’t like hospitals.

It’s more the fact of the places underneath all the operating theatres and the rooms where patients are nursed back to help. No, it underneath all that. Underneath it all are those morgues, full of dead people, their faces white and frozen.

It brought back terrible memories, I was old enough to look down at Stephanie in her coffin. Her face, beautiful as ever, ghostly white, her lips pale, slightly shiny with the gloss my mother had put on. Steph always loved her lip gloss. She only had one head wound, hidden by her hair. I’m glad you couldn’t see that, my nightmares would have been even more terrifying.

And I had to stay there for another two weeks, just to be monitored. The nightmares came back, and I’m ashamed to say I awoke on more than a few occasions crying out for my sister. It was better the nights Trace kept me company, and he’d been there pushing my hair back, soothing me back to sleep. He never asked what I was dreaming about, and I’m glad. I didn’t want to relive Stephanie’s stiller than still face in daytime. I had enough nightmares in the day to deal with.

As well as scary, too clean and squeaky, hospitals are fucking boring. Even more so when your nurse is a right pain the ass. ‘Imelda’ gave me the shittest magazines, placed the remote control too far out of my reach, and greeted me everyday with a sour expression on her face. Trace was polite and kind to her as he is with everyone, and it often gave me a strange amusement to watch her blush and stumble for words in his presence. I didn’t know a greying forty-something nurse would fall for a tall, lanky, tattooed stranger.

Frank-E came to visit me when I called him to tell him why I hadn’t been to see him. Poor guy thought I’d abandoned him. He examined my healing scars, and offered me a joint on the sly. As much as I was tempted, I had to refuse. It may have tipped Imelda over the edge.

But now, I’m home. And as much as I almost miss the rumbling purr of a tour bus and the presence of Ant, Mason and Sim, I’m almost happy. I didn’t know how much I loved California until I actually left it. And Frank-E, I missed him. As much as I loved Trace, I could really be ‘me’ around Frank-E. He kept me sane. And stocked up.

When I arrived home, my mother passed her hand over my face. Maybe that’s her way of telling me she missed me but I’ve no way of knowing. She’s a stranger to me, I don’t know who she is anymore. As she doesn’t know who I am.
Most of my stuff is scattered now, some of it is in my childhood bedroom, some is in Frank-E’s, the rest in Trace’s tiny apartment. My life is a series of broken pieces, go figure.

I’ve been staying at Trace’s the last few days, it’s strange not being with him everyday now, as we were when we were on tour. Even the simple things with him mean so much, seem more intimate than anything.

I’m scared of the feelings I have for him. I don’t know what they are, I don’t what to acknowledge them at all.

Walking in the park with Trace now, had become a sort of ritual for us. It was the last days of summer, and we were taking the advantage of the last rays of hest when we could. It was even better when we had ice-cream, like now.

We sat on our bench, comfortable with each other. I could feel Trace’s gaze on my skin, and I knew he was burning with a question. I turned to him, “What is it?”

He smiled, running his fingers on the back of my uncovered knee, and pulling the frayed hem of my shorts, “Remember when you were at my parents and you were helping Miley with her homework?”

I blushed slightly, “yes?”

“You said you loved Math, and I was just thinking, how I didn’t know that. I don’t know what you were like…before, everything happened. Something tells me that you weren’t like you are now?”

I looked at him, amazed he read so much into a simple phasing of liking a school subject. But he was right, as always. I wasn’t like I was now. I had to change. I grew up quicker. I lost myself, and I still was missing several pieces. It would take a while.

I shrugged, “You’re right. I only…became like I am now after she died.”

Trace’s gaze was soft “Why did you change?”

I frowned, “I had to. I didn’t know how to handle anything that was going on in my life. My sister was dead, she’d been a guiding factor in my life, everything I wanted to be, and then she was just gone, like that. My parents, my parents were fucking useless as always. They died at the same time as Steph. They still haven’t started to live again.”

“What were you like?”

I snorted “You saw the picture. I was a complete nerd, glasses, braces, straight A’s. I was captain of the math club and chess club.” I buried my head in my hands, moaning as Trace laughed with disbelief. Yes, not something he could imagine me doing.

I hit him, “Shut up.”

He laughed, “So what did you do, go out and party?”

I thought about it. I hadn’t thought about where it all started “Yeah, basically. I befriended the bad asses in school. I stopped doing homework, dropped out of all my clubs, stopped being friends with everyone. And then I got into hard partying, my lifestyle changed. I smoke, I drank, I did drugs. I wasn’t little Addison Grey anymore. I was trouble. And then I met Frank-E when I was seventeen, and well…here I am now.”

Trace looked at his hands, “You too are pretty tight?”

I sighed, “Yeah, we are. We’re kind of a package deal. He goes, I go.”

Trace frowned, but didn’t enquire into the meaning behind my words. I continued my ice cream which was beginning to melt. And then Trace spoke again, “Addison?”

“What?”

“I need to tell you something.”

I rose my eyebrows, “Go for it.”

Trace took a deep breath and looked me right in the eyes, which was slightly unnerving.

“I love you.”

Aw, hell no.
The world froze, and I felt my face freeze, my body freeze and I knew he noticed. This was what I had been dreading. Love. What the hell was Love? I didn’t know it. At least that’s what I told him.

I stared at Trace, not able to speak or form any coherent words. I told him from the start I was trouble, and I had begun to go soft. I needed to get out now. My barrier had crumbled without me even realising.

I got up slowly, making my way to the bin and dropped my ice-cream into it. I looked at the rusting surface of it for a moment, and looked back at Trace one more time.

And then I did what I did best, I walked away.