Chasing Chaos

2009

I’d never exactly warmed up to the idea of large crowds. There was something about shows, festivals like Reading especially, that irritated my introversion and made me thoroughly uneasy. So to top off my already twisting nerves, I would be pushed into an ocean of strangers. But there was no way to get out of going, Gracie made that clear. She also made another decision on my behalf. She decided it was her responsibility to get me as drunk as possible and keep me drunk for the remainder of the weekend. She said there was nothing else to do about my horrendous mood and that she refused to let me be a miserable bastard the whole time.

I tried to protest, saying that I was a miserable bastard anyway. I’d acquired the condition from years of listening to Morrissey. She didn’t hear any of my nay saying and promptly pulled a flask from one of her bags and shoved it into my hands, instructing me to finish it off before we arrived. It was barely noon.

By the early evening, I was sufficiently sauced and not regretting Gracie’s decision in the least. In fact, I felt very relaxed, though rather silly. It was easy to forget myself amid the masses of people and it was easy to forget the masses of people when my brain was so clouded from the beer Gracie had been buying me all afternoon.

“Tommmmmehhhh!” I shouted as my best friend approached. He’d been busy for most of the day. He was smiling and shaking his head. I’d already sent him a series of madly misspelled text messages telling him that he had to come find me when he had a free moment to spare, that I missed him wildly and absolutely had to see him. He obliged me without hesitation.

“Annnnna!” He mimicked me. When he was close enough as not to need to shout, he said “Silly drunken lass.” Out of habit, I reached for him, pulling him into my clutches. His natural response was to wrap his arms around me and let me kiss his cheek.

If I could have carried this feeling in my pocket, I wouldn’t have needed to be drunk.

“O’reight?” He said and I shrugged. “Yeh ‘avin fun, are yeh?”

I nodded with enthusiasm, though fun was relative. “Loads. Except that Gracie’s left me. She saw Nicholls an’ said she’d be back but I dunno what that means. Somethin’s been goin’ on with them. Been awful friendly these days.”

“Aye, I’ve noticed that. ‘E were talkin’ about ‘er on the way ‘ere… ‘S a bit fishy, ef yeh ask me.” He started walking, keeping me inches away by holding a hand against my back. It was a safety I reveled in. “Not that I got a problem ef they get back together,” he added.

“Me either, I mean ef they’re supposed to be together, they will be.” This, of course, had a second meaning.

“Yeah, definitely, they—“ He spoke but I tripped over my feet before he could finish his sentence. I stumbled and nearly fell but he caught me before I could do much damage to myself. “Anna, yeh okay?” He did a more exact job of holding onto me, adding a second arm to his grip. “Can’t even walk straight.”

“Think o’ it as makin’ up for yer birthday when I ‘ad to carry yer arse around.”

“O’reight, that’s fair, I guess.” He slowed down and let go of me. Without his help, I came very close to falling again but he found my hand and said “Hop on my back.”

I felt my eyes widen with eagerness and I immediately got behind him with a big smile. “On three then?”

He nodded, hunching down as to make it easier for me. “One—two—three,” he said and on three I bounced up onto his back. We teetered for an instant before he balanced us out. “Got it.”

I clung to his shoulders and his hands held onto my legs. “Oh my god, I looove yeh, Tom.” I pressed my hands against his shirt and continued grinning in spite of myself. I knew that there were other things I should have been thinking about. But it was so good to forget about it for just a moment.

He turned his head to me slightly and smirked. “Mmmhmm.” I rested my head against his shoulder and closed my eyes, ignoring the people around us. If I couldn’t see it then it wasn’t real. But with eyes closed, my hazy mind drifted. For a second, I dreamt that Tom and I were something else. Not something more. It was never a matter of more; we had plenty between us. So it wasn’t something more that I was considering, just something else. I imagined that after Chris Carter broke my heart just before I’d turned sixteen, Tom found a different way to cheer me up. And all this chaos would have been void, would have never existed. Imagining this was nice. And it almost made sense. Because Tom and I were forever, whether it was just friends or not.

But I opened my eyes and remembered why we were just friends always and only. It was because as long as he was my very best friend, I could run to him, hold onto him and it would feel this honest and simple. It would always be good. I would not have given this up for any reason, for anyone.

Tom’s phone rang as we travelled along. He maneuvered so that he could pull the mobile from his pocket without sending me flying from his back. “’Lo?” He answered. “What?... No, I’ve not seen it. It was with the rest o’ ‘em… Well, ‘ow am I supposed to know, Oliver?” He groaned and I flinched at the mention of Oli. It was inescapable. “I’m o’most over there, hold on… Yeah, yeah, I’ll get it sorted… I see yeh right now for fuck’s safe, piss off.” Tom ended the call.

I strained my eyes to see Tom’s brother. I found that trying to do this gave me a bit of a head rush, a passing fit of dizziness and drunkenness. I felt warm from the alcohol and the hidden anxiousness. I asked “What was that about?”

“They’ve lost one o’ the boxes o’ large sized shirts an’ they need it.” Tom’s face became disgruntled, slightly annoyed, as if he had already been taxed enough this day.

“D’yeh know where it is?”

“I don’t know, maybe.” He shrugged and then raised his arm in the air and waved, shaking us both. “Oy!”

This is when I finally saw Oli ahead of us. He was still covered in a layer of perspiration from being on stage quite recently. His hair was matted down against his face and he looked very much like I did, like sleep hadn’t been the top priority. “Yeh’ve the trailer keys?” Oli asked his brother. It was here that he noticed me draped across Tom’s shoulders. “Yeh’ve a bird on yer back,” he said.

“Aye, a bird too drunk to walk on ‘er own.” He teased but I felt a little ill.

I blinked and said “I can walk—just not well.”

Oli was staring at me as though this was the first time we’d met.

Tom was oblivious. “I can run to the trailer ef yeh want but I swear I brought all o’ them boxes out ‘ere.”

“Obviously yeh didn’ ef it’s not ‘ere.”

Tom rolled his eyes and eased his grip on me. “I’ll go look but I ain’t promisin’ to find the bloody box…” He turned his attention to me. “Gonna let yeh down now, Annie.”

I slipped from his back, giving his arm a soft squeeze before totally letting go. My legs were wobbly and Tom steadied me.

“Can yeh mind Anna until I get back, Oli?” He asked. “She’s bound to get into trouble on ‘er own.”

My eyes widened and I stepped away. “I don’t need mindin’. I ain’t that drunk.” Subsequently proving myself incorrect, I slipped in a small patch of mud and came very close to falling yet another time. But I wasn’t surprised. I could never just act normal when I really needed to.

As if it were no big deal, Oli nodded at Tom. “No worries, I’ve ‘er minded.”

Tom gave me a small smile before disappearing into the crowd. And we had done it. Oli and I had managed to keep a secret from Tom. The secret. I was confident that Tom had no idea that anything was between Oli and I. He had left us alone together after all, thinking that there was nothing but history for us. Tom had no clue that there was anything in the present going on. There was something very wrong about that on my part. It defied Tom’s trust to withhold information. My guilt had returned, no longer masked by my intoxication, just made worse. I wondered if Oliver felt this guilt at all.

“Yeh ‘avin’ a good time?” Oli asked with his hands stuffed down into his pockets.

“Yeh look knackered,” was all I could think to say.

“Yer one to talk.” He frowned.

It was as though we’d never had a conversation in our lives, as though we hadn’t seen each other naked. And this felt wrong too. I knew that at some point, we could talk to one another. For hours. For days. It made me upset to think that we had lost that, or that we’d given it up. It made me furious because it was very much Oli’s fault that we’d given up. But anger felt just as wrong as awkwardness and secrets. Being angry with Oli seemed cruel. Though he could and would talk me into anything, his intentions were never malicious. I knew that; I’d known that. But it was easier to blame him than to blame myself.

Wanting some sort of fulfillment or closure, I asked “Do yeh wanna go somewhere? I mean, do yeh wanna walk with me? Needta sober up ef I wanna drink more later.” There was a whole night of drinking ahead of me, if I knew Gracie at all. “I really can’t jus’ stand ‘ere and stare,” I admitted.

“Right, okay.” He gave a short nod and followed my lead. I attempted to venture away from things, away from the people. My pace was struggling and sloppy; I walked in severed lines. Oli was patient, slowing his own rate to match mine. Where was I headed? As far from the chaos as I could go. I’d never escape. I wanted to hide, to keep my secrets. “Savanna, hold on a minute, where are yeh goin’?” He had realized that I was aimless and slightly hopeless. “I’m not sure ‘ow well I can mind yeh when yer staggerin’ about the place.”

“I’m not staggerin’.” I defended myself rather weakly. I turned to him and found that he was grimacing. I didn’t like the look; it didn’t suit him. I eased my expression and said “I guess I was stumblin’ a bit.” It was my attempt to lighten the air. I was tired of so much seriousness.

It seemed to have almost worked because the corner of his mouth twisted. If he were just a small bit happier, there would have been his smirk. I wanted the smirk. Or the pout. Or the laugh. Anything but this look of apprehension. “Is there somethin’ yeh wanna say?” He asked.

I shook my head. “No, does it look like I’ve somethin’ to say?”

“Aye. Looks like yeh got a lot to say.”

“Well, I don’t. Absolutely nothin’. What is there to say?”

“I dunno, what about ‘’Ow’s the weather, Oli?’ That might work, for starts.”

Listless, I stared. “’Ow’s the weather, Oli?”

“Looks like it might rain.”

“Don’t it o’ways?” I took a large step towards him with my hands upon my hips. I felt irreverent and bold, like this didn’t matter. Fire had returned to me with a brash suddenness. I could not control the heat that filled my chest. It came and went as it pleased.

His eyes flitted down to me through slanted lids. “Savanna…”

I watched him watching me and I didn’t care about boundaries, best friends or boyfriends. I was swimming in inebriation and Oliver was still what I wanted more than anything else. I stood on my toes and pressed myself to him. I held my mouth against his in a motionless kiss. It was forceful and held very little tenderness or affection. It was an act of defiance, an act of confusion. I was just trying to understand.

And thus, I was not surprised when he pushed me back, keeping a hold of my upper arms. “What’re yeh doin’?”

“Isn’t that what yeh want? For me to kiss yeh… for me to want yeh?” I locked my gaze onto him and held it there.

“Well, yeah… But not when yeh’ve so much bitterness in yeh and not when yeh’ve so much booze in yeh either.”

“Oh, how foolish o’ me, thinkin’ yeh’d like me anyway I was.” Though in my mind, I’d asserted that I shouldn’t be angry, keeping it from actually happening was impossible. My old hurt lived on. I could still hear the big fight ringing in my ears. I still tasted rejection on the back of my tongue.

His finger tips pressed into the flesh of my arms. “I do like yeh anyway yeh are. Sav, I—“ He stopped himself, took an aggravated breath and started again. “I don’t know what to say to yeh to make yeh believe that I don’t want it this way. I can’t stand yeh hatin’ me like yeh do. It’s bloody unbearable.”

“I don’t hate yeh.” But in truth, I wasn’t sure how I felt.

“Yeh do. Yeh’ve hated me since… since I said those things, since yeh know.” He detached himself from me, putting a short distance between us. “Yeh wouldn’t look at me for two whole years. Yeh barely spoke to me at all until the summer… Yeh hate me.”

“No, I never meant… I jus’ couldn’t…”

“I know. I get it. I hurt yeh and I deserved the hate. I deserve every ounce o’ it. ‘S on me. I did it. An’ I know what yeh think, yeh think that ‘cause I let yeh go once, that I’ll do it now. But fuck, I can never let go. Not really. Because yer there, somewhere, in the back o’ my fuckin’ head.”

This small revelation spun my head faster than any amount of drink could. “Oli—“

“An’ all I’ve fuckin’ wanted was another chance. To explain to yeh that I ‘ad a good reason for what I did.”

I closed my eyes and shifted around with unease. “To explain? Oli, I think ef yeh was gonna explain, yeh shoulda done it a long time ago. An explanation would be completely irrelevant now, don’t yeh think?” I didn’t think it in the slightest.

He immediately disagreed. “No, I don’t believe that.” There was a great relief underneath all of my resentment. “It’s absolutely fuckin’ relevant, especially now… with what’s happened.”

“An’ what is it tha’s happened exactly?” My acrimony overshadowed my affection.

“Jesus, Savanna, do yeh really ‘ave to keep playin’ the same fuckin’ game over and over? This is the part I can’t fuckin’ take about yeh.” He had anger of his own to expel, it seemed. “The back and forth. The stringin’ me along. Ef I didn’t know yeh better, I’d think yeh enjoyed seein’ me suffer.”

“What?” came from my mouth unconsciously. “Suffer? No, Oli, I—“

“Can we not do this?” He was irate; I could tell from the way his fists were clenched at his sides. But he was restraining himself, holding back. “Not now at any rate. Yer drunk and not likely to listen well to anythin’ I say. Not that yer likely to listen sober either. I’m the bad guy to yeh anyway we look. So, fuck it.”

“Oli, I don’t think yer the bad guy…” Always hot and cold with me. I couldn’t make up my mind.

“Oh, really? Well, yeh flip-flop yer opinion on me at the drop o’ a hat… So, sorry for not counting yeh as the most credible source on the matter.”

With my mouth falling open, I took a step back. He was right and there was very little I could do about it. But like the indecisive coward I was, I decided that walking away from him was my best choice. And like the indecisive coward he was, he decided not to follow me.

--

2005

It was raining in Sheffield the Tuesday following the accident. It was the cold sort of rain that sank into your skin and stuck. I sat on the front steps of my parents’ house. I let my feet drift out from under the awning. Rain hit my ankles and sent shivers across my body as I waited for him to arrive. A phone call had signaled his intent to talk. I believed that I was ready for our conversation. Or at the very least I was ready for any conversation that didn’t involve my family.

I was under my older brother’s supervision while our parents were working that day. They had asked him to ensure that I went nowhere. For once, he obliged. Though Sam had originally encouraged my misbehavior, he had finally seen why it was better if I followed the rules. For me, boundaries were safety. I was not careful enough. Careless. Jump first then brood later. My family was beginning to understand this. Sam acknowledged his status as a traitor and accepted it. The accident had brought out an instinctive protectiveness in him.

The accident had also brought with it a flurry of rumors and gossip. It only made matters worse that I was not allowed to go anywhere. Over the phone, a concerned Gracie had explained that several people were under the impression that I was in a coma and near death. I told her that I was not anywhere close to dead, though she already knew that. I also informed her that the worst of my physical problems was the metal plate in my left arm from simple surgery, performed to realign the fractured bone. This didn’t seem to satisfy Gracie. She was looking for some sort of drama. She lived for it.

To be honest, I was glad to be away from said drama. I would not go as far as to say that I was glad to be stuck at home. But it certainly was nice to have alone time to collect my head. Not that I was getting much collecting done. In fact, all my thinking did not even prepare me for the sight of Tom skating through the rain down the middle of my road and stopping at my front walkway.

He tucked his deck under his arm and walked towards where I sat on the front steps. I raised my hand in a small wave. Tom didn’t wave. He instead took a seat directly next to me on the stairs. His arm brushed against mine and I wondered how you could miss someone who was right next to you. For some time, we sat there watching the rain.

I trailed my toes through a small puddle at the foot of the stairs, waiting. He had come to talk and I knew eventually he would. But for the moment, I understood the phrase ‘silence is golden’. Because he was there and for the first time in a long time, he didn’t look angry at all. He didn’t have any rage or scorn. He looked very tired, aged almost. I understood this look; I felt it too. I felt so old. Were we really only sixteen? We couldn’t be. It felt like it had been years since the two of us last sat in silence together.

“’Ow are yeh feelin’?” was his first question.

“Sore mostly. I got a lotta bruises.” My entire body seemed to be covered in them; the worst of them dotted my ribcage.

“Yeh got a lotta cuts too.” He motioned to my face, which held a pattern of moderate sized abrasions including one that had required several stitches.

“Yeah.” I ran my fingers over the cuts. I didn’t mind the sting of it so much. It was a grounding hurt.

Tom let out a muddled sigh and said “I were really scared, yeh know?”

“Eh?” I hadn’t been prepared for him to jump right into anything serious.

“When Mum told me ‘bout the accident… I’ve never been so fuckin’ scared.” He pushed a hand through his hair and rubbed his forehead. “I mean, o’ course I were worried about Oli. ‘E may be a bloody moron but ‘e’s my brother and I love ‘im… But it weren’t Oli I thought about. Only thing I could think about was you. I couldn’t stand the idea that somethin’ bad might’ve happened to yeh. An’ worse, somethin’ happenin’ to yeh before I could apologize.”

“Apologize?”

“Well, yeah… I’ve not been the most agreeable fellow.” This statement I couldn’t argue with. There was really nothing I felt I could say and so he continued. “An’ on the way to the hospital, I swore to myself that I’d quit bein’ such a tosser. Because yeh thought… yeh thought I hated yeh and I don’t want that.”

These were very overwhelming statements and all I could say was “Oh.”

He turned to me, finally making eye contact. I don’t think I’d ever appreciated the color blue more than I did then. “I don’t hate yeh, Annie. I could never hate yeh. I would never…” His eyes looked glassy and he bowed his head.

“I knew that, yeah.” I picked at my cast and clicked my tongue against the back of my teeth. “I guess I jus’ don’t understand ‘ow we went from mates to enemies.”

“Honestly? I don’t know. At first, I suppose I were jealous.” This twisted my stomach. “I mean, everyone loves Oli. ‘E’s the band and the girls and the looks and loads o’ friends. And me? I’ve you… That’s ‘ow it o’ways were and I guess I didn’t want to share yeh…” This wasn’t it, not the true reason. But I preferred this reason to his next. “But I really jus’ didn’t want ‘im sinkin’ the claws into yeh. Didn’t want yeh to end up like the other girls.”

“What?”

His eyes flicked to mine again. They were sharp and scared. He had became more urgent, filled with worry. “Please say yeh understand why I don’t want yeh with ‘im… why ‘e’s bad for yeh.”

I held his gaze, very purposefully. And I nodded.

“I know it’s wrong to say it about my own brother, my family, but ‘e’s careless and doesn’t think things through an’…” He shook his head and pushed his foot around my rain puddle. “An’ I know what everyone’s said, what Gracie and Curtis and Nicholls ‘ve said. That Oli were different with yeh. That ‘e were good to yeh, treated yeh proper like… But this right ‘ere is proof that ‘e aint’ o’ways gonna be good to yeh.” Tom’s ‘this’ reference was to my injured; he motioned to my arm and face. He had a point. Even if I argued that the accident wasn’t Oli’s fault, there were still the facts of Oli’s intoxication and the facts of his influence on me. “I know ‘e don’t ‘ave bad intentions, at least not when it comes to yeh… But they ain’t exactly good ones either.”

“True…” I heard myself muter this without thought. I felt very restless and my skin felt tingly from wearing off pain killers.

“’E’s not good for yeh, Annie.” Tom chipped at the cracking wood on the underside of his skateboard. “But, I dunno… Seein’ yeh with ‘im, I understood why yeh preferred ‘im to me.”

“Tom—“

“’E’s fun an’ excitin’. ‘E got yeh to let go… Yeh were ‘avin’ a good time at the party. Yeh hate parties. They scare yeh.” He looked rather despondent. It was a tragic look for him because I knew how brilliant he looked when he was happy. It was the best sight, one of my favorites in fact. “Guess I didn’t know what yeh really wanted.”

I’d done something very stupid. I’d made Tom think that he wasn’t the most important person in my life. Before he could speak anymore, I took his hand. “I don’t prefer Oli.” His hand twitched beneath my palm. “I don’t think anyone gives ‘im enough credit… But ‘e’s not you.” Our eyes were on our hands. It was a difficult closeness we were managing to maintain. “I may want ‘im… but I need yeh. Does that make sense?”

“Aye. It makes sense.” His fingers wrapped around mine, an affirming gesture.

I took a deep breath and found myself tearing up. “It was hard, yeh know? Not knowin’ what exactly happened between us. Ef yeh woulda jus’ told me, I coulda changed things, done somethin’ different. I would’ve done whatever yeh wanted, Tommy. All yeh ‘ad to do was answer the phone.” I dropped his hand and shifted away. Though he had seen me cry, I didn’t want him to see me crying over him.

“Anna, hold on, I’m sorry—“ He went to reach for me but stopped himself. “Listen, I fucked up. I know that. But yeh gotta know that’s not what I wanted to happen.”

Wiping my cheeks, I said “Well what did yeh want to happen? I tried to talk to yeh only as long as I could. D’yeh know ‘ow much it hurt to wait for yeh? To wonder what I did that were so wrong—Tom, I ‘ad to give up; I ‘ad to let Oli distract me… Ef yeh wanna be mad that I gave up, fine, be mad about that. But just know, I ‘ad to do it or else I woulda spent all my time wallowing and unhappy.”

In a low voice, barely audible above the rain, he said “I’m not mad. I’ve no right to be mad.” He was shaking his head again. I could tell that he meant what he said and he meant all this to be over. And this was an immense relief. Also an unbearable relief. What came next? “An’ I want yeh to know, I’m not gonna tell yeh to choose. I won’t do that.”

“Choose?”

“I’m sayin’ that I don’t like it but I’m not gonna stand in yeh way o’ bein’ with Oli. Ef ‘e makes yeh happy, why would I want to…”

I slid back nearer to him, still feeling apprehensive. “Oh, uh—“

“I’m not sayin’ that I’m in charge o’ who yeh see or that I’ve a say—“

“No, yer right,” I said. “It matters to me what yeh think. Yer opinion’s the only one that I’ve ever cared about really.” I gave up trying to keep tears a secret. “But honestly, I’m a bit mixed up right now… More than a bit. I’ve got a lot goin’ on in my head. I’m not even sure which end is up or what happens next.”

“Me either. But we can figure it out together.” He sounded quite hopeful and I loved him for it.

I bit the corner of my mouth. “Tom…”

“What?”

“I need some time to think.”

“What?” He repeated, staring.

“I need to get my head sorted, get myself together before I can really be o’reight bein’ around yeh again…”

He seemed to understand instantly. “Oh… Yeh still angry with me.”

“No,” I immediately protested but then amended “Well, yeah, I guess I am. I jus’ don’t know ‘ow to be normal with yeh right now…” I sighed. “I don’t want to be angry at yeh; I honestly don’t… But I can’t help it. I jus’ feel like it shouldn’t’ ‘ave taken a goddamn car accident for yeh to tell me all this.”

“Right, I can understand that.”

“I’m not sayin’ that I’ll be mad forever. I’m not even sure I’m that mad right now. I jus’ need…”

“Time,” he finished and began to stand.

“A couple days,” I said, grabbing his hand once more. “Can yeh give me that?”

He looked down at me and gave a weak smile. “Anna, yeh know that I’d give yeh anythin’ yeh wanted.” He was as sincere as I’d ever seen him. I appreciated the sentiment more than I could accurately express. “I’ll be off now then. I’ll see yeh soon?”

“Aye, soon.” I nodded and let go of his hand. He started off down the stairs and then the walkway. Before he made it to the street, I called after him. “Tom?”

“Yeah?”

“Love yeh.”

He smiled again, this time it was broader and sent a flush of pink over my face. With a bit of a glow about him, he said “Yeh too, Anna” before hitting the pavement on his board and starting down the road.

I watched him as he rolled away from my house in the drizzle. I knew where things stood with us. Finally. I knew that we would eventually be us again. And I thought that all was well with Tom.

Which is why I was rather surprised to hear that later in the evening, Tom punched Oli square in the jaw.