If Only I Knew How to Hate You

Alex

She drives me crazy. Insane. Berserk. Everything else imaginable. She’s sweet, then she’s vulnerable, then she’s caring, and then she hates me what. What is this? She’s completely bipolar.

So I guess that’s why we don’t exactly talk for a day… or two… or a week.

Call it what you like.

But I’m going crazy here. Every comment I try to say turns into some defensive snap from her, and so on. Maybe it has to do with her crutches or the fact that she got food poisoning on the third day we weren’t speaking-

I stayed up all night with her, rubbing her back, getting her water, and so on. And in the morning, when everything is flushed from her system, she blames me for not getting rid of the peanut butter.

It’s ridiculous. I’m not even that ridiculous. Heck, Jack isn’t either. This is just… insane. It’s insane.

“You’re going,” I tell her.

“No, I’m not,” she snaps.

“Why?!”

“Because I don’t want to!”

“The world doesn’t revolve around you,” I retort, frustrated.

“Then why do you want me to go to someone who will make me talk about myself?” She snaps back with an angry gleam in her eye, crossing her arms as she sits firmly on the couch. “Just- go away!”

“It’s my house,” I remind her, upset.

“Oh, so you’re kicking me out?”

“I didn’t say that!” Why does she keep messing around everything I say? “Come on, Bailey! Just go! It won’t kill you!”

“It’s just therapy!”

“That could help!”

“Help with what?”

“With- with everything!” I yell loudly, shocking both her and myself. I pause, catching my breath, hands in fists. “I’ve given you a lot, Bailey, and I’m not asking so much in return, okay? But you have to take care of yourself!”

“I am!”

“Not by hiding out like this! It’s not healthy, it’s not sensible. It’s stupid.”

“So I’m stupid?”

I’m going to strangle myself over this. “You know what? Fine! Keep twisting my words around! I don’t care anymore! Okay? Does that make you happy, Bailey? I am at my wit’s end with you! All you do is sit around and whine and argue and you’re mean and crude and I’m sick of this!”

Her mouth drops open. “How dare you! Alex, you are the one who’s going everywhere! I can’t go anywhere on the crutches, and I can’t drive with it either. You’re always going off to practice, or the guys, or any place you want to- and figuring that hey, I’m too tired or too weak to do anything fun! You’ve totally ignored all that I’ve been doing, including reorganizing just about everything in this sick house, I painted your room- I even cleaned the closet baseboards, Alex! I feel like a prisoner and that I don’t belong here!”

“Oh, so you feel all this and you can’t just tell me?”

“No!”

“See! You have to talk to a shrink, then, if you cant take anything!”

“I can take about anything, just not you,” she scowls angrily at me. “Just- just stop judging me, Alex!”

“Like you judge me?” I spit. “You go on and on about how horrible your life has been! But it’s not like everyone else’s life is just handy-dandy you know! I’ve had bad days and I’ve had horrible times. But I got through them, okay? You just want to wallow in despair and- and you don’t want to move on!”

“Is that what you think?” She gawks.

“It’s what I know,” I tell her heatedly.

“Well…” she at a loss of words. “Screw you, band boy,” she manages before stomping off to her room.