Status: FINISHED.

Of Confidence

Vingt-six

Melanie shook awake as she heard a crash from the down stairs of her house. She became nauseous with fear as she remembered that she was the only person that was supposed to be in the house right now. Her mom and dad were at work while Haley was at a friend's house.

She looked at the clock next to her bed that read 6:42 and wiped the sleep out of her eyes, trying to wake herself quickly. She grabbed a bat from behind her door as she quietly opened it. She walked down the stores slowly, hearing the soft clanking of metals in her kitchen. She walked to the opening of the room, making sure to check behind her multiple times before entering.

She peered around the room, raising the bat to hit the intruder that was in her home. She heard a bumping on the floor on the opposite of her island.

"Whoever you are I have 911 on the phone and I have a weapon!" Melanie yelled forcefully, something she had learned to do at her self defense class. If there was ever an intruder in your home or trying to hurt you, you were supposed to threaten them with a weapon and the law even if it was a complete lie.

"Who the heck would ever give you a weapon?"

Melanie sighed in relief as she heard the voice and let the bat fall from its upright position and to her feet. "You scared the crap out of me, John. What are you doing here?" She asked, stepping into his view on the opposite side of the counter.

She looked down to where he was. He was laying underneath her sink with a tool box beside him and a work rag tucked into the pocket of his jeans loosely.

John pulled out from underneath the counter, coming into her view. He wiped his hands promptly on the rag before putting it back into his pocket. "You mentioned the other day that your sink had a leak and I had time so I figured that I'd come over and fix it for ya."

Melanie smiled and leaned her back against the marble island. "You didn't have to do that, John. It's like, seven in the morning."

He gave her a small grin and stood up next to her. "I don't mind doing stuff for you, Melanie. It's what friends do."

“Yes, they do,” Melanie said complacently in agreement.

John rubbed the back of his neck and turned to her tentatively. “So, uh Mel, what are you up to tonight?”

She chuckled, “I don’t really know yet, John. It’s only seven in the morning. I first plan on sleeping until noon, then therapy, then whatever I want I suppose.”

“Well, you see there’s this party tonight and I wanted to know if you wanted to come with me…face your fears?”

Melanie felt somewhat anxious for the last time she had been to a party wasn’t exactly her fondest memory. “I don’t really just want to hang out with you and Taylor,” Melanie responded, slightly honest.

“Taylor isn’t coming,” John responded simply.

Melanie looked at him curiously, “Why not?”

“We’re uh-we’re kind of on a break you could say,” he said, running his hands through his messy hair.

“What happened?”

“She just wasn’t too happy with some things that I’ve been doing lately,” John replied.

Melanie felt herself wanting to know more. “Like what…if you don’t mind me asking?”

John looked at her contemplatively, “Maybe later. I need to get going, but uh I’ll pick you up at seven, because we’re partying!”

She chuckled, “Okay, I’ll see you then.”

He began walking towards her door, a small smirk on his lips. “And look good, because I’m single as of right now.”

Melanie let her lips fall slightly apart, her jaw not making its entire way down. She smiled to herself in reflection of the past few months and the bittersweet taste they left on her lips. Only a few short months ago those words just spoke would have made her crazy, but now his teasing game only seemed childish.

She had truly grown out of his foolish games and the feelings he had had over her for years; it was strange in a sense. On one hand she wanted to feel mature and grown out of his adolescent mind games, but in the other she wanted nothing more than to fall back into his trap, feeling like the teenager she once used to be.

She longed to feel butterflies in her stomach when John softly touched her hair, and she wanted to feel the old burning inside her every bone as his breath fell on her neck as they hugged, but her mind wouldn’t let her let go just yet. Her heart wanted to be confused, but her mind was just too figured out.

Melanie wanted the rain to come, a storm to wipe away the sun that was giving her a tan but also slowly giving her cancer. All she wanted was clouds to come and fog up her mind; maybe then could she feel normal once more.

___

John grasped her hand tightly as they weaved in and out of people, Melanie feeling slightly uncomfortable at the constant scents and visuals that registered memories of that night in her mind.

Dr. Harrison had said earlier that day in therapy that this would be a likely factor, that she would feel uncontrollable stress tonight, but in the long run facing the things and the people that scared her most would be her savior. Only after confronting her own uncertainties could she really accept and resolve her issues.

So that’s what she planned to do. Without hesitation she curled her long blonde hair, put on a pink lace shirt and a skirt with some heels. She looked good, and she felt good, and she planned to keep this attitude for as long as she was possible to. And that was how she ended up there.

Melanie laughed as Garrett Nickelson stood between a girls leg as they dangled off the counter. He had a beer in his left hand his other on the girl’s hip, obviously trying to romance her into his bedroom later that night.

“He’s ridiculous isn’t he?” She heard John chuckle close to her ear. “Want something to drink?”

Melanie looked at him and responded with a firm, “No.”

Drinking was what got her in this mess in the first place. Drinking was the reason she still blacked out sometimes as she showered, with her waking up in rooms that she wasn’t sure of how she arrived there. Drinking had been the ultimate thing to ruin her graduation-though she previously liked to blame it on the sandy haired boy next to her beginning the spiral of downward events.

John smiled, “I’m going to get a Pepsi. You want one?”

She nodded her head, a small grin on her lips. “Yes, please.”

He squeezed her hand in his, “You going to be okay here alone for a second?”

Melanie nodded her head in assurance, giving him a look that said he was absurd for acting like she wouldn’t be just fine. She leaned her back against a counter as she surveyed people in the room.

Some of the kids she went to high school with, some of them were in college now, and some of them she had never seen before in her life. But it was all the same, it always was.

Girls everywhere drank their body weights in tequila while leaning on the boy next to them who fifty percent of the time was a stranger. Boys grabbed their girlfriend’s waists tightly, holding them up as they chugged down beers their minds becoming intoxicated at a slower pace.

Melanie chuckled at a stumbling couple on the other side of the room. The boy was obviously still sober, only there to supervise his girlfriend and to keep her out of trouble.

Melanie gasped as she felt hands grip her waist, hands that she wasn’t familiar with, a tight grip that sent chills up her spine. She felt lips place themselves at her ear, “Don’t I know you?”

She knew who it was instantly; she didn’t even have to glance. His hair was blonde, matted onto his head, sweaty no doubt, as he would have been here for hours by now. His skin was tanned and strong, completely superior to her small frame. But it wasn’t those factors that she would forever remember, no, those were his emerald eyes.

“Get your hands off of me,” she said sharply through a tightly clenched jaw.

He laughed viciously, his body pulling closer to hers, “That’s not what you said a few months ago.”

Melanie pulled herself away violently, escaping his tight grasp. “Screw you, Jeremy.”

Jeremy smiled taking a step closer to her, pushing her against the counter, “See Hun, you already did that too.”

For once since that awful night Melanie wasn’t scared as she looked into that monster’s eyes; she was furious. She was angry that he had put her through so much stress and depression. She was angry that he had made her double check everything she used to believe in. She was livid that he had taken away who she used to be.

She scoffed, “I hope you die and rot in Hell you sick bast-

“Is there a problem here?”

Melanie looked away from Jeremy’s cruel smile and into the blue green eyes of the boy in front of her. He set the two Pepsi colas he had in his hands down on the counter behind him and balled his hands into fists.

Jeremy chuckled at John before looking back to Melanie, “Is this your boyfriend?”

John stepped in front of her, taking Jeremy out of her view, “I’m her best friend.”

Jeremy grinned, “So she’s still single, yeah? Looking for a meaningless hookup? –Because if she is I’m completely open. Tell her to hop on,” he said with a vulgar wink.

Melanie couldn’t even comprehend what had happened until after the actions were already made, all she remembered was the room going silent suddenly and watching as people joined in her stare as John knocked Jeremy to the floor.

John O’Callaghan was not a fighter, that much could be seen as she watched Jeremy roll on top of him getting a punch right to his nose, but John also didn’t give up. He fought back forcefully and for most of the fight it looked as if he was winning.

Melanie felt someone pulling her body away from the brawling boys sheltering her from the punches that could have easily taken her petite body down.

“Melanie are you okay?”

Her eyes were still unfocused, zoning out on the various colors of the room. Kennedy gripped her shoulders tighter, “Melanie? Can you hear me?”

She could, but her mind couldn’t find the words to respond. She just wanted to cry. She wanted to cry out of anger, out of worry, out of guilt.

“Is John okay?” She asked suddenly, trying to push back to the quieting crowd. She could hear John and Jeremy’s yells and the owner of the house telling them to get out immediately.

Kennedy grabbed her wrist firmly, following behind Garrett who was holding John back and leading him to his car. The boys loaded her and John into the back of Garrett’s car, Charlotte following closely behind Kennedy.

The whole way home was full of John’s yells of insistent cuss words, threatening to go back and kill Jeremy for the words he was saying. Melanie stayed silent, not daring to tell John about who Jeremy really was in fear of what John would do.

The boys led them into Melanie’s house, telling her to change and that they’d calm John down, but she refused to leave his side. She ran to her freezer quickly grabbing him bags of ice, placing them on his bleeding lip and swollen fist. His eye was two times its normal size, its usual blue iris being surrounded by a bloodshot white.

John lay on the couch as Melanie rested his head in her lap, instructing him not to fall asleep in case of concussion. She instructed the others to go home, finally convincing them after nearly two hours that they’d be okay.

They lay silently, neither one of them speaking a single word. It was awkward, that was definite. But Melanie wasn’t sure if that’s why she stayed quiet, or if because the storm she had begged for that afternoon had finally come.

Her mind was fuzzy again, but not out of fear or of anger or of anticipation; sure, those emotions were still there but they weren’t the major thing that was making her pulse race.

Her pulse beat quicker now because of the boy in her arms, the boy who had just defended her honor. She felt confused again, butterflies in her stomach as he sat up and looked in her eyes. She once again felt the heat that John had always made her itching for.

“Are you okay, Melanie?” John asked softly, removing the ice pack from his lip exposing his now purple skin.

She gasped, using her fingertips to touch the scratch softly, “Of course, are you? John I’m so sorry you didn’t have to fight him.”

“Yes, I did,” John said compellingly. “You didn’t hear the things he was saying, Melanie. No man ever gets to speak to you like that, never.”

“He’s not a man, he’s a coward,” she said bitterly.

John nodded his head in agreement. “Do you mind if I stay here tonight? My parents may be pretty pissed if I come home like this at three in the morning,” he softly chuckled.

Melanie smiled gently, “I was going to suggest that, come on.”

She held her hand out to him and he grasped it gently, painfully sitting up from his place on the couch. She knew his head was spinning and she placed his arm around her shoulders as she led him up the stairs and into her room. He collapsed onto the bed shortly after she set up enough pillows to keep his head elevated. “Thanks Hun,” he said softly.

Melanie nodded her head, taking a seat across the room from him on her bean bag. She looked at him and how he was eyeing her weirdly, “What?” She giggled.

“We’ve slept in the same bed before, Mel,” he said, using his hand to pat the bed next to him.

She got up slowly before lying next to him, keeping at least a foot and a half between their bodies. “I just didn’t know if it was appropriate because of Taylor…”

John sighed, “Melanie, I told you her and I aren’t together.”

She shrugged, “I just wasn’t sure if it was permanent or not.”

He stayed silent for a few moments, icing his bottom lip. “She couldn’t handle us,” he said at last.

“What do you mean ‘us’”? Melanie asked curiously, enjoying the subtle feeling of nervousness he seemed to give her again.

“She thinks there’s something between us still, and she confronted me about it.”

“What’d you say back to her?”

John looked dumbfounded, “Nothing.”

“…You don’t have to tell me, I guess,” Melanie said, disappointment in her voice.

“No, that’s just it, Mel. I literally said nothing. Like, I was dead silent,” he said honestly.

Melanie felt something in her stomach, something she hadn’t waned to feel in quite some time until now. She was hopeful, and the small smirk on her lips displayed that.

“W-why couldn’t you tell her?” Melanie said bravely, trying to cover her nerves.

John looked into her eyes, his beautiful orbs going back to their normal color slowly. His cheeks were bruising, blood in parts of his hair but he had never looked more handsome to her. “I was hoping that maybe you could clarify that for me…”

Melanie looked at him honestly, disappointed that he couldn’t step up at that moment, grab her, kiss her, and be the man that she needed him to be. “John, I think you need to figure that out for yourself.”

And with a kiss on his forehead she rolled away, closed her eyes, and tried to replace the haunting green eyes that she had seen that night with the comfort of knowing the boy next to her would never let Jeremy touch her again.
♠ ♠ ♠
Melanie.
This chapter was for disappearing act. and keriberrrrrrry <3 I love these two girls so much! Go check out their stories.
Buuuut, on another note, sorry it's been so long for an update! Let me know how you're feeling? Only a few chapters left (: