Tortured Hearts

“Have you done your essay for tomorrow?” I asked Cora through my mobile as I lay on my bed, hiding inside since there was a match on that day; a match meant that the whole University went wild and were either at the match, or were talking about it around the campus. I hated match days.
“Crap,” Cora groaned. “Could this day get any worse? I have nutters yelling ‘Go Will’ outside my window and now I’ve forgotten to do that stupid essay.”
“Anyone would think Will cheated on you,” I laughed, finding some way to make light of the situation.
“Doesn’t stop me from hating him,” she replied. “Now, will you do me a favour?”
“You want me to come help you with the essay, don’t you?” I mentally groaned as I thought about having to walk past the pitch on my way to Cora’s halls.
“You know I wouldn’t ask if I wasn’t desperate,” she pleaded. “And besides, you need to fill me in on your friend Mills.” I’d told Cora about Charlie and Mildred and she was eager to hear everything about that situation.
I gathered up my notes and stuffed them into a bag before leaving to meet Cora at her halls. I was reluctant to walk past the match, but there was no other way of getting to Cora’s. The noise from the pitch carried all the way to outside my block and I dreaded what it would sound like as I tried to get past the people rushing about, buying snacks and drinks.
I tried not to watch as I struggled through the crowds of people, but I found my eyes being drawn towards the pitch where Will was playing. I immediately found him amongst the players, doing his best to win the game. I started to smile in endearment before I remembered what had happened. Then I found my smile faltering and I had to drag my eyes away from him. He wasn’t mine anymore and he would never be mind ever again.
Getting to Cora’s didn’t come a minute too soon as I was let into her room. At my expression she said, “That bad a trip here?”
“You have no idea what it’s like to hear everyone, absolutely everyone , chanting his name.” I sat down heavily on her bed and brought my English notes out for her. “Here.”
“Thanks.” She gave me a sympathetic smile as she took them from me. “So, do you have any more news on Mildred and Charlie?” She flipped open her laptop as I made myself comfortable on her bed.
“Mills called me last night, actually. It seems Charlie is just getting worse and worse, whilst Mills keeps getting more upset.”
“But what can she do about it?”
“Nothing, that’s the problem. I just wish he was talking to me; maybe then I’d be able to shake some sense into the boy.”
“Why don’t you take a trip home then?”
“I tried talking to him at Christmas. He wouldn’t even answer the door.”
“So don’t give him an option,” Cora replied, giving me a look that said I needed to be more assertive; she often gave me that look about Will, saying I should ‘haul his ass over the coals’.
“I suppose I could do that. I do know where the spare key is kept.”
“There you go, then,” Cora replied.

Our conversation got me thinking, so when I next had a day with no lectures or seminars, I took a bus back home and went to get some answers from Charlie. I let myself into Charlie’s, knowing his mother wouldn’t mind even if she wasn’t at home. I hoped it would be just Charlie and I. Then I sneaked upstairs and entered his room. There was clothing strewn everywhere, some Charlie’s and some that I didn’t recognise as even being Charlie’s size; Mildred was right, things had gotten bad.
I gingerly sat on Charlie’s bed, trying not to think about what nasties there might be hidden on the unmade sheets. Looking about the room, I remembered back to a time when Charlie, Mel and I had been here together. Then Mel had started hanging around the wrong people and we’d fallen out. And then Charlie stopped talking to me. That along with Will and I was beginning to feel like I was driving everybody I loved away.
I had to wait a couple of hours before I heard the front door slam and footsteps on the stairs. My heart hammered in my chest and I hoped he wouldn’t get angry about seeing me there. The door opened and Charlie froze upon seeing me there. He was taller and had built up muscle since I’d last saw him, but he was still the Charlie I remembered.
“What the hell are you doing here?” He asked me, his look of surprise turning into anger.
“I came to talk to you, since you’ve been completely ignoring my calls.” I stood up, not wanting to feel intimidated as he stood.
“You needn’t have wasted your time,” he spat, flinging his school bag to the floor; presumably, he’d been in lectures that day.
“Don’t be like that,” I sighed. “Charlie, please tell me what’s wrong.”
“There’s nothing wrong,” he insisted. “Now, would you please leave?”
“No. Not until I find out why you’re acting this way.”
“Just leave.”
“Why are you ignoring me? What have I done?”
“Not everything is about you!” he yelled, his eyes sparkling with pent-up emotion.
“I…” I couldn’t reply to that. My eyes started to fill up and a lump formed in my throat, but I swallowed both of them back. “What’s got into you? This is so unlike you. And don’t say I don’t know you, Charlie. I’ve been your best friend since both of us can remember. You can trust me to tell me what’s wrong.”
“There is nothing wrong, Alicia. Go back home.”
He was being incredibly cold towards me and I almost cried right there and then, save for the feeling of anger that was quickly removing the sad feeling I had.
“Stop being so damn pig-headed,” I snapped, finally putting my foot down on him lying to me. “If there is something wrong, you tell me right now. I mean it.”
Charlie sighed and slouched into himself. “You just don’t get it, do you?”
“Not unless you tell me!”
“I can’t!” He cried. “I just can’t. Please, just… just go back to Uni, meet up with Will for dinner and forget about me. You don’t need me.”
“Yes I do!” I cried, almost reaching out and shaking him. “And anyway… Will and I are no longer together.” Even though I’d said the last part quietly, Charlie looked up and met my eyes once I’d said that.
“What happened?”
“For all my complaining to you, it never did me any good,” I replied. “I should have just followed my instinct. He was cheating on me, like I thought.”
“Oh.”
He didn’t say much more than that and a silence rested between us until I spoke again. “Now, can you please tell me what’s wrong?”
“I’m not kidding when I say to get out and forget about me, Alicia.” The way he looked at me was hard, but I suspected he was putting a front on since there was sadness beneath his gaze. What was so difficult and awful that he couldn’t tell me?
“But—”
“Get out. I’ll call the police if you don’t. I’m not kidding.” He stared at me until I realised I was fighting a battle that was already lost.
Grabbing my things, I left his room, though not before saying, “You call me. You may not want me, but I will always be there for you.”
He watched me from the top of the stairs as I shut the front door behind me and then as I walked along the street, I turned and saw him watching me from his bedroom window.