Other Side of the World

Nathan froze and stared at his nearly-in-tears girlfriend. He had a sickening feeling that the view in front of her would intensify a thousand times if something went wrong with him – specifically, with his lungs. And somehow the things she said 5 minutes ago, the events that happened last night between her and the guy named Liam didn’t matter much.

This relationship was unhealthy as he was.

The first time Nathan saw her, she was so full of life. She smiled a lot, she fought alongside of other optimists and wishful thinkers, she stalled their journey from point A to point B by helping random pedestrians (he had to drag her away from random people from time to time) and those little annoying things, ironically, became the things that Nathan loved the most about her.

And then everything changed in her. She stood there in front of him more broken than ever. Her sweet look that he had known so much was smeared with exhaustion and the leftover anger and despair from her parents’ issue. Then, he was putting her through a lot by not even having the time to give her a call, check how everything was. He made her think that he might possibly be dead somewhere.

Nathan’s fingers touched her shoulder, treating her as if she was this really fragile glass. When did he fell so hard? The feeling was just too scary to fully welcome into his life right now. He changed so much in a short period of time just with Haley being in his life. It was daunting, somehow.

And just because of that, just because he was falling for Haley, he should step away. He didn’t want to go too deep because he might never want to let go even though one day, he might have to. He surely didn’t want to go. It would just make his departure just that much harder for him to bear.

Also, there was Haley. He didn’t want to see the broken side of her. He wished he could do something, to make everything better but how could he when he himself was a pessimistic bastard? How could he sound sincere and honest when in fact, he couldn’t even lift his own spirits up?

Haley didn’t have to go through more pain. She didn’t have to see her boyfriend dying. She didn’t have to worry that her boyfriend might be dead already. She could be free.

“—I’m so sorry, Nathan,” she said once more. “I-I wasn’t in my right mind and I…I just don’t know anything anymore,” she said, her cheeks red and her eyes watery. She was gripping on his shirt as if it was a lifeline, so afraid that he would slip away from her fingers.

If he was as kind as Haley, he would’ve stepped away from the relationship that they had.

But his heart ached. He finally could see Haley again. She was finally in his arms again.

He placed a finger under her chin and tilted her head before pressing his lips against hers once more, his fingers stroking her hair. “It’s okay,” he whispered. “I kind of figured out that you would be way out of your mind when you’re drunk,” he chuckled. “Just please stop crying, will ya?” he continued, holding her at arm’s length as he wiped her tears away.

Was it okay to be this selfish?

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

The first thing that came to Liam’s mind was that he was going to die that day.

He got a full-beating from his father for 20 minutes straight before he realized that he was in a housing area in the middle of daylight and that someone might see him. That 20 minutes felt like 20 years. He couldn’t even make sense of why he was even lying on the road as he opened his eyes.

And then his father, William Sterling gave him a hard kick on his stomach while he was down. In his daze, he didn’t evade that move as much as he evaded the other ones. He didn’t dare. He couldn’t even find his voice. He hated it when he was like this. It was as if someone turned off the ‘rational’ switch in his head.

It was as if his mentality morphed into that of a 4-year-old him.

Deciding to give him a last warning, William took Liam by his collar and slammed him again against the side of car. Liam spat out blood. “So are we on a mutual agreement here?”

Liam nodded silently.

“Give me my money by tonight or else,” he said, looking around to see if anyone was watching before slamming him again against the car. Liam fell on the ground limply. A few minutes after William silently left, Liam grabbed the handle of his car’s door, clutching his sides with his other hand.

He cursed under his breath. He didn’t want anyone to see – anyone here mostly referring to Belle and Haley who were in a house a few feet away from him – him in such a pathetic state.

He gritted his teeth. For now, he had to deal with this alone.