I'll Never Be the Same

I woke to Darren whispering my name and shaking me slightly. I blinked up at him in the dim light of his room. I knew it had to be early in the morning.

“My mom’s going to be home in about an hour,” he said when he saw I was awake. “I don’t want to kick you out… but I don’t think she’d be too happy with me if she saw you here.”

I sat up slowly, yawning and stretching my arms. I hadn’t done much during the time I was at Darren’s. Last night we had watched TV and Darren ordered a pizza. I had read some Harry Potter before going to sleep relatively early. Even though I had been sleeping for such a long time, my energy levels still felt drained.

Without a word to Darren, I got out of his bed and picked up my clothes that were folded and clean on his desk. Darren had let me some sweatpants and a t-shirt so that he could wash my clothes. I got dressed quickly in the bathroom and deposited Darren’s clothes into his laundry basket.

“Hungry?” Darren asked when I entered his kitchen. He held up a box of cheerios. I shook my head.

“No, thank you,” I said. “Are you going to bring me to Becca’s? That’s where my car is.”

“Yeah,” he said, smiling. “Are you ready to go?”

I nodded my head and Darren picked up his car keys and we headed out the door.

---

When we arrived at Becca’s I turned to Darren as he put his car in park.

“Thanks again,” I said. “I don’t even want to think about what would have happened if you hadn’t interfered.”

“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “I’m just glad you’re okay.”

We were silent for a moment. I didn’t know what to say… or even if I wanted to say anything.

“So I suppose we’ll just continue on as we were before yesterday,” Darren said. “Me leaving you alone and you pretending like I don’t exist.”

My eyes met Darren’s and I noticed the flicker of a faint smile, but it faded quickly and I could see in his eyes that this hurt him in some way. I felt my throat tighten as I realized that I was just like Darren in my own way, not caring how he felt. I looked down and reached behind me to open the door to his car. I didn’t know what to say and before I knew it I was standing next to his car, Darren watching me closely. I closed the door of his car without saying a word. I got in my car and drove off before he did.

When I got home, I went straight to my room and immediately started crying. It had dawned on me in that moment that I was as big of a bitch as Darren was heartless. I couldn’t even bring myself to recognize that Darren wasn’t as heartless as he appeared to be, but I was still a bitch no matter what.

I had been about to agree with him that we should go on ignoring each other, not caring that Darren had saved me from Ben and let me stay at his house to get a grip on myself. Sure Darren used girls, but he didn’t hurt them in any way. He wasn’t like Ben, taking them by force and drugging them. He was charming and nice, and the girls couldn’t help but fall head over heels for him. The fact that they fell that easily was the reason they got hurt, wasn’t it? Darren wasn’t a bad guy.

“You didn’t answer me.”

I jumped and hastily wiped at my tears as I looked up in shock at Darren standing in the doorway of my bedroom. I started crying all over again, sitting down on the edge of my bed and burying my face in my hands.

A second later, Darren was kneeling on his knees in front of me, pulling my hands from face, trying to carefully wipe away my tears.

“What’s wrong?” he asked quietly. I shook my head, honestly not really sure what was wrong.

“I have no idea,” I said quietly. I wiped at my eyes. “I’m just… I’m so confused right now.”

“What’s there to be confused about?” he said. “Just tell me you want me to leave you alone again.”

“But that’s the thing,” I said, staring down at him. “I don’t know if I actually want you to leave me alone.”

“Does that mean my plan to get you might actually be working?” he questioned, grinning at me.

“That’s not what I mean,” I said. “It’s just… I need some time to think. And I guess in the mean time you don’t have to leave me alone.”

Darren stood up, and leaned forward, placing his lips on my forehead. I closed my eyes at the contact.

“You won’t regret it,” he said quietly.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” I mumbled. Darren just laughed.

“See you in school on Monday,” he said and then he was gone.

I lay back in my bed, staring up at my ceiling. I had a lot to think about, and no idea where to begin.