Heart Attack Waiting to Happen

Chapter 14: If You Follow Me You Will Only Get Lost.

Josh's P.O.V

The sun shone through the gap in my curtains, waking me up. I squinted my eyes and shifted so the light wasn't directed in my face. My eyes were sore and swollen from crying the night before, my nose was still throbbing from punch I received yesterday too, fuck.

I rubbed my eyes from sleep and let the reality of yesterday sink in, replaying everything what happened. It wasn’t a horrible dream liked I hoped, it was all real.

I sighed and looked over at Oli who was still fast asleep beside me. The poor thing was exhausted, he hadn’t move from the same spot all night, and I knew he wouldn’t if I held him close to me and he knew it too that's why he was so reluctant to. But he needed to rest.

I rest the side of my head on his shoulder gently so I wouldn't disturb him from his sleep. I glance down at him and notice that his t-shirt was revealing abit of his bare skin on his hip. I went to pull it down but something didn’t look right.

The skin on his hip looked a funny colour compared to his snow white face which made me curious. I gently lifted his t-shirt up to take a better look, my curiosity was going to be the death of me with this boy. But after what I saw last night, I wasn’t giving anything a miss.

Oh god. I shouldn’t have looked but I knew I had to see it. His hip was covered in dominate big purple blue bruises which seem to follow up to his ribs maybe. I wanted to pull his t-shirt up higher to see the full damage but I was afraid of waking him.

I didn’t want Oli waking up and catching me looking at his beaten body he hid from me so much. I quickly pulled his t-shirt back down, covering up all of his skin. I feel my eyes start to water, I couldn’t take this anymore, it's breaking my heart.

I slid my arm around his waist and cuddled into him closely but gently, not wanting to cause him any pain from those bruises. Just the thought of them had me sobbing into his back.

First the cuts on his wrist and now this? I didn’t understand any of it... was this apart of his self harming? Was he taking it to different extremes? Destroying his body one bit at the time? Why was he doing this to himself? He was perfect to me in everyway and I loved the bones off of him so why does he feel he has to do this? Was he really that unhappy? I just couldn’t wrap this around my head, my brain was frying.

I needed answers. Answers I know he will refuse to give me, but I can’t do this anymore, not after last night and now seeing those bruises. I needed to know what was going on! What kind of boyfriend does this make me? Not knowing anything what he’s going through, not being able to help him get through his dark times. Just letting him suffer on his own. I was useless to him. But not anymore, I was determine to get answers no matter what.

“Josh?” Calls out a sleepy voice.

Crap I was a mess, I couldn't let him see me like this. I quickly wiped my eyes before peeking my face over his shoulder.

“Hey sorry, did I wake you?” I ask.

He turned around so he was now facing me ignoring my question, typical.

He ran his cold finger along my cheek and down across my jaw line, his eyes examining my face, he knew I’ve been crying.

He propped himself up on his elbows and kissed me softly on the lips before burying his head into my chest. I held him securely against me and swallowed down the lump in my throat.

“Oli baby, we need to talk.” I murmur.

We had to talk.

I was met with his silence. I know he was going to find it tough to speak to me, but I’m not going to pretend that last night didn't happened.

“Oli?”

He pulls away from my hold and I'm instantly missing his warmth and comfort. He sits up and crosses his legs under him, his face hidden by his long messy bed hair. He looked so lost and helpless it tore me apart. I just wished he'd open up to me.

“Erm, I need to go home for abit.” He mutters, avoiding eye contact with me.

“What, why? You stayed there the other night.”

I didn't get why he wanted to suddenly leave, he always seemed to hate going home and now he wants to- Oh of course. I get it now. He was running away from the questions I had for him.

Oh Oli.

I let out a sigh and placed my hand gently on his knee.

“Oli, running away from the truth isn’t going to solve anything.” I say softly.

But he got up from the bed hastily and walked over to my bedroom window in a huff. He was avoiding me, I could see that. My heart ached for him to open up to me, why is it so hard for him to talk to me? Am I really that difficult? I would never judge him, ever.

“Just, let me go home and get a few things… and then we can talk.” He whispers, staring out my window.

I frown at his words. Was he actually going to talk to me? Or was this just a lie to trick me into letting him go back home and avoid him having to talk to me at all? I was unsure.

I felt more unsure about leaving him on his own whilst he's in this fragile state. He wasn't himself and it made me feel really anxious.

“Let me come with you.” I suggest.

“No.”

“Why not?"

“Josh Please! I said no okay!” He snaps, spinning around from the window and glaring at me.

His rash outburst startles me but his face softens when he realise there was no need for it.

Why wouldn’t he ever let me go back to his? He was hiding something from me… and the thought only worried me more. What's going on with him?

“Sorry love, but please let me go and I’ll be back in about an hour, you will hardly notice I’m gone.” He says.

I scoff, rolling my eyes. Yeah right. I lived and breathed for this boy, I’m pretty sure I would notice an hour of his absence. But I knew he wouldn't speak to me either way.

“Okay fine, but promise we will talk in an hour?” I sigh giving in.

He nods and slowly walks back over to the bed.

“Promise me Oli.” I push. I refuse to let him go until he promised.

“Promise.” He smiles faintly.

I watch him as he gets his things together and slips on his shoes before picking up his bag. We both slept in our clothes last night so he didn't bother needing to change as he was going home anyway.

He comes back over to the bed, kisses my forehead goodbye and leaves.

The minute he left my heart was pining after him. Something just didn’t feel right. No, I couldn’t bare the thought if he did something to himself while I weren’t with him. Last night was a big eye opener and I found out the love of my life is struggling and I just need to make sure that he's okay and nothing will too him over the edge.

I made up my mind, I wasn't going to just sit and wait for him to come back... That's if he ever planned in coming back. I shoved my feet into my vans, not bothering to change into some fresh clothes and run on after him. I had no idea where he lived but as I got to the playground I saw him in the far distance and that's when I made the decision to follow him.

~~

I kept my distance so he wouldn't catch me following him. But we ended up on the far other side of town, the less classy part if town which I've never been to before.

I followed him to this run down chavy council estate, Is this where he really lives? The area was horrible to tell you the truth. There were groups of chav’s hanging about more or less on every corner in every street, waiting to cause trouble. There were graffiti and rubbish everywhere which littered the walls and the roads, it was a nasty part of town and I wanted to leave as soon as possible in fear that I would get mugged walking around here on my own.

But I just kept my head down and carried on following Oli. He turns a corner which lead to these tacky looking row of flats. I stood behind the brick wall and watch him intently stand in front of one of the flats.

He stood outside it for ages, like he was deciding whether he should go in or not which concerned me. He finally gets out his keys and opens the door to the flat with the cracked window. This was his home.

I decided to reveal myself to him before he closes the door behind him.

“So this is where you live?”

He flinches and turns towards me in his doorway at the sound if my voice.

The horror in his eyes made me realise I made a big mistake following him.

“What the fuck are you doing here?!” He hisses.

“I uh, I was worried about you.”

“So you followed me?!”

“Yes…” I bit my lip guiltily and down to the ground.

“Josh, you have no idea what you’ve done by coming here!”

His words made me take my eyes off from the ground and look up back at him. He was angry and paranoid, but yet he was keeping his voice to a harsh whisper.

He took a sudden look behind him, he seemed terrified but quickly brought his attention back to me. I didn’t understand why it was such a big deal that I was here. Was he really ashamed that I was his boyfriend? Didn't he want his parents knowing? If that's the case, I wouldn't say anything, he knew I wouldn't because I understand if he's not ready.

He tugged my arm and pulled me inside of his house as he closed the door extremely quietly. He glanced at me with stern unforgiven eyes and the guilt fills me. Oh no, I can’t deal with him hating me, I shouldn’t have followed him, fuck.

“Stay here and be quiet!” He mouths to me.

I didn’t want to upset him anymore than I have so I stood completely still as he tip toed slowly towards the living room and peeked his head around the door. I think he was looking for someone, checking if we were alone maybe. He then crept towards the kitchen and looked in there and as I waited for him to come back I looked around my surroundings in the hall.

It was small and dim and there were many empty beer cans and bottles scattered all over the floor, the place stunk of cigarettes and stale alcohol. My eyes glance up beside me, the wallpaper was extremely old fashioned and it was peeling off the corners of the walls. It look like there must have been a flood at some point because there was a massive damp stain on the ceiling leading down the wall making mould grow around it, it was disgusting really, why wouldn't you clean that?

I amongst the un tidy floor I saw a smashed picture frame and stepped towards it but before I could make out the photograph inside it, Oli appeared again.

He motion his hand at me to follow him up the stairs and I did without a word. This silence frighten me a little.

Once we both stepped inside of a tiny box room Oli locked the door behind him. He turned to face me and looked at me in a way I wished he would never look at me again.

“I can’t believe you followed me.” His voice sounding hurt.

“I’m sorry, I was just so worried about you. I needed to know you were okay.” I say in defence.

“I told you I would be back in an hour! Don’t you trust me?” He asks making my eyes shoot to his.

I can't believe he just asked me that. Of course I trusted him, I was just worried about him…they were two completely different things.

Question was, did he trust me?

“Why didn’t you trust me to tell me this is where you lived?” My question startled him and his furrowed his eyebrows together.

“You have no idea what you’ve risk by coming here.”

“What’s that suppose to mean?” I ask concerned but he sighs.

“Nothing, just sit on my bed while I get some stuff together. We can’t stay here for very long.”

His bed? This was his room?

I hesitantly sit on his small single bed and took a look around the box he called his room.

It was tiny. God knows how he could live in here. There was a wardrobe built into the wall with one of the doors was hanging off of it while Oli pulled clothes out of it ignoring the hanging door completely.

He had the oldest TV ever, it was one of those square brick looking ones you had when you were like 6 and thought it was amazing 'cause it was your first TV. The pale blue paint on the walls was chipped all over, he only had a torn up Linkin Park poster on the wall which stuck next to a slanted shelf, which had a dinosaur and a Sonic the Hedge Hog action figures on it. This wasn’t somebody’s bedroom; it looked like a prison cell.

The room was lifeless with no identity or warmth to it at all.

His bedroom door was opposite from his bed which I notice the door had massive dents in it, as if it's been kicked in several times, inside and out.

I shifted on the bed I was sitting uncomfortably and frown as I looked underneath me. I think there was something buried under the duvet cover. I pulled back the duvet noticing droplets of blood stains on the sheets... Should this concern me? Or do I already know where they came from? Oli was too busy shoving things into his bag to notice what I was looking at.

I saw a grey piece of material under the duvet, this is what I must be sitting on. I shifted and pulled it out from underneath me and revealed my grey hoodie I leant him months ago. It was filthy, you can tell it hadn’t been washed since I lent it to him. I examined the hoodie closely and notice he made holes in the cuffs for his thumbs to go through. I rolled my eyes, despite it was my hoodie, he still claimed it as his own. Of course he cut holes in the cuffs. There were evidence of blood stains on the sleeves and on the inside of the hood. I sighed heavily to myself.

He’s got some explaining to do.

Lost deep in thought I hadn't notice Oli standing in front of me until he took the hoodie from my grip.

“Sorry, it’s dirty." He says timidly, shoving it inside of his ruck sack.

“Oli we need-” He cut me off.

“Josh we don’t have time to talk here, come on we have to go now!”
He was still angry at me and paranoid as hell for some reason but I followed him out of the room with out question.

We crept down his stairs as quietly as we could, ignoring each step creaking below us.

When we got to the last step, Oli’s head shot towards the front door as the sound of keys came from outside it. I could see a faint silhouette through the frosted window on the other side, someone was coming in.

“Fuck!”

Oli took my hand and dragged me to the kitchen as fast as he could, his hands shaking like crazy as he searched through one of the kitchens drawers for something. I’ve never seen him look so terrified in my life, what’s was going on? Who was at the door? I started to panic myself.

“Oli what’s going on?” I asked but he ignored me and carried on rummaging through the drawer.

He finally pulled out a key and held it in trembling hands and quickly tried to fit it through the key hole of the back door.

“Oliver!” A loud stern voice came from outside the kitchen, it made us both jump with fright. Shit, who the hell is that?! For some crazy reason I stepped towards the voice, but Oli grabbed my arm and pulled me away.

“Run Josh!” Oli yells at me.

And we both legged it out the back door without looking back.

I heard the voice call out Oli’s name again in anger. Who is that? And why are we running away from them?

I had no idea what was going on and who I was running from, but Oli wasn’t looking back or even considered stopping running. We ran far enough from his house to finally stop running but he didn't stop.

“Oli stop!” I shouted out to him but he kept on running.

My chest was burning and my legs were aching, I was about to collapse if I didn't stop to catch my breath.

“Oli!” I grabbed hold of his hand and brought him to a halt.

He sprung around terrified and confused. Tears were streaming down his cheeks as he fell to his knees breathlessly.

“Oli what the bloody hell is going on?!” I knelt down besides him catching my breath also but he only shook his head at me.

For fuck sake, I’ve had enough of this! I need to know what’s going on!

“I can’t take this anymore! You need to tell me what’s going on! I need to know or I can’t help you!” I snapped.

He glanced up at me through his hair, registering what I’ve said but then looking back at the ground again, panting.

“You promised me you’d talk to me, Oli." I reminded him of his word.

I see his bottom lip tremble and sniffed back tears. I’ve never seen him so scared before…I didn’t understand why. My heart was aching, I hated seeing him like this and I was completely useless to him because he just keeps me in the dark with everything.

“The hour isn’t up yet." He says causing me to frown in confusion.

“What?”

“I said we’ll talk in an hour.”

Oh for crying out loud! I bit down on my bottom lip, holding in the anger inside me. He fucking frustrates me so much.

He had no idea what he was doing to me, I was falling apart inside, I can’t handle not knowing anything any longer. He had to talk to me.

“I can’t take this any longer Oli. You really need to talk to me.” I beg.

He sits up and finally stands up from the ground.

“Fine, I’ll talk but not here. Even walls have ears.” He wipes the years from his eyes.

“Okay, we can go back to mine-"

“No. I know somewhere we can go... Follow me.”

Without even a single glance in my direction he took off and started walking to this unknown place of his.