Coming Home

I used to ask him if it hurt, the scars. And he used to say yes like it was no big deal. Maybe he had a diary I never knew about, dedicated to pain. Because truth is, it hurts like a gigantic motherfucker. And I can’t look at a mirror without feeling scared.

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Cassadee stared at the ceiling, the happenings of the past night burning down onto her. She had barely said a word while Derrick made her drink tea and sat opposite her and tried not to stare. But she had so much to say, a kind of fullness that she didn’t know how to put into words.

The idea that Cassadee had now was not to fall asleep because she knew if she did, she would wake up to a stranger sense of forlorn emptiness.

Lying like a statue and staring at the ceiling, Cassadee couldn’t toss around because her body ached too much- especially the area between her legs where Vincent had terrorized with his fingers. Thinking about it made her feel ill. She couldn’t sleep, and she heard shuffling outside of Derrick’s guest room.

Getting up painfully, she shuffled out of the room- muscles and bone aching under her. Pushing the door open, she saw Derrick muttering quietly into the phone, his back sheathed in a jumper, a free hand running through his hair the way he did when he was frustrated.

She stood awkwardly behind him, staring at her feet.

~

“Is she okay? Did she you know-“

“I don’t know mum,” Derrick sighed, pacing around his rented house. After she had drank her tea, Derrick sent her to bed without a word and left before either of them could say anything. He didn’t want to look at her, because everything that she symbolized seemed to be a slap in his face. She was a product of his negligence and selfishness, and he couldn’t look at her without wanting to punch himself in the face.

“Did you make a police report?” His mother asked painfully over the phone. Derrick could hear her gripping the phone wires, twirling it around her fingers. It was customary actions that Derrick had gotten to learn about the people near him, actions that made him closer to them. But when he turned around abruptly, he saw Cassadee standing behind him, looking at him hesitantly.

She stood still, just staring at her feet and Derrick swallowed painfully upon sight of the bruise on her face. He realised that he didn’t know of anything that Cassadee did when she felt nervous. She probably knew his- pulling his hair and clenching his fists, but he knew nothing.

“Sorry, hold on mum,” he said, before looking at Cassadee.

“Are you alright?” he asked, treading carefully, looking at her but not feeling anything because he knew that neither of them would be strong enough to handle any more emotional outbursts.

She blinked at him once, then seemed to remember why she came out of the room.

“I couldn’t sleep. Do you have paper, and pen?” She asked, flushing slightly. Hurriedly fishing for a notepad and a pen, Derrick handed it to her, watching her tepidly receive them with her bruised, pale hands.

“Sorry, again,” she mumbled, casting him a look before quickly switching to the floor and returning to the room quietly. Derrick watched her small body disappear quickly into the dark before returning to his conversation over the phone.

He heard his mother sigh over the phone.

“Was that her?”

‘Yeah.”

“I’ll talk to your father about this,” Derrick heard his mother give a final sigh, and more crackling as he felt her play with the wire again.

~

Cassadee sat awake on the bed, writing and writing until her thoughts and fingers became numb with repetition. It was the only way she could, and it was the only way she knew how to handle her problems. She wrote about all she had lost in the fire of the moment, and in the floods of the past. She tried to be honest about everything, and everything she had lost- she let burn into the paper.

If there was anything that she had learnt in the past years of being alone, it was that writing always helped soothe a burning heart. But the thing about writing is that, the past comes back to you. And when it does, you write it down, again and again until your mind feels too tired to carry on and you drift off into sleep.

~

It was 3 am when Derrick pushed the door of the room where Cassadee was in, open. He looked around, she was curled to her left, and breathing in painfully as her exhales came out as fearful shudders. She was dreaming.

He padded in slowly, noticing the sizeable stack of papers at the side of her bed, her handwriting illuminated by the warm glow of the bed-side lamp. Picking the stack up, Derrick stood by her bed side and read the first page. He let his eyes skim over her writing, raw and vulnerable, just like herself- again and again until he felt tears prick the back of his eyes.

He read the first page all the way to the thirteenth page. And by the time he was done, he was crying.

~

Cassadee felt claws grip at her throat, as if they were going to snatch the breath out of her. She felt blood burst through the seams, and air rush out. Then she was gasping for air and her eyes flew open.

Bolting up from her foetal position and wincing at the pain which exhumed her, Cassadee pressed her palms against her closed eyes to shake away the whispering nightmare. She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up.

His face glimmered slightly with tears, and in his other hand, he held her memories and thoughts. She knew he would be here, but now that he was here, she just stared at him mutely. They stared at each other for a moment, Cassadee trying not to stare too hard at his face because she knew if she did, she would start crying too.

She watched as he opened his mouth to speak, then close it again, like he didn’t know what to say. Cassadee swallowed a lump in her throat, she hadn’t said anything, yet he had seen everything. Derrick had read every single thing she wanted to say, and there was nothing else she could have said to him. There was hurt there so thick that Cassadee could feel it curl up into a tight, toxic ball at her fingertips. She watched him look at her, eyes so lost and hateful that it crushed her.

“Please don’t hate yourself because of me,” she whispered hoarsely. She watched as he forced out a smile, which seemed to tremble and collapse on himself. He let out ragged breaths of regret and anger, before his knees seemed to give way too. Scrambling out of the bed, Cassadee knelt in front of him- like a person fallen from knowledge and grace.

She watched him cry, and she felt everything. Then she started crying as well, her spasmodic eyelids and tears stinging the bruise around her face. Despite herself, Cassadee wrapped both palms around his cheeks, mapping the tears that had been long restrained away. She hated seeing anyone cry, and it was never fair that he had seen her cry so many times. Now that he was crying, she could feel every single nook and cranny of their wayward relationship bearing into her bones.

She felt the sobs tear through his body, and she heard the same from her own. It was all so painful, hearing him choke out the phrase “I’m sorry” again and again.

“Please stop, just stop,” she whispered, her crying making her voice nasally and unpleasant.

“Doesn’t matter anymore, stop apologizing,” she continued. Then she wrapped her hands around his neck, pulling them together- feeling his skin under hers, her cold body suddenly pressed against his warm one. She felt the tremors of cries below them, and then felt his hands around her waist. In the life buoys that seemed to support her from drowning.

It was tiring, to be caught in such a relationship. To keep crying all the time, it was exhausting to keep tabs on the past. They had ruined each other, and at times like this it was hard to get up.

“I should’ve been there,” he said into her hair. Cassadee felt herself smile through her tears.

“Are you sure? Vincent said some pretty nasty things,” she replied. She felt him dig his hands into her sides slightly, making her take in a sharp painful breath. Then as quick as his fingers were there, they loosened.

“I don’t think I’ll ever forgive myself,” he finally said. Cassadee pulled away, and he was there. He had never really left her side, he was the same boy that had managed to steal her in 5 years ago- and he was still here. He still had the same guilt-tripping, messiah complex in him that she had known would destroy both of them.

“I think we should stop saving each other Derrick,” she said, smiling through bleary eyes. She watched him look at her, smiling slightly with the side of his mouth. He used his thumb to press away the tears on her face, being extra gentle around her bruises.

“You know I can’t do that,” he smiled sadly. Cassadee looked at him with mild interest.

“I love you, and I’ve never stopped loving you. I might mess up all the time, but nothing’s ever changed.” He finally said.

“And I probably shouldn’t say this but, I swear to god that we should stop breaking down in the middle of our relationships,” he said again.

Cassadee smiled. She realised that it was all she ever wanted, for him to tell her the truth. She had known it all along, but hearing Derrick finally say it make her heart break as did it make her whole again.

Then she kissed him, and replied, “I knew you loved me.”