Falling Out

The room was silent as I sat across from Billie Joe that you could hear a feather hit the floor. It was only him today. That’s what Dr. Jenn wanted.

Billie was on the verge of tears, I could tell. He wasn’t looking at me; he was looking at his clenched fists. My legs were brought up to my chest and I rested my chin on them. I didn’t know what to do. I just held onto my legs as tight as I could.

“Billie, tell me what you are thinking,” Dr. Jenn said after a few more minutes of silence. Billie stood up and walked over to the window. I had told Billie everything. No more secrets. Nothing to hide anymore.

“I am thinking that I want to rip Jim’s dick off and shove it up his ass. I am thinking that this is all Amanda’s fault.” It felt like he plunged a knife through my chest when he said that. He turned to face me.

“I’m sorry, Amber. You’re mother was a great person but she should have told me about you and none of this would have happened. You wouldn’t be here in this situation. You wouldn’t have been raped for seven years by that-that disgusting piece of shit human.” He sat back down and ran both hands through his hair.

“I know why she didn’t tell me. She didn’t want me to give up my career in music. She knew Green Day would make it big.”

“How long have you blamed Amanda for you not knowing about Amber?” Dr. Jenn asked.

“Since the day that I found out about her.”

“It sounds to me that you feel more hurt and betrayed about what Amanda did and blaming her hides those feelings.” Billie nodded and wiped his face.

“Yeah. I would have taken care of both of them.”

“Do you blame yourself?” Billie slumped back against the couch. He simply nodded.

“She didn’t tell me because of my future career. My career. She knew I was going to be famous and...I do blame myself. I probably blame myself more than I blame anyone else, really.”

“It wasn’t anyone’s fault other than Jim and Carol’s.” I piped up. It was true. It wasn’t my mom’s fault, it wasn’t Billie’s fault, and it wasn’t my fault. It was Jim and Carol’s fault. They chose to do those things to me. They are to blame. Dr. Jenn turned to me.

“Why is that?”

“Because it just is. They did this to me. They hurt me. Mom trusted them to not do that to me and they broke her trust. Mom didn’t plan on getting cancer and dying. She planned on raising me for her whole life and she would have probably told Billie about me when I got older but that didn’t happen. I have blamed myself this whole time and it’s not my fault. It’s not your fault, Billie. It’s not my mom’s. It’s theirs.” Dr. Jenn smiled at me. Billie got up and sat next to me. He wrapped his arms around me and kissed the top of my head.

“I’m so sorry, Amber.”

“There’s nothing for you to apologize for. I want to start putting this behind us. I don’t want to be tethered to them anymore.”

“Okay,” Billie said as he pulled away. He smiled at me. The rest of the session went smoothly. Dr. Jenn made us do exercises that will help us communicate better. As we were walking out, Billie stopped me.

“I have a surprise for you.” I crossed my arms, starting to feel nervous. I hated surprises. I hated not knowing what was going on. It’s a control thing. That was when Becky walked up to us.

“What kind of a surprise?” Billie smiled that mischievous smile of his.

“You have a visitor, Amber,” Becky said. I looked at Billie suspiciously. We followed Becky down the hall way to the visitors lounge. When Becky opened the door and I walked through, my heart swelled. Donovan stood up and smiled at me. I literally ran to him and jumped in his arms, him lifting me off the ground. It probably could have been a take from a movie. His arms wrapping around me was so comforting and I miss them. I missed him. He put me down and I leaned up and gave him a brief kiss. We sat down on the couch. I immediately grabbed his hand. I missed his hands.

“I can’t believe that you are here.” Donovan smiled at me.

“I kept bugging Billie to bring me here but he had to put me on your visitors list and then make sure it was okay with your therapist and I had to take off work.”

“Well, I am glad you are here. I needed to see you.”

“I needed to see you as well.” We sat there and smiled at each other. I felt like a goofball but I didn’t care.

“How have you been? How is school? How’s work?” Lots of questions. I wanted to know everything. He groaned.

“School is school. I finally got done with my detention and work is work. As for me, I’ve been out of my mind missing and worrying about you. How are you?” I looked down at our hands.

“Now I’m good. Especially since I’m sitting here, with you, holding hands.” He squeezed my hand.

“How’s Felicia?” I asked.

“She’s good. She was mad that she couldn’t come but she understood. Her and Mom are better. They don’t argue that much anymore.”

“She never told me what they argued about. Of course, I never really asked either...” Donavon sighed.

“Mom is dating someone new-”

“Oh, that’s nice. Why would Felicia be mad about that?”

“-it’s a woman named Jennifer.” I didn’t say anything. I didn’t know what to say to that. Donovan continued on.

“I like Jennifer. She makes Mom happy; better than my dad ever did. Felicia thinks this is just a phase in Mom’s life, which it’s not. Mom told me that she said she knew halfway through her marriage with Dad that she wasn’t attracted to him anymore or any man, actually. Anyway, Felicia blamed Mom for our parent’s divorce when it was really our dad’s fault because he cheated.” He ran his free hand through his hair.

“But they are okay now, Felicia and Mom. Jennifer is moving in because our apartment is bigger than her’s and her moving in will help Mom so much. She can quit her second job and it won’t be so much pressure on her. Jennifer is a public defender. I’m sorry, I’m rambling.” I smiled at him and rubbed my thumb against his hand.

“It’s okay. I like hearing you talk.” But we were silent for a bit after that and just took in each other’s presence. I was staring at our hands intertwined and I was trying to convince myself that he was really here. I hadn’t seen him or talked to him in weeks. I didn’t go a day without thinking about him but thinking and seeing him were two different things.

I looked up and saw that he was staring at my arms. I started to feel uncomfortable then. I pulled my hand away and crossed my arms, trying to hide them. It was no use because scars covered every angle of my arms and body but the ones on the inside of my arms were worse. I felt really naked and exposed. He frowned.

“I’m sorry for making you feel uncomfortable.”

“No, I understand. They are shocking to look at. Repulsive, even. I’m just not used to being so...bare.” He grabbed my hand and flipped my arm over. He ran his other hand over my scarred arm, feeling the bumpy skin under his fingertips. My eyes followed his hand as he did it. I wonder what he was thinking as he did this. Did he think I was a freak? Did he think I was disgusting for finding joy in mutilating myself? Did he think I was fucked up?

His fingers lingered over the vertical cut on my wrist. Even though it was healed, it still looked gross. It was pink and puckered and it pulled the surrounding skin. The scars under my shirt looked worse because they were deeper.

Right when I looked up at him, he looked at me and gave me his lopsided smile. It made me smile. He leaned in and kissed me. When he pulled away, his forehead rested on mine. I knew he wanted to know what happened to me and what brought me to this place and I needed to tell him. I needed to tell him what happened to me and why I would do this to myself. Out of everyone, he was one of the people that deserved to know. He found me. He saved me.

I pulled away from him completely. I brought my legs up to my chest and hugged them.

“What’s wrong?” He asked as he gently squeezed my leg. He was smiling.

“I need to tell you something.”

“You don’t have to tell me, Amber.” I looked at him.

“Yes, I do.” He grabbed my hand that was wrapped around my legs.

“Okay.” I took a couple of deep breaths, trying to calm myself. I can do this. I did it with Billie and complete strangers. I can tell him.

“When Billie found out about me my aunt tried to kill me. She tried to drown me when she couldn’t strangle me, to be more specific. I had broken bones and bruises all over my body. She had been abusing me for a long time, around the time I turn nine is the earliest memory.” I took another deep breath.

“The reason she tried to do that was because she walked in on my uncle raping me. But to her I was the slut who was seducing her husband and Jim made that clear to her, as well. He had been doing that ever since I was ten years old. When I turned 15 he took what he was doing to a whole different level and that was when I started to cut myself. When I left the hospital I got addicted to the pills they gave me for my broken ribs. It escalated when I had to get an abortion.” My crying was starting to escalate.

“Do you think I’m disgusting?” I asked. I didn’t look at him. I couldn’t. I was crying and I didn’t like crying. I didn’t want him to see me cry. I felt him scoot closer to me.

“No, I do not. I can never think you are disgusting. You are not what happened to you, Amber.” He put his pointer and middle finger under my chin and lifted my head up. He took the same hand and cradled my face, something he usually did when he was going to kiss me. He ran his thumb under my eye and rubbed the tears away.

“You are so beautiful. So, so beautiful. I am glad you told me but that doesn’t change my view on you and the fact that I love the Amber that is looking at me right now. Scars and all.” He leaned in and kissed me. It was such a sweet and tinder kiss but it held as much passion that our more intense kissing involves.

“You don’t have to hide them from me.” He whispered when he pulled away. I wrapped my arms around him and hugged him tightly. His arms wrapped around me just the same. I inhaled his scent, taking him all in. I knew our time was about to be up and I didn’t want it to be. I wanted him to be here with me and not leave. But when Billie came over and told us that visiting hours were up I almost started to cry. When we stood up I wrapped my arms around him again, squeezing him so tight. I didn’t want him to leave. He pulled away and gave me a small kiss. I gave Billie a hug goodbye and Becky came over to me and brought me back to the main room.

“Oh, Amber, Dr. Jenn wanted me to tell you that you are on Level Two. That means you get vending machine privileges and extra phone time. You have shown so much progress these last couple of days that you deserve it.” She handed me two $10 rolls of quarters.

“Your father gave you $20 and I converted it to quarters for you. He said if you need more to call him and he’ll send more.” I grabbed the rolls and smiled.

“Thank you, Becky.” She smiled and nodded before walking away. Progress. I was progressing. I literally ran to the vending machine. I grabbed enough money for two bags (one for now and one for later) of m&m’s and a coke. I walked over to where Amy was sitting and started eating my snack.

“Finally you got to Level One. It only took you about a month.” I smiled at her.

“I’m actually on Level Two.” She nodded and shuffled the deck of cards she had. I remember her telling me that her parents owned a few casinos in Vegas.

“Awesome. Who came to visit you?” My smile got bigger.

“Billie and my boyfriend. I didn’t realize how much I missed Donovan until I saw him. I felt like I was going to pass out when I saw him.” She smiled.

“That’s awesome. My parents are going to come later on today because they had an emergency. They usually don’t allow that to happen but they made an exception.” I nodded.

“Are you nervous?” She shuffled the deck again and shrugged.

“This will be the third time I’ve seen them since I’ve been here. We are talking about what happened to me today so I’m a little nervous about that.”

“What made you want to talk to them now about it?” She looked at me and gave me a small smile.

“You, actually. You were brave in group and it made me want to confess to my parents what happened to me.” She went back to concentrating on shuffling her deck of cards and we were silent. I started to feel happy that I had helped Amy in some way. I felt like that was the good that came out of this crap that has happened to me. I got up and threw away my garbage. I looked down the hall and saw that Janet was walking into our room. I sighed before walking down the hall and going into our room. She turned when she heard me in the doorway and quickly turned back around. She was packing her clothes.

“Where are you going?” She didn’t stop.

“I’m leaving. They are discharging me or whatever you want to call it.” My eyes widened.

“What?” She stopped and turned to me.

“My 90 days are up and my parents don’t want to pay anymore so I am leaving.” She sat on her bed and sighed.

“We are also moving to New York. They already packed my shit and sent it there.” I walked over to my bed and sat across from her. I didn’t know what to say. Even though we had our differences, I still kind of liked her. She told it like it was. She was my only roommate and I was really, really going to miss her.

“I’m going to miss you.” I told her. She smiled.

“Even though I was a bitch to you?” I chuckled.

“You’re a bitch to everyone and I know you were doing it to help me and I’m sorry that I took this long to figure it out.” I grabbed the other bag of m&m’s and handed them to her. She laughed a little and looked at them.

“Level One. I’m so proud of you.” She grabbed them.

“Level Two, actually.” She opened them up and ate a handful.

“Even better,” she said through a chocolaty mouth full. After a few moments I helped her pack—well more like repack her clothes into a more organized fashion. I gave her a hug before she left with one of the techs. I sat on my bed and frowned at the empty bed across from me.

I really was going to miss her.