Misplaced Words

My thoughts are still very fuzzy, memories still float aimlessly in my head. Everything is still crazy jumbled. I know that there are still a few gaps but with the little that I know I have to push forward with my plan. I am currently with Ally, Vic and Kellin, so phase one is completely. I just told them that I need to talk to them, so that was simple enough, now if only I would talk. My hands are in my lap as they stare at me waiting for me to say something but my throat feels tight. What I am going to say is going to hurt, but it’s time to be honest, just like I was going to be when I was headed towards Ally after my chat with Tania. This was long overdue and I sincerely hope this mends these relationships for good. I need to do this, to let go of the past. I clear my throat and begin.

“There is a reason I asked you all here,” I fidget slightly, “though things are still hazy, I remember the bulk of things. So, I feel that there are some things I would like to get off my chest now while I still have the courage.” I laugh nervously as I look at their worried expressions, “uh, I guess I will start with the easy stuff. Vic, come here.”

I reach out my hand to him and he takes it, a mix of emotions dancing in his eyes. This is it, I will finally be fully honest with myself, with him and the other two people I love who are in this room.

I stare at our hands as I speak, “Do you remember that day about two years ago when we were in the empty classroom and I spilled my guts out to you?"

"Uh, yeah." His seems nervous.

"Do you remember what I said?" I play with his bracelets nervously.

"You said a lot of stuff, uh, me being the star, not feeling good enough, that you had loved me."

"Yes, that part! I lied" I firmly grasp his hand. "I love you Vic,” I could almost feel Kellin cringe and Ally’s horror, “and I think everyone in this room knows that. That’s why us dating again was so painful for them, but I want you to know why we didn’t work. I mean the stuff I didn't say, excluding the fact that you never told me that my sister kissed you.” I tighten my grip, “I noticed you because we are the same you and I, kind of like we are broken in the same places so we kind of fit. I saw the scars on your wrist and it reminded me of mine.” I flip his hand over and remove his band bracelets, exposing his scars, I run my fingers on them. “I thought we could fix each other, it was a stupid thought really because how could we do for each other what we couldn’t do for ourselves. Which I have said to you before, but the other two haven't heard it so, I repeated it for their sake." I sigh, "These past few weeks,” I look at Kellin apologetically, before looking Vic in the eyes, “I remembered why I was so in love with you. You are so completely amazing but…” I feel myself crying, “you were so afraid to lose me that you pushed me away, right into the arms of the very man you feared me being with. Which of course you know but I have never told you that I am so entirely sorry for how I have hurt you Vic, you have no idea. I have cried about it so much because Kellin and I weren’t fair to you. I just want you to know that I will always be here for you but only if it’s not too hard on you,” I feel the guilt gnawing at my chest, eating away at me while my tears get harder to manage. “I don’t want to hurt you anymore.”

I pulled my hands from his and cover my face as I sob. Kellin tries to touch me but I pull away, I can’t be distracted from this pain. I have to feel it, so I can finally let it go. They stay silent as I sob, I can feel the tension in the air. I have to move on, to the next subject. I have to keep purging. I take a few deep breaths and pull myself together.

“Can I just say something?” Vic, says before I go on. I nod and give him the best smile I could muster, “I forgave you a long time ago, Liz. I couldn’t stay mad because you and Kellin, as much as it hurt at first, you are just so right together.” He pats my legs awkwardly, “and I guess a part of me will always love you because you made me feel like I was a god. Though that scared the crap out of me, I liked that someone believed in me so unflinchingly.” He chuckles and kicks his foot against the leg of the bed. “I guess that's what made me so paranoid about you and Kellin was I always saw that you guys would work, which I have said before, and I just kind of selfishly stood in the way of that. I just…,” he blushes, “I just wanted you to keep believing in me and well, cheering me on.”

“I can still do that.” I smile at him, “So can we be friends? Even with everything I have done to you.”

“Of course, the very best, I mean, if Kellin doesn’t mind.” He looks at Kellin.

“Anything to make my best friends happy.” I could hear the smile in his voice, I hope he still means that after I speak to him.

I look at Kellin and smile, okay his turn.

“Kells,” I fidget with my blanket, “I don’t know where to begin. Well, first of all, I am sorry for technically cheating on you this past few weeks. I feel awful,” he opens his mouth to speak but I shook my head, so he closes it. “I am sorry for letting my feelings for Vic linger so long and you having to find out about it in front of two other people." I look at him and he smiles to encourage me. "I am also sorry for not being 100% honest as to why I didn’t want a baby right now, I-“ I feel my resolve slightly falter, but I push forward I have to do this, “I-I-I didn’t want to let go of Vic.” I stare intently at my blanket, “everything I told you was true too but a part of me felt like if I had your child that was it, I had to let go.” I peel at my skin by my nails not looking at him, not being able to face how I am hurting him right now. “I love you in the purest form, in the most simple and beautiful definition of the word but…well…we never allowed time for me to get closure and really get over Vic. So over the years he has lingered in the back of my mind, making me feel guilty and horrible. I’ve been cutting.” I peel back the blanket and show my upper thighs and I hear them all gasp. “I cut each time I think of him and feel like I've betrayed you. There is a total of thirty seven tiny marks,” I rub my hands on them and sigh, remembering the blade pressed on my skin, ridding me of the dirt that lays underneath it. I shake my head and cover up, “I am so sorry, because I haven’t been fair to you.” I ignore the tears as I start to get choked up, struggling with my words, “please...d...d... don....don’t st..stop lo..lo..loving me. I..I...I need you.”

My husband is at my side without hesitation, “I will always love you my fragile flower, but please, no more cutting, talk to me. We can get through this. Please believe me when I say I will never leave you, not if I can help it."

I could hear the hurt as he spoke, my heart cracks as I gasp for air, why I am ruining everything. This is stupid, but I can’t stop no, only one person left and this will be the hardest one of all.

I hear Vic whisper, “Please don’t cut yourself Lizzy. Please. Not over me, not over anything.”

I look Kellin in the eye, “Before I speak to Ally, I have to let you know, that everything has changed Kellin. I..I am ready. I want to have a family.” His eyes light up as he looks at me and my heart leaps, I didn’t completely ruin our marriage. “One condition, a movie, I just want the lead in one major film and than we can start our family.” I see his smile drop a bit and I laugh, “You don’t have to wait silly because I got the lead role in Amazing Spider Man 3! I am playing Mary Jane! We start filming this summer! JT got me the job because he said I am ready to graduate, he said I am too talented to be lingering here any longer. We are graduating the same year baby!!” I squeal, I can’t help it, I am so excited for my first big role and to walk in my cap and gown with my husband.

“Oh my god baby,” He squeezes me tightly, “You’re big break. Congratulations. Our life is starting.”

I kiss him like I have never kissed him before, with so many pure emotions. I swear to myself that everything up to him, all this Vic stuff. I am finally putting Vic behind me, romantically anyway, no more holding on to what’s done. I have my happy ending. Time to move forward with my life. We end the kiss and I know he feels it, the shift in me. I think he knows what I have resolved. Of course, he knows, he can read me like a book. He has known it all this whole time. He kisses me again, and backs away from the bed.

Last but not least, I look at her briefly but a pain so intense fills my chest that I have look away.

“Ally,” she stands at the foot of my bed, so I straighten myself so I can look at her when I speak. “You have betrayed me in unspeakable ways. You went behind my back with my boyfriend, then you fooled around with him when he was my ex, basically showing me that it didn’t matter to you that you hurt me.” I feel the anger boiling and mixing with the hurt, “you didn’t visit me once when I had cancer, NOT once. You continually hid things from me, proceeded to partake in endless reckless behavior, had sex and never once told me, tried to kill yourself and well, never bothered to fill the gap between us. Not once, you cried and said you were scared I had cancer but you never it showed it. You say you love Vic, but now you are running around the school with Aiden, probably acting like Vic isn’t even alive. This is such a pattern with you. You push everyone who cares about you away and,” I swallow hard looking away from her, “and I can’t forgive what you aren’t sorry for Ally. I just,” I am crying again, I feel it, “wish that things were different between us. I wish that I could pretend that you aren’t selfish and that you do love me but I can’t.” I look at Kellin and sigh before looking back at Ally, “when you lost your memories I was heartbroken, because I knew all my anger against you was supposed to be just forgotten and pushed to the side. I was upset because you couldn’t remember how much you hurt me. I was mostly upset because it was all fake, the real you, who you are now, isn’t interested in me, or my life. I am just someone you turn to when a mess needs to be cleaned up or you need someone to validate you and even then you had….” I couldn’t say her name, so I let it hang unspoken in the air for a while, making sure she knew who I was referring to you. “Nonetheless, I want us to start over, to have a clean slate but I need you to see what you did was wrong. I really need you to be sorry. So think about it, okay?”

I look into her eyes and I know she is about to retaliate.

“What you don’t think that you need to be sorry about things? You have publicly humiliated me. Made me feel small, like I am some kind of an annoyance to you. You never tried to see me that summer I left MJ Academy the first time. You are so stuck in believing that I am such a screw up that you don’t want anything to do with me.” She laughs bitterly and tugs at her sleeves, “even your memory loss was better than mine, you got to have him.” She points at Vic, “out in the open, without having to be ashamed of the fact that your best friend, his fiancé, just died. Your life is pretty damn peachy compared to mine. You have a loving husband, an amazing group of friends, oh and your best friend is ALIVE!” She is crying and shouting now. “AND YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE? You were always Vic’s first choice, he met us at the same time and he chose you! OH, let’s not forget that when he had to choose again he STILL chose someone else over me! I will always be second best and you know what, for once someone doesn’t make me feel like that. Aiden picked me,” her hands are shaking, “Me! I am not his substitute Lizzy! I am his Ally!” She is crying so hard now, “Someone finally sees me as worth it! Something that even you don’t see! You rather have Roxy and even Tania as a sister, anyone but me. You even invited Roxy to your wedding while I had no idea it was even happening.” She wipes a tear and looks me dead in the eye, “I will never be good enough for you!”

She turns away from me, “Ally that is not true! You are my sister and I love you, I just don’t like…the decisions you make. I want us to work things out Ally. I really do, but we both have to make changes. I am sorry for how I have hurt you. I want to us start over. Please, Ally. ”

“Well it may be too late for that,” she rushes out of the room and from the hallway she shouts. “Oh and Vic, I hope you have a nice life!”