After Gloria sent me home, I took the last painkiller and went to bed. I stayed there, curled up on a pile of fluffy hair, and refused to stand up. I was suspended, under investigation, everyone was missing, and my mother died.
But I woke up at about nine o'clock the next morning and found that someone had climbed into my bed.
Ryan is snuggling next to you, completely fucking you, pretending to be asleep. I poked his cheek until he opened his eyes.
"I have two rooms," I said. "If you climb on me again, I will take your key away."
He stretched his arms high. "Allie can sleep in your **"
"You are not Ellie."
"Stop reminding me," he growled. He grabbed my hips and pulled me towards him. A heat wave and tense tension went from my abdomen to my groin. I shivered. He took it as an invitation, turned me over, pinned me, and kissed playfully on my two cheeks. He even dared to hide one under my ear.
I haven't had sex for a few days, I find it ridiculously simple.
I pushed his chest away, forcing him to go away from me. "I have to find Ellie."
"God doesn't allow you to be apart for one day," he said.
"No, you don't understand. She—" He covered my mouth with a kiss and cut me off. When I gave up, he kissed me again. Each of his lip brushes erased the thoughts in my mind. The contradictory pressure and hope escalated, until there was no obvious reason, my vision changed.
"Wow," I said.
"Do you want me to stop?" he asked.
"No, I--" I was dazzled by the static layer between Ryan and my body**. It's like the colorful waves I saw when I was replacing, but with a sharper contrast. Static electricity is like an arm that I can stretch. There is no sign of Gabriel, nor even an idea of how to change my mind. Is anyone dying
"Oh. You startled me," Ryan said with a smile.
I thought about what I did—I tried to "lift up" the static electricity like lifting an arm. So if I...
"Oh, hey." He cleaned the mattress, as if it was really hurting.
"Oh my god," I said. "I'm dying".
"It may be a problem with the sheets," he said, patting my thigh as if he could counteract the static electricity.
It's not a problem with the sheets. In my mind, all electrical accidents became clear: smoking computers, light bulbs and fuses. Oh, God, it's obvious. On top of my emotional trauma, there is something wrong with my body.
When I thought my fear would kill me completely, my strange hallucinations returned to normal.
"Oh, thank goodness," I said. I pressed the pillow on my face and took a deep breath in relief. "I thought I would be trapped there forever."
Ryan raised his eyebrows, and I tried my best to explain what happened.
"You are under a lot of pressure," he said. "Stress can really crash you."
Stress, well, sounded like a normal excuse, and I accepted it immediately.
"Do you know what is good for stress? A gift." Ryan handed me a box, and I tore it open. Throw the paper aside, I can smell them before I see them. The smell of new shoes. Shiny black. I touched the original white shoelaces, surprised how they matched.
"How is the funeral?" he asked.
"My mother is dead, will you buy me shoes?" I asked.
"I thought you would like these instead of flowers."
He is right. So I told him all about the funeral, even the weird guy who drove me to death, but I didn't mention Rachel and Brinkley. Secret, secret.
He walked out of my bedroom with the promise of breakfast, and when he left, he gave me a beautiful view of his bare butt. I smiled at the pillow, thinking I have to tell Kayla later.
The moment of happiness disappeared as soon as Ryan left. The stones filled my stomach, and I was immersed in the thoughts of Ellie—worries. fear.
Quitting painkillers will not help. I can detox. I have been doing it for many years. Some terrible things happen and it doesn't help much. I must remember not to let my emotions affect me.
Mechanically, I spent my morning. I found Winston sleeping behind the entertainment center. I put him in a bowl full of cheddar cheese biscuits because Elle was supposed to buy dog food when I was away, but apparently didn't. When I asked him to go out to do his thing, I tried to call Ali twice, but I received her voice mail.
Winston gave up after enduring a poor massage attempt for a few minutes.
Is Ellie really kidnapped? Should I go to her? Where will I look? Maybe she was not kidnapped. Maybe she hid Eve's child. What is she doing? She will call to make sure I get home safely—if she can call. So the real question is why can't she call
Ryan held his head out of the kitchen and told me to have breakfast: oatmeal with brown sugar, cut fruit and raisin toast. For himself, he made an egg sandwich with cheese. We divided a pot of coffee.
"This is the first time I have seen you without gauze," he said. He reached across my kitchen table and pulled down the collar of my shirt. "It looks good, a little bruised."
The sun shines through the windows and back door, making his appearance soft and tangible. He is totally a home here, no shirts, only boxers, sitting in the same corner of my kitchen table, sitting on a pale wooden chair.
I quoted Dr. York as saying: "Slight bruises are to be expected...". "I'm glad it doesn't leave scars"
"The scar is very painful."
I bit my lip. "Do you have any news about Ellie?"
He put the fork down gently, but his jaw was taut.
"She is missing." I told him everything Garrison had said about her disappearance. He stretched my hand across the table.
"You hate her," I said, taking his hand. "You may be glad she is gone."
"It's not fair," he said. "Just because I hate competition does not mean I want her to be hurt."
"There is no competition, because there are no prizes," I said.
Somehow, the argument that I didn't deserve to be jealous at first turned into a complete confession. These words became water in my mouth. They flow from head to mouth in a flowing motion, cutting off the story anywhere in between, like putting water in my mouth, trying not to swallow or spit it out.
I told him about Eddie, everything, I asked him to pay for what he did to me, my regrets for Danny and Rachel. I even told him about the fact that Rachel was cut on the floor, about all the madness she preached about angels, and how scared I was when I was destined to eat banana mash. I didn't mention that what I actually saw was an angel, but I used the term semi-crazy more than once.
I even told him that my dad was a dead man, but he never came back to find me. I kept talking and talking until my butt was sore in the seat and I clocked in to work minute after minute. He never interrupted me once.
"Wow," he said, once my voice disappeared, there was silence in the kitchen. "I don't know you still have so much to do."
I snorted in response, but we were both silent for a long time.
"No wonder you can't promise."
After I told him all this, is this what he cares about
"You love her," he added, and there was something in his voice that made me look at him when he said this.
"she is my best friend."
"Have you ever slept with her?" He lifted his head from the dirty plate and gave me the poorest pair of dog-like eyes.
My anger exploded. "I told you I killed a person, I lost my mind, people want my life, and you only care about who I like better? Unbelievable."
I want to put my plate away and leave this chair, but I can't let myself move. His silence trapped me in this seat.
"Why are you breaking up with her?" he asked. His face is red, but his voice is steady. He managed to get his Jǐng Wei back to his original position.
"We have never been together," I said. "That's just xìng."
"Like us?" he asked. But this is not a real problem.
I grabbed my plate and threw it into the sink with a loud noise. "Yes, because the speech she gave me is the same as what you said, you can't fuck with me without her feeling."
He pushed away the chair and stood up, as if to leave. "I have more respect for her now."
"Less for me?"
He walked away.
"I'm sorry," I shouted. "What do you want me to say?"
"Why?" He asked in a low voice. "What are you sorry?"
"Because this is an emotional vacuum. I know you want more, but I can't give it to you. I think that when my life is completely out of control, you force me to make promises, which is really unfair."
Something loosened on his shoulders. "Do you want to be with me?"
"Yes." I raised my hands and shrugged desperately. ""No. This is difficult to explain. "
He turned around to face me. "Then why do you want to sleep with me? Most girls will not sleep with a man until they are sure."
I do not know what to say. I don't think that "you are very good at **" is what he wants to hear now. Obviously, I waited too long because he came to the bedroom from the stairs. When he reappeared, he was holding the key and wallet in his hand.
A voice screamed, talked, talked, talked in my head, and he went down the stairs and walked straight to the door. It wasn't until he put on his shoes and put his hands on his hands that I finally blurted out the only sentence I could think of.
"It doesn't hurt at all."
The empty house nearby is back to my despair.
He released the door handle. "What does it hurt?"
"Life is not painful. What we have is not complicated." I don't know what I want to say. My headache is terrible, another symptom of the last painkiller is disappearing, and I can hardly think normally. "Worry about others, care about them, and wait for them to hurt me as usual. I can't face it." (to be continued) (end of this chapter)