turnabout

When you have nothing to lose, you have everything to gain.

Even a broken heart.

It’s bright outside my window. The rays of the sun wash over me, warming my chilled skin. I sigh. I can’t really think today. It feels like I’ve been delved into a nightmare. One that’s burning my lungs with water. One where nothing ever will make sense again.

I closed my eyes and shut out the liveliness of the sun. I can’t handle it anymore. Why is it sunny and nice outside? Isn’t it supposed to be thundering and storming? Why, even after everything, why can’t I have one day to be my own.

He was the reason everything fell apart. He was the one to break me down so easily. He was the one who played me for a fool. He was the one who made me believe in nothing. He was the one to become the cheater he had told me so many times he hated.

Maybe he was trying to tell himself he wasn’t cheating on me, because, you know, he never even liked me.

He liked me only as a friend, and yet, he still kept coming over and kissing me and promising he would never hurt me. He promised me so much, and I have such little to grasp. I’ve nothing to show for it. I’m bent and broken. Seemingly beyond repair.

I guess that’s how much a promise is worth from a boy of his…stature.

I knew of his reputation—man-whore. The boy who had one too many one-night-stands. But I’d looked over those, to prove a point, to prove that maybe some people could change. And he seemed so sincere about it. I guess that’s what I get from that stupid smooth talker. I’d known he’d done some bad things.

But I wanted my silver lining with the boy every girl seemed to like.

I opened my eyes, wanting, wishing for the rain. If I can control one thing, it would be the rain. I want my day to come. I want something so good to happen to me, so good it would wipe my slate clean of all my bitter sorrow.

If I had to suffer, why shouldn’t everyone else in the thunderstorm suffer, like me? I was in a daze, so everyone else had to be, too.

It felt like I was wondering into a fog, unable to see what lay at the end of the maze. But, then again, I could see the prize, but it was nothing that I wanted. It was humiliation, pain, and betrayal.

I felt the tears run down my cheeks. But I don’t have the willpower to wipe them away. It’s a sign of my defeat, my giving up.

He doesn’t need a name; he doesn’t even deserve a name. He has so many titles I could refer to him now. And I would use them, because I knew they were all true. I wouldn’t hesitate.

I’m thinking of a word between A and Z: smooth-talker, betrayer, whore, liar, heartbreaker.

But, deep down, past the dark tavern of my shattered soul, I still wanted to say his name. I remembered—just yesterday—how it always seemed to roll off my tongue. With such ease. And, now, I couldn’t ever say it. It burned my throat.

My lips parted, trying to speak the sin. I need a distraction. I need the pain. My eyes are wondering around, trying to find that distraction that eludes me so.

I looked down, at my nest, somewhere that I could spend the rest of my woe-ridden days in peace. My bed was almost in as much disarray as I was; tousle and ruined. I could count the tear stains against the bluish fabric, but I had lost count at fifty-seven.

Why put so much effort into something that wasn’t worth your time?

I reasoned that I would be all right in a few days’ time, give or take.

But, was I really so worthless as to cheat? How hard was it to say ‘no’? I’m a big girl now. I could have taken it like one. But, to him, I guess I’m still my brother’s little sister. Something he couldn’t say no to.

I closed my eyes. The burning of my throat still wasn’t enough. I wasn’t sure what was going to be enough, though.

When I looked back outside of my window, water splayed across the glass, smearing my image of the grass and the sky. It made me feel a bit better. Though only a smile ghosted on my lips.

It made me feel only a little better, even with the knowledge that it had been the sprinklers.

…

Today, he is known as Betrayer.

Going to class is hard enough. Telling my friends is another thing. I find it nearly impossible to do. I nearly scream when I have to tell the story over and over again. Why were people basking in my pain? If they want it, they could come and lap it up.

I know what they are saying, as they look at my face: it won’t happen to me. Lucky it’s her and not me. Poor thing.

Even that hurts, the pity does. I’m not sure what to do with myself when I finish my tale. What do they want from me? An encore? The awkward silence sinks in, but I’m already meandering away, still numb. Just going with the flow. Just walking through every second of ever minute. Of every hour.

But when I see him, I die a little bit on the inside.

My heart is thumping chaotically in my chest, as if it’s trying to rip itself from my chest. I try and hold it back. I’m trying to hold the hope back. Tears are welling in my eyes when I wish that he’ll come up to me and apologize, say that it was a mistake with her—the other girl. I want him to say he’s sorry and beg for me back.

And I can’t help but watch him walk. His hips sway easily enough, and he’s wearing his same black jacket—the one I always thought about wearing, but never got the chance to. I leaned against him, when he had it on. I knew it smelled like it. He has this natural musk, it’s nice.

My eyes are traveling up, and my friends are tensing behind me, awaiting the inevitable confrontation.

I look at his face—even when it’s only for a split second. His eyes don’t see me—or anything, I don’t think. He’s looking ahead of himself, into that dark oblivion that I can’t see into, but I find myself desperately wanting to.

My hands quiver at my sides. I turn my face, and my friends are there to comfort me. Is it so wrong I want to burry my face into his chest, just to know he’s there, when he’s not?

Because he’ll never be here. Not ever again.

The day is a blur, but I’m thankful I’m numb. But every few times during the day, I reprimand myself on the way my heart races when I think about him. I’m trying to relinquish my hope for him. I’m trying to sever the already bleeding ties.

I’m sitting on the bus when I think about some of the things we did wrong. I feel like I’m trying to make myself feel better, and it true. I’m making excuses for what I did wrong, personally.

I think about my first kiss. He was my first kiss. But it was wrong.

I always imagined my first kiss soft and sweet; a peck on the lips. Nothing more. I didn’t want the lusty kiss, burning with the passion and desire. I hadn’t known what to do when I felt his tongue. It felt wrong, on many different levels, I knew that much at the time.

But it hadn’t mattered then. He had told me he’d never do anything to hurt me.

The gentle sway of the bus brought me back, and I see him, and my eyes linger, yearning for his attention. I want him to come and sit with me and hug and kiss me. We hadn’t done that much. I was shy in public, and maybe that’s where I had gone wrong.

But when his eyes connected with mine, for that split second, nothing mattered. He was going to tell me he was sorry. He was going to tell me it was a mistake. He was going to shake me awake and tear me away from this nightmare.

Something flashed in his eyes, and I saw it clearly: sorrow.

Moisture was beading in my eyes, betraying myself. It hurt how he admitted with his eyes that he indeed had betrayed me. It showed me how much of a coward he was to actually speak to me. It hurt. I want to cry.

I wanted him to come and speak to me.

When the bus rocked again, I saw his retreating back easing off the bus. His backpack was dumped on one of the seats in the very back. I didn’t know which one. I was in the middle, where our seat used to be.

My eyes looked out of the window, but I knew what I was going to see.

My heart shattered a few more times when he kissed her goodbye. She has his jacket on. The black one. The nice smelling one.

That was supposed to be my kiss.

…

He’s not anything today, because I haven’t seen him.

But his friend—my friend—asks me a few questions about him. If I’m sad about breaking up. Why did we break up? If I’m okay.

But he could already guess why. It felt nice not to have to explain. In fact, it touched me to have someone who actually cared enough to ask. I shifted awkwardly. He was a nice boy—nothing like him.

I told him he hadn’t spoken to me in three weeks. His response is that I deserved better. He wants Betrayer to apologize to me. He is going to make him apologize.

Despite myself, my heart flutters.

But I’m afraid. I don’t want any more pain.

It hurts to realize that I still am hung up on him.

…

Today he’s everything I hate.

He still won’t look at me. My heart crumples when I want to talk to him again. I want him to say my name again. I want to hear his voice. I just want anything he can offer me.

But most of all, I want him to leave me alone.

No, he doesn’t talk to me, look at me, but he’s still killing me on the inside. It felt like my insides are shredding up itself. My stomach tries to recoil in a gag reflex, but I’m too tired to think about it.

Too tired staying up late and thinking about him.

…

It’s been a month and eleven days. I’ve been counting.

I finally work up the courage to talk to him. I tell my friends to wait for me, because I need them. I don’t need her to talk for me, but I need to know that someone’s behind me, ready to catch me when I fall, because I know he won’t.

I tell him that it’s annoying, him avoiding every aspect of my being. I’m tired of it, and he needs to stop being a coward and own up to the fact. He can’t avoid me forever. I want to say more, but I stop.

His eyes flash. He tells me that he hasn’t been avoiding me.

I call him out. Liar.

He tells me that I looked upset and mad.

I tell him I have a right to be bitter. Don’t I, though?

He tells me he knows. His head is hanging.

I call him out on playing me. He never really liked me.

There’s a pause before he nods his head.

It goes around and around, but then the bell rings, cutting my words short. He looks at me, a torn expression on his face. He asks me if we can go back to being friends and forget that this ever happened. Wouldn’t it be easier that way?

I can’t deny him. I nod blankly.

He smiles at me, as if none of it really happened. How can he forget so easily? Does he really expect that it’ll be that easy? How can he look at me and not remember my horrid first kiss? How can he look at me and not cringe?

How could I not be a smudge in his record? Just another smudge. Just another mistake.

I watch him as he walks away, thinking he’s won.

I can’t stop the tears when they come.

Doesn’t he see that he’s doing to me?

…

And today he is Smooth-Talker.

When he speaks to me, I can’t hear him. I only hear the petty things he tells me. Like the fact he’s leaving next year. Like the fact he and his girlfriend broke up. Apparently he’s afraid of commitment.

Does it make me a bad person that I’m happy at this fact?

He talks to me about moving, how he’s going to miss all of his friends. About he’s going to be living in a dorm, and how he’s hoping that his roommate doesn’t mind guitars; there’s no way he’d leave it behind. I know that, for a fact.

Like I remember he doesn’t like chocolate, but he’ll eat chocolate bunnies on Easter.

Like the fact he feels like he has no chance in his future, except for his guitar.

Like the fact he told me he’d never forgive Lauren for cheating on him.

Like the fact his birthday is two days after mine.

I hate the way he’s smiling at me, like we’ve only been friends for two years and nothing’s ever conspired between us. As if he’d tell me anything. As if I was a great friend he’d miss when he plays his guitar in his dorm.

Parts of me are tearing away inside.

…

Today he is heartbreaker.

I’m talking to my cousin. I can’t stop the tears from cascading down my face. It feels so good to let them out. I hate the fact I’m showing a weakness. She tells me she doesn’t know what to say.

And that makes it better, in some warped way.

My friends and family have been telling me what to do. Kill him with kindness. Flip him off. Be merciless. It’s hard not to hate him when they tell me this, when I remember his secrets he’s told me after the fiasco. I want him to go away, but I don’t want him to go.

My mom tells me to have him as a friend, but don’t trust him.

I’m failing already.

My friends are telling me that they have my back, and they’ll back me up with anything, but if it’s being his friend, they won’t be happy with it.

One of my closest friends has had enough of it a month and eleven days ago. Apparently, she’s had too much to worry about, without adding my problems to her growing pile.

But, when my cousin tells me she doesn’t know what to do, it makes me calm. I feel in control. I’m not trying to make anyone happy with her. She’s just as confused as I am. She feels pain as I do.

But she tells me one thing, as everyone else has: the first boy is always the hardest.

But she says it as a dare, somewhat. I smile into the phone. Even when she’s hours away, she’s right beside me, balancing my pain and making me feel better. Sometimes I wonder why she’s comforting me, the older cousin, when I should be comforting her.

I’m smiling. Genuinely. Not the gaudy smile I give him. It’s a happy, light smile.

She’s given me a dare, not in words. But it is implied. And I find that I can’t wait for it. I feel like I can run any race, even with my head as heavy as the whole world. I always try and hide my feelings, but not from her.

It’s a turnabout. My eyes widen. My breath is warm on the phone. It reflects it back to my cheek. I lay my head down on the pillow. I’m not sure why I’m so happy, but not over it.

It’s a dare to cross no-man’s-land, to try and find the one boy who does deserve me as much as I deserve him.

And I think I know where to start.

When you have nothing to lose, you have everything to gain.

A/n: It says everything I can't.

Edited 8/22/08.