How I Got Here (23 page)

‘Sweetheart I know it’s sudden but if it’s what he feels is right, then we have to support him.’ Judy says once again trying to calm her daughter down.

‘Tell me you’re not doing this because she’s not here anymore.’ Amanda persists, but at a more reasonable volume this time.

‘I won’t lie it’s partly that, maybe more than it should be, but whatever the reasons I need to leave the city.’

‘
Could someone explain the importance of this girl?’ Paul says putting down the house details, with just a little envy that his son had purchased a house with such nice grounds.

‘There was a girl at the hospital, I’d been helping her for a while with her problems, and she was very withdrawn and didn’t trust people. She was anorexic and didn’t speak much.’ Oliver replies, wanting to tell his version rather than let Amanda speak for him.

‘Oh how terrible for her. That sounds awful.’ Judy sits down; sympathy for the girl she didn’t know was flowing though her.

‘I was helping her, working with her every day, that’s what was distracting me so much and why you called Amanda here, she was – special, just so amazing, and she started to get better, to eat again and to get over her fears, she was telling me what had happened to her, why she felt so down all the time.’ Oliver cuts off, struggling to find the right words.

‘He fell in love with her.’ Amanda supplies, somewhat unhelpfully. Judy’s eyes widen, and Paul sighs loudly.

‘Oh Oliver,’ Judy shakes her head slowly, her head dropping into her hands.

‘Nothing ever happened, but I did fall in love with her and she fell in love with me, but then she left, she’s moved away and I don’t know where too.’ Oliver admits, looking down at the blue table cloth.

‘That’s probably for the best dear, even though it hurts now.’ Judy gently lays her hand on his arm, ‘It’ll get better.’

‘You’re giving up your whole life, changing everything drastically, just because you can’t stand to be in the city where you met her.’ Amanda shouts, ‘You’re being so ridiculous.’

‘That isn’t the only reason I’m going, I need a change.’

‘You’re being a fool, I knew things were getting too serious between the two of you, I only wish I’d spoken to her sooner.’ Amanda realizes what she’d said too late, her eyes widen but she tries to hide it, foolishly hoping he didn’t hear her, but as he turns his dark gaze on her she knows better.

‘What did you just say?’

Chapter Twenty Five

Letter 14

It’s warm today so I’m writing this outside by the water, the house is still insight but I do feel better being away from it, I’m finding myself feeling more and more trapped when I’m in the house, so I try and get out as much as possible.

Things here haven’t changed all that much, I’m still working as a check out girl at the grocery store, I’m still working towards my high school diploma, and I’m still eating. None of this is very surprising considering it’s only been a day since I last wrote a letter, I can’t seem to stop writing these days, and I’ve always got a notebook with me. I spend so much of my time writing stories, because I found that when I stopped writing for a while, because I thought my obsession with writing was just another aspect of my illness, I found myself missing it almost as bad as I miss you. So I started writing the stories again and I’m feeling a lot better for it.

This morning I was sitting in my room just staring out of my window, wanting so badly to talk to you, and when those feelings become as strong as they did this morning, I have to write a letter, and so here I am sat outside, scribbling away because I can’t stop thinking about you.

So now I’m going to tell you how I’ve been feeling, because there’s been something that’s been – well not quite right for a while, but I haven’t been able to put my finger on it, but now I can, so here goes.

I’ve started to feel like I’ve fallen into a rut, everything is just trotting along nicely and I can’t seem to stop feeling low, I want more, and then I feel bad for wanting more, when everyone is doing what they can to help me, but I can’t help feeling like my life has been frozen for a while, with leaving school and being ill, I haven’t been moving forward, I’ve been stuck on pause and now I want to resume my life, I want to do more with my life, but I know that I can’t. In all honesty it’s one particular thing I want to resume, I want to start running again, but my parent’s won’t let me because they’re too worried about the physical strain, my therapist thinks it’s a sign that I’m slipping back into my old way of thinking, so won’t allow me to run because of the emotional strain, my group therapy leader thinks that it’s a little too soon to be considering
it, and I just want to have the final say on this, but I don’t. I’m forced into following their views on the subject, and no matter how much I try and reassure them, tell them that this isn’t about getting thinner, and that I’ll take it easy, they don’t trust that I’m stable enough to make my own decision on the matter, and I can’t even blame them, because my decision making skills have been severely lacking recently, and so of course they won’t let me make the decision even though I am perfectly capable of making it now. I can only blame myself for the view they have of me, because I did this to myself, which makes me hate myself even more.

I have been putting on weight though, so now I am officially back at a healthy weight, so the nutritionist that my parents send me to see, has come up with a maintenance plan, because everyone is worried that if I put on more weight, I’ll spiral out of control and stop eating again, which may be true, because I catch myself thinking it sometimes, thinking how easy it would be to just slip back into that pattern, but I catch myself before the thoughts get out of control, and then I’ll call Kylie and she’ll talk it over with me until I feel better.

The point is, I think the fact that I’m at a healthy weight again, should win me some credit and I should be allowed to run again, but that argument was shot down before I could even explain it fully, I was told that I shouldn’t rush things, and if I was bored then maybe I could take up sewing. I don’t want to sew. I want to be outside and be running again, I used to love running so much, I loved it before I got ill and yet everyone around me only remembers me using it as a weight loss tool. I want to be able to get rid of all my own bad memories associated with running, because in the end there were so many bad memories when I was at the height of my illness, that I need to bring some more positive ones to the foreground, but I can’t talk them round and I won’t allow myself to go against them, I’ve already caused my parents too much upset.

I’m going to Megan’s place today, we’re going to study for a while, but we’ll probably end up watching a movie or something. We’ll probably invite Kylie over as well, and then it’ll inevitably turn into a slumber party. I don’t really feel like going, I don’t think I’ll be very good company for either of them, however hard I try and be positive. I’m just in a generally low place today, because of the whole running thing, but also because I can’t stop thinking about you.

Megan says she understands, she was in love with someone last summer, but he dumped her and moved half way across the world, she was heartbroken but now she’s fine. I wonder if that’s how it’s supposed to go, you love someone and then when it’s over, you can just work towards being fine again. Will I be fine in a few more weeks or months, is there one set time do you think? Or is it based on how long you were in love, for instance, I’ve loved you for several months, and so will it take me longer to get over you because of that? Megan tried to calculate it from an article in one of Kylie’s magazines; Kylie struggled with the math side of it so Megan took over. According to the magazine, which I’m sure is a truly reliable source of information, I should have been over you a month ago, which leaves me believing I’ll never be over you, Kylie thinks that it’s ok if that happens, because it won’t always hurt so badly, she says it’s possible for me to still hold you in my heart, as a memory of someone I loved, and still I’ll be able to live a happy life and meet someone who I can love, someone who the timing is right with, and that eventually you’ll become a barely visited memory, always there but rarely noticed. I think that made me feel worse, because it feels awfully unfair that I should have to forget you, push my feelings aside and find someone new, because I never got the chance to actually be in a relationship with you.

Megan doesn’t share the same view as Kylie, she thinks it’s incredibly short sighted of me to say that I’ll never get over you, she doesn’t think that there’s only one person you can love, and she’s of the mind that because I was so young when I fell in love with you, and lost you. That I can easily find someone else who I will fall in love with, she says that I can’t see it now, because I’m still in the mourning phase, but one day I’ll be able to move on fully, so I shouldn’t think about being eternally in love with you. That made me feel worse as well, because I think a part of me wants to love you forever, and not because it’s a terribly tragically romantic sentiment, the kind of thing in a classic romance, but because when you love someone as much as I love you, I think it’s worth holding onto.

My parents on the other hand don’t know about you, well I mean they don’t know that I’m in love with you, my father suspects that I had become a little too close to you, and he believes that is why I left when I did, why I begged if we could move out of New York City, but he thinks that it’s just a close friendship, a crush at most, and even though my mood is often low, he’s certain that it’s got nothing to do with you, he thinks that I’m over it. Neither of my parents knows that I can’t get you out of my head, or that I have nightmares and wake up crying, thinking that I’ll never see you again. Nobody knows that part, the nightmares part.

I started a new story today; it’s going to be a love story that never really takes off, just like ours. I haven’t decided yet if I’ll give my characters a happy ending
, I suppose time will tell.

Chapter Twenty Six

Oliver 5

His sister hadn’t responded to him yet, she just stood there looking like a deer in the headlights, so very quietly and firmly he repeated his question.

‘What did you just say?’ His quiet anger is something his parents recognized in him, they’d seen it before, it didn’t often happen as he was good at holding his temper, but when he did get angry, the sheer force of it was shocking, not because he went crazy yelling and shouting and demanding answers, but because he never raised his voice when he was truly angry, he just made his tone deeper and more commanding, he was very like his father in that way, and it could be more frightening than if he’d yelled his head off, which was usually Amanda’s way of expressing her anger. Paul and Judy excuse themselves quietly from the room, knowing better than to interfere with their children’s battles, they knew that they had to allow them to sort this out for themselves, but while Paul went to check on Tiff, Judy hovered by the door into the dining room, almost pressing an ear up to the wood to hear what was being said, her curiosity getting the better of her.

Inside the room Amanda had stood up and was packing up and down, Oliver too had got to his feet, but he was standing still, staring at his sister and waiting for her response.

‘I went to see River in the hospital, I got Tiff to tell me which room she was in, and I went there when you were at home watching Tiff.’ Amanda closes her eyes briefly, pressing her thumb and her finger to the bridge of her nose.

‘Why?’

‘Because I needed to talk to her, you were losing yourself and I hated seeing you like that, I was trying to protect you from making a mistake, because I was scared for you, for your career. You didn’t know what you were risking.’ Amanda replies folding her arms over her chest defiantly.

‘You had no right to make that decision, what I do with my life is my business, not yours.’ He says firmly, his voice quietly thundering around the room.

‘Oh please, Oliver I’m your big sister, it’s in the job description for me to look out for you.’ Amanda sighs, ‘You’ll thank me for this one day, you’ll see that I did you a favor and you’ll thank me.’

‘What did you say to her?’

‘It doesn’t really make any difference what I said; you need to get over her now. It won’t do any good to keep dwelling on things, what’s done is done.’ She tries to end the conversation, not wanting to get into everything that happened, but she should have known better than to think Oliver would back down.

‘Don’t avoid the subject Amanda; I want to know exactly what you said to her.’ Oliver demands
staring her down until she sinks back into her seat, her resolve to stay quiet washing away from her.

‘I told her that I was worried about you, that you were getting too involved in her case, and it wouldn’t be good for either of you in the end. I told her that you could lose your job, and that it wasn’t worth it, that she was being a selfish little girl by letting you get so close; I told her all the things I’ve been saying to you and you’ve been ignoring. I hoped she’d see sense even if you couldn’t, and I have to give her credit, she was incredibly mature about it, and she listened and saw sense.’

‘I cannot believe you did that, do you know how fragile she is? How bad she feels about herself all the time, and you just go in there and tell her she’s selfish, you could have seriously set her recovery back.’ He grips the edge of the table, there’s something else that he needs to know, the question keeps knocking around in his head, but he doesn’t know if he has the strength to know the answer.