"Lying to ourselves is more deeply ingrained than lying to others." – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
October 4th 2013; 10:11pm
I stared at Avian.
He was watching me carefully, his body visibly stiff as though he was expecting me to snap any moment. I glanced from his face down to my hands. Everything he'd said rushed through me.
What?!
Everything that I had just heard replayed itself in my head as my vision blurred. Slowly, I pressed the heels of my palms into my eyes, in an attempt to stop the blur, until all I could see were tiny sparkles. I didn't understand, as if my brain had short-circuited and needed to be rebooted.
Around me, everything seemed to slow down: Avian slowly blinking as I processed, the raising of my hands to run them through my hair, the dragging of my eyes away from his gaze to stare down into my lap.
How had this happened?
I glanced up at him.
"It's not possible," I shook my head, closing my eyes as I let out a low breath. I heard him sigh then, and my headshot up, the animosity on my face evident. He ran his hands through his hair and averted his gaze. Slowly, I shook my head and bit my lip nervously.
"Shay, I'm telling you the truth"
"But how?" I uncrossed my legs from the bed and shot up, taking a couple of steps away from him. I crossed my arms over my chest and turned to look at him "how?"
"You guys appeared out of nowhere," Avian's voice broke as he turned his body to me, and pulled his legs off the bed to dangle on the side.
"We appeared out of nowhere?" I ran my hand through my hair and glared venomously at him "are you fucking kidding me?"
Avian was taken aback.
Although I was screaming now, I didn't seem to care anymore. Everything I had ever known to be true was being confirmed by Avian to be an absolute lie, but I still had no recollection of what he was talking about. Why I wondered, could I not remember any of this? That night was the reason my entire life was broken up into bits and pieces; the divorce of my parents, shutting out all my friends, breaking up with Alex, everything.
Now, I was learning that everything I knew about that night was a lie?
I stared at Avian; my cheeks flushed as the blood inside me boiled.
How dare he?
After all this time, he decides to tell me the truth?
How could I even trust that this was the truth? After all, he'd kept it this long while I had been going around with a completely different version of the story in my head.
I clenched my teeth and ran my tongue over the back of my teeth, uncrossing my arms to run my fingers through my hair; I was venting and I knew it. The fact was, at that moment, countless emotions were running through me.
On one hand, I felt like I wanted to explode at him, like a ticking bomb with no hope of being stopped. My heartbeat appeared to emulate the countdown that seemed to be buried in the depths of my mind as I slowly closed my eyes and gazed into the fields of void.
On another, I wanted to shout, and let out all the frustration that was building inside me, and that had stored within me the whole time. I wanted to scream into eternity, or at least until my throat was tight and dry.
Then on yet another hand, I wanted to cry.
I wanted to cry as though I had never cried before because in truth, I hadn't. At that moment, I felt like I didn't know how to do anything else. Slowly, I swallowed the lump that had built up in my throat, and closed my eyes once more. It was then, that a deep distressed feeling filled up my insides, and a blank, detached expression swept over my face as the realization of the moment gradually seeped in. Like a trapped beast, I stood there, my body numb; paralyzed by the tragic feeling of isolation.
Lolita's face flashed through my head.
I glanced sharply at Avian then, and the sudden realization that it hadn't necessarily been his fault hit me like a blow. He hadn't been driving the car for one thing, and all they had done was flash their lights for Lolita to slow down.
They had wanted her to slow down because we were being chased by some crazy lunatic I had hooked up with that night.
He'd been chasing us because of me.
"Shay please let me explain"
I tightened my jaw slowly and exhaled heavily, running my hands through my hair once more.
Was I just overreacting?
Even after everything, the only question that kept popping into my head was why I could not remember everything Avian had just explained. After he and his cousins had left, what had happened? Had I crouched down and held Lolita's limp body close to mine? Had the ambulance come then to help us to the hospital, or did they show up five minutes late?
How hard had I banged my head?
I glanced at Avian.
My eyes widened then, and I let out a gasp. Shocked, I stared at the red liquid trickling slowly, out from his right nostril, and down his upper lip.
Blood.
Panic rose in me then and I rushed to him, pulling him abruptly up from the bed. He stared at me as though I had lost my mind.
"Your nose is bleeding," I said immediately, lifting his chin in an attempt to stop the flow. His eyes widened in realization, and he gently moved me aside, before racing out of my room and toward the bathroom.
"You're not okay" I muttered, narrowing my eyes as I followed him into the bathroom. I wasn't sure if he had heard what I said, or if he just plainly chose to ignore me, but he didn't say anything in reply. Instead, he switched on the lights and immediately rushed toward the toilet paper. Grabbing a bunch of tissue, he cleaned up the blood that was on his lips and rolling down his face, before throwing the toilet paper into the bin. Pulling on the roll, he snatched another cluster and placed it under his nose. After doing this repeatedly, he finally seemed to have the bleeding under control; it hadn't completely stopped running, but it didn't seem to be as bad as before.
Slowly, he sat on the closed toilet seat, holding the tissue to his nose. Sighing, he ran his free hand through his hair and glanced reluctantly at me.
I stared at Avian for the longest time, silently watching him curse quietly under his breath. He avoided my gaze, glancing up to stare at the ceiling as I shook my head crossly.
Slowly pushing myself off of the door frame, I sauntered over to him. Lowering myself, I sat gingerly on the side of the bathtub, opposite him, and placed my arms on either side of me to keep myself from falling back into the empty tub.
"I'm fine huh?"
The sarcasm dripping from my voice was almost too thick to be cut with a machete. Avian sighed and glanced at me. Slowly, he lowered the toilet paper, looking at it before throwing it away. When the paper was in the bin, he reached toward the roll and repeated the process, completely disregarding the fact that I had just spoken.
I fumed, gritting my teeth as I glanced at the tiles on the floor.
"Are you going to tell me why your nose is bleeding?" I tried again, running my hands through my hair.
Slowly, I glanced up to stare at his face, dragging my gaze from the stained tiles. He exhaled sharply, and squinted at me, shrugging as he slowly lowered the toilet paper.
"Chill out, Shay," he said softly, raising the toilet paper back to his nose as the blood had begun to gush out once more "They're just nose bleeds. I get them sometimes"
I ran my tongue over the back of my teeth, nodding as I glanced back down at the tiles. I honestly did not want him to storm out of here, enraged with anger because I wouldn't mind my business; I also couldn't understand why he wouldn't just tell me what was wrong with him.
Slowly, I dragged my gaze to where my left hand lay on the side of the bathtub and started drawing light circles with my fingers. When I glanced back up at him, Avian was watching me, as though he were waiting for me to snap once more and bombard him with questions.
I bit my lip.
Slowly, my mind wandered back to what he'd told me. I realized then that I didn't blame him or his cousins. As of that moment, I wasn't sure exactly who was to blame.
I wasn't even sure if it was my fault anymore.
We sat in silence for what seemed like an eternity.
"I'm not angry at you, you know" I said softly, glancing up to look at him. His nose was still bleeding lightly but he smiled all the same. His eyes were bloodshot as he stared at me, as though he weren't seeing me. He didn't reply, instead, he took in a deep breath and closed his eyes.
I scrunched up my eyebrows in worry.
"Avian, what's wrong?"
He didn't answer.
He opened his eyes, and closed them again. Suddenly, he dropped his arms and hung his head, as though life was slowly being sucked from his bones that very moment. Unexpectedly, he fell forward heavily, arms limp at his sides; I shot forward then, almost in reflex action, and flailed out my arms to catch him.
We both fell to the floor.
I sat on the cold tiles, with Avian's head in my lap, his eyes barely open. Panicking, I tapped his face repeatedly, willing him to answer or at least, murmur something.
"Avian?"
Silence was all the response I got, his eyes opening and closing drowsily as though he were about to fall into some kind of deep sleep. He stared at me, or rather right through me, and his breathing becoming slow and heavy.
I pulled out my phone then, fingers shaking intensely as I dialed 911 with one hand, and ran my fingers through Avian's hair comfortingly with the other.
"Hi, I need help. Please, it's a guy, around the age of eighteen, and he's drowsy, he looks dizzy, please hurry"
I glanced down into my lap; Avian had stopped moving completely.
He'd passed out.