Driving Me Mad (31 page)

“What’s bothering you today?”
Mrs. Potter asks.

“You know, that’s a crappy
way to start a session. Do you start them like that with all of
your clients?” I pick at an imaginary spot on my sweatpants. It was
not a good morning, so I went with a bra, hoodie, and
sweatpants.

“Just you.” She smiles, and I
force a chuckle.

“Lucky me.” I refrain from
rolling my eyes.

“I’ve come to learn you
always have something bothering you, but you always pretend nothing
is at first,” she adds.

“I don’t pretend,” I grumble.
Mrs. Potter leans back in her chair and waits me out. “I think I
depend on my boyfriend too much.”

“What do you mean?”

“I always turn to him to make
me feel better, but I can’t turn to him all the time. What am I
supposed to do? I don’t,” I pause to search for the right word. “I
don’t know how to cope otherwise. That’s bad, right?”

“How does he help you
cope?”

“What?” I ask, confused.

“You said you don’t know how
to cope if you can’t turn to him. How does he help you cope
then?”

How do I describe it to her?
“He’s there,” I eventually say. “He can talk me through it, he
listens to me, or he’s simply there. It’s not necessarily what he
does to make me feel better. It’s that it’s
him
. I couldn’t
get up with him yesterday, so I was left on my own. I ended up
sleeping because I didn’t know what to do and I couldn’t take it
anymore.” And I still haven’t heard from him today.

“What do you like to do? What
makes you happy?”

I shrug. Nothing comes to
mind. God, is that where I am now? Where I can’t even think of one
thing that makes me happy?

“There must be
something.”

“I can’t think of
anything.”

“Okay, that’s fine. My
suggestion is that you try to do something else that makes you
happy that may comfort you when he’s out of reach. You can’t solely
rely on him to help you or be your happiness. That is a disaster
waiting to happen. You need to find more things that can do that,
and I think that’ll help.”

I nod, and my session moves
on to other topics. Usually, I leave sessions feeling better, like
I got everything off my chest, solved what needed solving, and was
reminded on how to keep improving. This session hasn’t affected me
at all. I still feel as crabby and sulky as I did before.
Regardless, I force myself to attend my classes, do my best to pay
attention, and suffer through it. Who would’ve thought that
suffering through stuff would be an accomplishment?

Once my classes are over for
the day, I head back to the dorm to get my homework done and out of
the way. At this point, I don’t care what my grade will be. As long
as it’s a passing grade, then I’ll be happy. I just want to get it
done and over with for good.

“Hey, what are you doing?”
Rebecca asks when she enters our room to find me lying in bed on my
back, staring at at the ceiling.

“Nothing.”

“Bad day?” She sits down on
her bed.

“When isn’t it?”

“Super bad day, then.”

I roll toward the wall with
my back facing her. “I’m calling the grinch.”

She’s quiet for a moment.
“Okay. Before I leave you alone, do you want me to go get you
something to eat?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Okay.”

I pull the covers up over my
head, leaving a hole for easy breathing, and close my eyes. It’s
like all of my senses disappear at the same time. I don’t hear
Rebecca moving around. I don’t see anything. I don’t smell the
scent of my sheets. I don’t feel anything. Not the warmth from my
comforter, not the worry that I haven’t heard from Trace today, not
the voice in the back of my mind that I should still be working on
homework, not even the bad, heavy weight that seemed to be sitting
on my chest all day.

There’s nothing.

As if I was injected with a
shot to make my entire body, senses, and mind go numb.

I learned two things
today.

One, I
do
depend on
Trace too much, and it
is
a bad thing.

Two, numbness isn’t half
bad.

Unlike recently, sleep
doesn’t come easily. It’s late when my phone buzzes. I don’t check
to see who it is. I don’t care. Somehow, I’m able to manage
drifting in and out of a fitful sleep, but I’m awake more often
than not. In the morning when I’m prolonging the act of getting out
of bed, I check my messages.

Trace:
Too late to
ask you to come over?

Guilt takes shape in the form
of air and fills my being. I should’ve checked. As quickly as it
appeared, it disappears. There’s nothing I can do about it now. I
close that and open the calendar app. I think I’ve only missed one,
maybe two, days of school. If that is for sure the case, I’m
skipping today. I’m still in grinch-mode, and I have no desire to
fake life today.

Rebecca is very quiet as she
gets ready. I’m thankful that she doesn’t talk to me. I thought
some sense of relief would come once she leaves, but I feel the
exact same way. Numb. Tired. Empty. Maybe I should be trying to do
something that would make me happy or find another source of
comfort, but I don’t even feel like calling Trace.

I don’t feel like doing
anything at all.

My day is spent in bed, only
getting up to use the restroom, and ignoring all the buzzes my
phone makes with notifications of messages. I don’t want to deal
with anyone. This cocoon I’ve made myself with my blankets is my
safe place, my source of comfort today. That’s all I need.

At some point, I hear the
door open, but I don’t roll over. My twenty-four hours isn’t up
yet, so I know Bec will leave me alone for a while longer. But
something’s not quite right. She does bother me. She pulls the
blankets away from my face, and when I roll over, annoyed that
she’s not leaving me alone, I find out it’s not Rebecca at all.

It’s Trace.

Rebecca gives me a weak smile
as she sits down on her bed.

I roll over with my back to
them both.

Trace’s hand rests on my
shoulder, but he doesn’t try to turn me toward him. “Britt,” he
says softly. “Come home with me.”

I shrug my shoulder to
dislodge his hand. I don’t want to go anywhere. I don’t want to
talk to anyone. I want to be left alone. Why the hell can’t they do
that? What makes him think I want to go to his house, especially
after he pushed me away and only eventually texted me because he
wanted me to come over to comfort him? I wish I could feel mad or
lonely or something. There’s still numbness.

“Can you give us a minute?”
Trace says to Rebecca.

“Sure thing.”

A moment later, the door
closes behind her. The bed dips as Trace lies down, wrapping his
arms around me and pulling me tight against his body.

“What happened?”

“Nothing. I woke up like this
yesterday.”

His breathing hits my hair,
disturbing it slightly, and I want to pull away from him.

“Come home with me,” he
repeats.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t feel like going
anywhere,” I say, this time pulling away from him.

He tugs me right back where
he wants me, though. “It might make you feel better.”

“Doubt it.”

Trace sighs. “Come anyway.”
My silence answers him. “Lily misses you.” Yay. The dog misses me.
“I miss you,” he whispers. I still don’t say anything. His words
practically bounce off me, having zero effect. “What will it take
for you to come home with me, Britt? You want me to pack your bags?
You want me to carry you out of here so you don’t have to walk?
What do you want me to do? I want you to come with me.” Desperation
leaks into his voice and it cracks me open just enough for me to
agree.

He presses a kiss to my
shoulder and gets out of my bed. He opens the door for Rebecca to
come back in. I sit up and watch as he and Rebecca start to pack a
bag for me. Faintly, I wonder whose idea it was for Trace to come
up here and whisk me away.

Once he’s packed everything,
he hands me some clothes to change into since I’m still in pajamas.
I change, take his outstretched hand, and he leads me out of the
building. I don’t feel good, and I mean that in a physically sick
kind of way. The rest is a blur until Lily is walking circles
around me, wagging her tail like crazy. I drop to my knees and hug
her neck. Okay, so it looks like I missed the dog too.

“Are you going to sit on the
floor and love on Lily or come watch an episode of
Dateline
that I missed and love on me?”

I glance up at the sound of
Trace’s voice. He’s walking toward the couch and I think he has two
cans of Sun Drop in his hands. Of course, I get up to follow after
him. I take the Sun Drop, suddenly feeling really thirsty. I pop
the top and start guzzling it down, as my stomach growls.

“Have you eaten today?” Trace
asks. “Or drank anything?” he adds as he watches me finish off the
can of soda.

“No.” I curl into his side.
This time, I’m glad to have his body next to me.

“Want me to order pizza?”

I shrug. Trace pulls out his
phone and opens an app to place the order. Lily jumps onto the
couch, sitting next to me and resting her head on my lap. I scratch
behind her ears, wishing I could sleep. How can I be so tired, but
not sleepy?

“Hey.” Trace hooks a finger
under my chin and lifts so I’ll look at him. He doesn’t say
anything. He just studies me for a moment. “Did you get any sleep
last night or today?”

“Not really.” He looks tired,
too.

“Talk to me.”

“About what?”

“How you’re doing.”

I roll my eyes and look away.
“How does it look like I’m doing, Trace? Can we not talk?
Please?”

“Sure, okay.”

I lean into him again,
getting comfortable. Trace changes the channel to his recording of
the show. He holds me close. I don’t pay much attention to the
show. Instead, I focus on Trace’s breathing, the fast and steady
beat of his heart, and his sturdy body. I feel just a little better
by the time he has to pause the show because the pizza has
arrived.

“I’m not really hungry,” I
say once he returns with the box, disappointed in myself.

He turns the box so it faces
me, opens it, and moves it in circles under my face. “You can
resist pizza that smells this good?” A corner of his mouth quirks
up into a crooked smile. “Would it be more tempting if I cut it up
into pieces and tossed them for you to try to catch it in your
mouth?”

I laugh. “No, it wouldn’t.” I
reach out to snag a slice, Trace’s smile turning into a full-blown
grin.

“I’ve missed that laugh.”

Trace sits down again next to
me. I decide to change the subject because I still don’t want to
talk about myself. We might as well turn the tables.

“Did you ever call your dad
back?”

His smile fades. “No, not
yet.”

God, I hate myself. I
shouldn’t have asked. I knew how it would make him feel. Is it
really worth it just so it’ll take the focus off of me? Without
ever having taken a bite of my pizza, I set it back in the box,
which is now on the coffee table. That overwhelming feeling rushes
over me again. I’m supposed to be normal. I’m supposed to be a good
girlfriend. I’m supposed to eat and take care of myself. I’m
supposed to be all these things and I can’t fucking do it! I can’t.
I can’t. I can’t!

Tears start spilling down my
cheeks. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. Trace starts to say something, but
I can’t sit here next to him anymore. I get up and rush to his
bathroom, locking the door behind me. I turn on the shower,
hurriedly remove my clothes, and step into the tub. Standing seems
to take too much effort. I sit under the onslaught of water raining
down, pull my knees up to my chest, wrap my arms around them, and
start crying hard.

Three knocks sound on the
door. “Brittany?”

My chest heaves, breathing
becoming too much of a task for me. My sobs leave me gasping for
air. It’s too much. I can’t. It’s all too much. The weight of this
insurmountable sadness and nothingness all combined together is too
much.

I lift my head when the
shower curtain is shoved to the side. The look on Trace’s face is
one I haven’t seen before.

“I can’t. I can’t,” I repeat,
shaking my head. Although, I don’t know just what it is that I
can’t do.

He steps into the shower to
sit on the edge of the tub. “I know, Britt,” he says gently. He
pulls me up into his lap. I bury my face into the crook of his
neck, the tears falling faster now. I’m grateful that he’s here,
but at the same time, I hate it. I hate that he’s seeing me like
this. I hate that I feel so vulnerable. We lean one way and then I
hear the sound of the water being turned off before a towel is
wrapped around me.

Trace rubs my back. “All I
want,” he begins in possibly the softest tone I’ve ever heard him
use, “is for you to survive. Continue to breathe and do the basics
to survive. That’s all I want right now. You can do that.” He runs
his fingers through my hair, tilting my head back in the process so
I can look at him. “It probably doesn’t feel like it, but you are
strong; one of the strongest people I know. Survive now, so you can
live later.”

“I’m tired of fighting for
such little return.”

“It’s that way
for
now
, Brittany. Gotta remember that. Want to know
something?”

“What?” I ask to appease
him.

“The only reason I got out of
bed yesterday and today is because of you. Maybe I didn’t feel like
talking, but I knew you were still there for me. You’ve given me
strength when I’m running out. I depend on you too much. I’m right
here,” he says quietly. “Depend on me too much.” I shake my head
and frown, more tears falling at what he’s said. “Why is that
upsetting you?”