One Week Earlier
A few days had passed since Ashlynn had dropped into this shithole and Ava had stormed off. Ashlynn had hit the nail right on the head in saying that Ava wasn't going to talk to me for a while. She hadn't answered a single text or call, and hadn't given me the light of day. It had been less like the silent treatment and more like the Cold War. Ava had not acknowledged my existence in any form.
Had she really been that angry with me? Could she not see that she had been wrong, at least a little? She was clearly in the wrong in some ways, and right in others. Yet, in no form did it directly defended her actions or behavior. She was wrong, but this is not how I wanted it to be. Not with me, and not with Ashlynn - who had been looking out more for Ava than for herself.
"I told you." she laughed, coming out of the door with a two cups of coffee as I lit a cigarette. "She probably hates your guts right now...More than mine, maybe."
As it had turned out, the hotel I had been talking about was practically empty. The owner, who had jumped to conclusions, originally only gave us one key to one room. After getting it correct, he had given me a room right next to hers. Looking back, I had to wonder if that old man was more sly than he looked.
"Maybe, or she might be busy thinking of a way to apologize." I grinned, taking the coffee from her. "Always two ways of looking at everything."
Taking a cigarette from the pack I had left on the wall, she lit it. "No offense, but you make yourself really hard to apologize to. It felt like when I got serious with you the other day or even now, you run away with comedy or sarcasm. I can't say it's original, but it's effective."
Again, she hadn't been afraid to call out my problems - just like Ava. Though, Ava had typically been much less blunt and more finessed with it. That had been typical of the both of us. I was always the caveman with a blunt stick, while Ava had always been the swan ready to take off. Primitive and elegant, the beast and the beauty, it had always been simple compare and contrast between us.
All it had taken was a short look to see, externally, that all we had in common was tattoos. However, Ava had something special that pulled me in, that pulled everyone in. She had this glow, this wordless beauty that siphoned diverse thoughts and forced everyone to look. Even past that, we had a good few things in common and I had felt closer to her than I had anyone else in quite some time.
Over the past few months, we had been to parties and small venue concerts to see the bands we had both liked - which happened to be quite a few, surprisingly. It had been more than just the physical, we had grown closer in a lot of ways; through honesty, and talking, I had truly felt that we were together, though nobody would have ever heard that come from my mouth.
"What if she doesn't want to talk to you anymore?" Ashlynn asked. "Aside from blaming me, are you just going to accept it, or are you going to fight back?"
"You act like she's going to dump me over it." I responded, confident in the way I thought we had felt about each other. Turning, I looked at her as I exhaled the smoke. "Obviously I didn't do anything bad enough to warrant that."
"You're probably right. Probably." she rested her chin on her palm, clicking her tongue. "Just don't convince yourself of that. You should be ready to take it from both ends."
**
A week had passed since that conversation with Ashlynn, and it had seemed as though she may have been right. Ava hadn't communicated with me in any form, vocal or text. It had been as though she had vanished from this dump altogether, never wanting another thing to do with me or it. Had Ava been upset with me? Sure, and I had understood her anger to some degree. Yet, what had I done for her to go this far?
As much as I had told myself that I had been prepared for the day she had decided to leave me, there was nothing I could do to suppress how I felt, the fear I felt. I feared being alone, and I had feared losing the one thing that had been my guiding light for all of those special months we had spent together. Had I destroyed everything we had built because of what I had titled my morals?
What had Ava been thinking? Where had she been? Why hadn't answered me? What had happened to her wanting honesty and communication, hadn't she been doing the complete opposite of that very thing? Had I pissed her off enough to cause her to lie about everything she had said to me? What good had all of this thinking been doing for me? Absolutely nothing. I had literally driven myself into a corner, and I had no clue how to get out.
After having been sent to voicemail for the second time that day, I had decided to take another route. I had googled and found her parents numbers. After dialing, the dial tones had ended and a female voice answered. "Hello? Who is this?"
"It's, uh, Aiden." I spoke, my fingers sliding through my hair. "I've been trying to call Ava, and I'm not getting an answer. Do you think you could pass the phone on to her?"
"Hold on." I heard the phone get set down.
Lighting a cigarette, I opened the door to the outside of my own hotel room as I waited for someone to get the phone. The Sunday afternoon had been cloudy, with no sun to be seen whatsoever. In the air, the scent of rain held strong - though the news had said there was little chance of said rain following through. Either way, the atmosphere had somewhat mirrored my feeling. Dull and gray, unsure and in fear of itself. What had all of this silence meant?
I should have known, honestly. It had always been my best friend.
"You still there, Aiden? I'm sorry, sweetie. But she isn't feeling well and doesn't want to talk right now." she gave a lie that had clearly been full of shit. "Just give her a little bit."
Hanging up the phone, I sighed and had felt the smoke follow the air out with it. What game had she been trying to play with me? I had obviously always been a mess, but I had been trying my best to be better - to both her and to everyone. I had been so tired of driving people away, I had been so tired of finding myself alone when I needed someone else most. Ava, of course, had been my priority. I had hoped that she had known that, I really did.
If she didn't, then what was all of this for?
She had been my world, and I hadn't been sure of what or who I would be on the day she would leave me. Would I continue to find solace in emptiness, darkness? Would I go back to my old ways, or had Ava changed me into something better? Had her attempts to fix me come to some sort of fruition? Clearly, anyone who would have heard this would have called me a whiny emo bitch, but that had been how I felt. If Ava had decided to leave, I couldn't have said for certain what I would have done with myself.
I took a drag of my cigarette and threw it off before heading back into the hotel room. "...Fuck."
__
Monday morning had swung around and I had found myself in the cafeteria. In what had been a rare scene of me being the first one there, I had waited with my eyes locked on the doors. I had been sitting on the table, waiting since the doors had opened. Ava had always been troublesome with confrontation, as had I. It was one bad trait we both had in common. One of us would have had to nearly force the other to talk, it had always been like that. I hadn't minded it, either. It had been fun sometimes, just not then.
An hour had passed, and students were beginning to come in the droves. Yet, none had been Ava. Had she really been telling the truth and she wasn't feeling well? Or had she wanted to avoid me so badly that she had missed school? Standing up, the first bell had rung and people began to march forward like the sheep following the Shepherd's call. I had began to cut through people, criss-crossing my way through the crowd of teenagers who had been in my way.
However, just as I had been about to enter my first class, my eyes caught a thin girl in my peripheral. Turning, I had seen her rail-thin form and long, black hair. It had obviously been Ava. No other person in the school had looked that much like her. I had went against the current, forcing my way through people who had been going the opposite way. Just as I had entered her classroom, the final bell had rung and the halls had went silent - leaving me, an outcast to that period, awkwardly standing there.
With a few students and the teacher looking directly at me, I darted my way to Ava and ripped her from her desk. Seconds later, we had been standing inches from each other in the dead silent hallway. Ava had leaned against a locker, her eyes had avoided me period. No contact, or even a glance at the neck below - she had been entirely too distant from me - something I didn't deserve in the slightest. What had I been supposed to say at that awkward moment, through that tension and that silence? She had clearly wanted nothing to do with me.
"What the fuck are you doing?" I asked, bringing myself down to eye-level with her.
"I'm not doing anything, just going to class." she tried to maneuver away from me. "That's all. Now, unlike you, I actually care about school. So, move."
"Look me in my eyes and tell me that." I put my arm in her way. "You aren't acting like yourself."
"Myself? What the fuck do you know about me, again?" Ava cracked a smile, finally lifting her head to show me a pair bloodshot eyes.
Ava glared at me, her eyes nearly completely red. Had she been crying, or had she not slept at all? Had that been because of me, or because she hadn't been feeling well? Reaching out, I rested my hand on her neck, ever so slightly tightening my grip. She had stayed deadly still, and hadn't moved an inch. Ava hadn't been herself, and she had been closed off. Nothing I had said would have gotten through, and nothing I could have do would have moved her any. She hated me, maybe even despised me.
As my head moved itself towards hers, I had received a swift, near blinding smack to the face.
"Leave me the fuck alone, for good."717Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡP8p1UhEdWt
