Chapter 35  Comfort

I know my dad and Timmy are worried about me. I’m not smiling and I’m not saying much, but I really don’t want tot talk about what I’m feeling inside. I rather ignore the ache, the betrayal, the longing. I keep praying that if I don’t think about it I won’t have to feel it. Of course, it doesn’t work like that but I’m trying. I don’t know how to handle all this, but I’m doing the best I can.

I don’t want to call my sisters either. I know that Mary would have the perfect answer, she would tell me what I have to do to overcome this pain in my chest, but how can I call her and explain all the stupid decisions I’ve made? How do I explain her that I don’t know how to get over a heartache? How do I tell her that I fell in love and that I got my heart broken? I’m lost.

Harry came the next day… and the next. And the next. But I’ve run and hid every time. Until he doesn’t come after me anymore. He sighs and whispers something I can’t hear. Today he hasn’t come and I hope he won’t. I don’t want to run, I don’t want to hide, but I don’t want to see him. It hurts too much knowing that I can’t hurt him because I love him, and because I love him I’m trapped in a deal I can’t escape from. I hope once he’s gone, which will be tomorrow, things will start to improve. He’ll be out of the picture.

I sit by the dock, watching the lake and thinking of taking a swim. When I’m in the water I feel safe, complete and all right. When I’m in the water it’s just me, calm and relaxed. I think I need that. I’ve always thought too much. It’s like as I never talked I had too many things going on in my head and now I don’t even know how to keep them inside. I want to stop overthinking, I want to stop pondering things. I just want peace. And water can give me that.

So I take off my dress and my trainers and stay only in my swimming suit. I take a deep breath and dive in, welcoming the water that embraces my body and hugs me tightly. I needed this. I needed it so badly.

I swim calmly and my thoughts slowly start to clear. In no time I feel like myself again but then I remember I’ll have to leave this place. I haven’t even told my dad! I won’t have the lake to help me calm down. I won’t have my father. I won’t have this place.

I’ll have to leave.

I start to feel like I’m suffocating again so swim back to the dock and stay there, trying to even my breathing. I don’t want to leave. I don’t want to leave my dad and my home. Oh God.

“Ari?” someone asks and I freeze, terrified to look up. But I do and I feel my muscles relaxing when I see Niall standing there. “Are you okay?”

I shake my head and he hurries and helps me to get out of the water. There’s no towel around, only my dress so I point at the cottage next to the lake and he goes there for a towel for me. Soon, I’m wrapped and feeling warm again.

“What’s going on? I haven’t seen you around and Harry doesn’t wanna tell me anything,” Niall says and I shudder when I hear his name.

“I—I— I don’t,” I stutter, not knowing how to explain things, getting tongue-tied.

“It’s okay, Ari, you can tell me,” Niall offers and soon his arm is around me, pulling me closer, comforting me. I let him do that because I haven’t let anyone do the same since that afternoon when Harry came to the lake. “You heard me once, it’s my turn now. We’re friends, remember? That’s what friends are for.”

I nod so he leads me to the dock and we sit there, with Niall still keeping me close to him. I take a deep breath, trying to figure out how to start this.

“When you and Harry arrived to the centre this summer,” I begin slowly and lowly. “You came to the lake and he fell, remember? I… I saved him that night, and ran away when you came back for him. I screamed your name, remember?” he nods at my question. “Harry came later to thank me but I couldn’t face him. I ran, every time he came, I ran away and hid. But I wanted to talk to him, I wanted to say ‘you’re welcome’, but I couldn’t. Because of my SAD,” I tell him and he keeps nodding.

“I met Mare later,” I carry on with my story. “She heard me singing and told I had to try to make it big, I have the talent, but I told her I couldn’t. I saw her so confident, I admired her since the beginning. Later on she proposed me a deal. She would help me to overcome my disorder, and I would help her to get a deal. It seemed perfect for both of us because I wanted to live from my music but I didn’t want to face the crowd.

“And she helped me,” I laugh. “I was able to talk to you… to Harry, and many other people. I improved and we made it. At the ball she got a deal, finally. But that very night I realised that Harry… Harry doesn’t like me. He told me he didn’t like Mare, that he was mad at her because he thought she was the one who saved him (I never told him it was me, I was scared) but then he went after her. And she left with him! Both… both of them did something that… I… I feel so betrayed. I feel like I can’t trust any of them. And I told Mare I didn’t want to go on with this deal. But I forgot we signed a contract and I can’t run away from this again.”

We don’t say anything for a while, we just stay in silence. Niall knows there’s more to say.

“She offered me a way out because she says I’m stabbing her in the back because of a boy. She said I did all this for a boy, for Harry. But Harry went after another girl, he hurt me. So she told me that if I could hurt him like he hurt me I was free to walk away. Free from this deal.”

A sob escapes my lips and Niall hugs me tighter.

“But I can’t hurt Harry, Niall. I can’t! Even if he hurt me, even if he doesn’t like me back, I can’t hurt him because I love him. And now I’m trapped. I have to go with Mare, comply with my part of the deal and I don’t want to. Everything is broken between us but I can’t do anything. The only other way to be free is to pay the amount of this deal, but I don’t have money! We struggle to make ends meet. I can’t ask my dad for that. We would have to sell the lake to Mrs Drennan, but that’s not an option. So I have to leave and I don’t want to, Niall. I don’t!”

By that moment I’m crying and Niall is hugging me tightly, holding me together and I hold on to him for dear life. He’s all I have right now and I feel like I’m falling and I don’t see the bottom. I’m falling and I’m so scared.

“I’m so sorry, Ari,” Niall says. “I thought… I thought I knew how Harry felt. He kept talking about you and was always running to meet you but… I’m sorry. Maybe I can talk to him and clear this—”

“No!” I interrupt him. “Don’t talk to him. Don’t tell him any of this. He… it’s okay, Niall. If he likes Mare or any other girl, it’s okay. Either way it’s not like something between us is possible. I’ll be too busy and away. You two are leaving tomorrow. What difference would it make?”

“It would help you to not feel like this,” he tells me and I shake my head.

“I’ll be fine, Niall. Please, don’t tell him, okay?”

He sighs deeply and I’m scared he’d go and tell Harry about all this. I don’t want to talk to him. It hurts too much.

“What if all this is just a misunderstanding? Maybe you have to talk to him… or to Mare. Maybe it’s not what you think,” Niall proposes but I shake my head.

“It doesn’t matter now. He’s leaving, and I’ll leave with Mare. I signed a contract and I have to be a grownup.”

I pull back and look at Niall in the eyes, trying to smile. He looks so concerned.

“I’m sorry, Ari. I wish things wouldn’t have to be like this for you,” I sigh deeply, too, but I smile at him. “When you’re out there and you need a friend, call me, okay? You’ll have someone there.”

“Thank you,” I tell him and I hug him, happy that I found a friend. A real one. And that he’s willing to still be my friend when he’s gone and when I leave with Mare. It means so much to me.

After that we stay there for a while and he tries to keep my mind out of this, so we sing. We start making up songs and rhythms with percussions. I even run home to go for my beautiful old and new guitar and we play together. We sing every song that comes to our minds, we make up new ones. And I even show him the song I wrote for him and Ella and he loves it. Of course, I’ll work more on it, I’ll make it better.

“When I finish it,” I tell him. “I’ll send it to you. You can record it and it can be your next present for Ella. Imagine, when you two finally find each other again you can give her all the presents you’ve got for her all these years.”

He looks surprised and interested in the idea.

“I like that… a present for every year that we’re not together. It’ll be a way to catch up later,” he says and I nod frantically. “I like it.”

“See? And the song will be one of the presents!” I carry on so excited for them.

“Oh, but we could sing it together! And record it. It would be only for Ella. I wouldn't want it in our next album, you know?”

“That’d be fun,” I agree.

And it’s great to have exciting plans by when I leave with Mare. Something to look forward. Something to make things more bearable. I’m really happy that at least I’ll have Niall.

So we keep making plans as we sing. He says that I’ll have to help him write new songs because he knows the band will be over one day and he wants to write songs for the rest of his life. During our time by the lake we actually come up with a song between the two of us and it’s quite good. I really like it and it’s about friendship. I like writing about different things. About life, friendship, family and romance. Life it’s so full of wonderful things, why only focusing on one? Most artists sing about love, but I’d like to have more songs about friendship, you know? More songs that tell you to be strong when the world seems to fall apart. More songs to tell you that you are wonderful, even if you’re flawed because those flaws make you unique. I want more songs about life and fewer songs about love.

It gets late and we barely notice. It’s so easy to talk to Niall even though what we most talk about is music, but I like that. It makes me feel comfortable, it makes me feel secure. I can really feel how much he loves music, just as much as I love it. We don’t just bond over the fact of getting our hearts broken in different ways, we also bond over music and I think that’s even more powerful.

I know I haven’t met many people in my life, but I’m sure I’ll never met someone who loves music and understands how I feel regarding that as Niall does. I’m happy I have him as a friend.

“Bummer that I’m leaving tomorrow when we started to get closer. You don’t even know when you’re leaving?” he asks me and I shake my head. “Well, you have my number so we’ll keep in touch. And tomorrow come to say goodbye, will you? At the stables?”

I think about it. I’m not sure if I want to see how Harry leaves, but I want to say goodbye tomorrow. Plus, I need to talk to Mare.

“Okay,” I agree and he smiles, handing me my guitar.

“See ya tomorrow, Ari,” says Niall and then he hugs me.

Only when he leaves I realise that I don’t react badly to his hugs, that I don’t get anxious, that I feel all right. And that makes me smile.

Maybe I got my heart broken, maybe I lost my freedom… but I won a friend and the ability to make new ones. With hard work, but it’s possible. That's something really good. That makes me happy.

-:-:-

Their friendship melts my heart <3

Bel, xx