I sat on my bed, staring at the phone in my hands. Part of me felt bad for hanging up on them like that and part of me didn’t care. I felt like I was raw, like every hurt was on the surface. I wanted it to stop. I needed it to stop. I rolled over to my night stand and opened the drawer. I took my bottle of nighttime painkillers out of the drawer. I looked at the glass of water sitting on top. I opened the bottle and poured a bunch of pills into my hand when I thought I heard something. My head jerked up and I scanned my room. Nothing. Wait. I froze for a second and dropped everything. The bottle and pills fell to the floor. Holy crap. What the hell?
“Ow.” Patrick had climbed through my window, clearly head first. He started to get up off the floor.
“Patrick! You scared me half to death!” I dropped to my knees and rushed to pick up the pills scattered around me.
“Better half than all.” He said dryly. His eyes burned through me. Patrick stood in front me, grabbed my wrists and pulled me up. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“You know what I’m doing.” I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. His eyes wouldn’t let me.
“This?” He lifted my hand that was clutching pills I had recollected. Tears started to well up in my eyes, but I said nothing. “Why? Don’t you get what it means?”
“Means…” My head was spinning, swirling, pounding. It was like noise, horrible distorted noise filled my ears. I tried to concentrate on Patrick’s words. I knew I was losing it. I begged in a near whisper. “Means I can get some peace and quiet. What does it matter to you? Why won’t you leave me alone? Just leave me alone.” I tried to break away from his gaze and his grip. I could no longer see his face as tears streamed from my eyes. I tried to push him away, but he held on to me tighter.
“You don’t have to do this.”
I shook my head. “You don’t understand. I can’t live like this anymore.”
“I want to understand. Help me understand.”
“You don’t know me.”
“I know enough about you. You don’t need to do this. I don’t want you to do this.” He held both of my hands in his left hand and wrapped his right arm around me, pulling me closer to him. He whispered in my ear. “I’m not going to leave you alone. I’m not going anywhere. You can’t push me away.”
I started to sob uncontrollably. I felt like I was shattering into a million bits and pieces, I couldn’t hold it together anymore. My knees buckled underneath me. Patrick held me next to him and sat us down on the floor.