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There’s no real reason for it, at least nothing worthy or valid enough, yet still my whole body shook as sob after stupid sob wrecked my body. Though I knew Mom is at work and Ian is at the library or whatever with his friends, on instinct I still covered my mouth to quiet the sounds.
I mean, I guess when you bottle everything up, eventually it has to come out eventually. I say that like this is abnormal, I guess I just hoped that after a while I wouldn’t need to explode, that I could just keep quietly imploding. If you don’t let some steam out of the kettle, the whistle will eventually break the silence.
I could only keep my mouth covered until, of course, my lungs decided to stop working. God I hate when this happens. No matter what, my lungs just will not be efficient. Either I’m hyperventilating and can only take in endless gasps of air without really receiving any or being able to release any. Or it’s just endless exhales with each sob, just breathing out all my cries without time to gasp in more oxygen. Lose lose situation.
Today, my lungs decided on the latter, my body releasing without ever receiving. Just giving away all my air without taking any back in return.
God why can’t I just breathe like a normal Elf, why can’t I just be normal? Everyone would be so much happier if I was.
I did not dare cover my mouth anymore, needing every chance to gain any oxygen as each sob came out of me. At least with this much tears escaping my eyes, I should run out. Then I won’t have to cry anymore, for a while at least, that’s good. I just need to get to the point I can run out.
Suddenly, there was a soft knock on my door, I did not need to ask who it was to know it was Ian. He always knocks practically inaudibly, I’m lucky I could hear him at all over my cries. Immediately, I cut off my pathetic sobs, forcing myself to be quiet, for once . I wiped my tears and snot away with the back of my hand, not daring blowing my nose and giving myself away, if I haven’t already .
God how stupid could I be to let myself cry so loud when he could come home at any time. He’s not supposed to hear me cry, or even know I’m crying at all. He can’t know, how am I supposed to be here for him if he knows I can’t even take care of myself?
“Hey Barley?” He asked from the other side of the door, he never enters until I give him permission to.
Though I knew I needed to clear my throat and blow my nose and wash my flushed face, I called out, “come in.” When he entered, or rather opened the door and stood in the doorway, I gave him my practiced till perfect confident smile.
He looked at me, brows furrowed, “hey, hi,” he greeted, voice so soft and timid. So unsure.
Though my chest hurt from me forcing air in, I still kept going, I can’t let him see me struggling to just breathe. Breathing really should not be so hard.
My voice even and enthusiastic as always, as always , “I thought you were out with your friends, you just couldn’t resist bringing them home to meet your epic brother?” I joked. Humor is good, humor distracts. Afterall, who makes jokes when they are not okay, right?
I need to act normal, be my confident, happy, humorous self. Even if he heard me cry maybe if I’m acting like normal then he’ll figure I’m okay and then he’ll leave me be. He needs to leave me be. I can’t let him see how weak I am…
I’m supposed to be the strong one, the rock, even mom says I’m not afraid of anything. And I need to live up to that idea, that ideal, that standard. Ian is too scared to not have someone unafraid to help balance him out. He needs someone strong that he can lean on, so that he doesn’t have to do this on his own.
He doesn’t deserve to have to deal with everyone alone…
He did not laugh, not even so much as smile at the joke, “no, we’re done,” he paused for a second, thinking, “Barley are you okay?”
God I was stupid to think I could actually be good at protecting, but I just screwed this up too.
I scoffed, “of course I’m okay, aren’t I always?” No. Trick question, I never am. But that’s why it’s a trick, no one sees past tricks.
He stepped closer to me, “it sounded like you were crying,” somehow his voice was even softer, nervous even.
No, he can’t know I was crying, he can’t know how weak I am, he can’t think I’m weak then he won’t be comfortable to come to be because he’ll think I can’t take it, he needs to be able to lean on me he needs he deserves support.
My brows furrowed, “Crying? You need to get your ears checked, I was practicing a spell for my game.” There’s still plenty of spells he doesn’t know he won’t know if there’s a crying spell or not, it’s not like he is gonna fact check.
He fidgeted, still looking torn, but he still came closer to me, “Barley, it’s okay if you were crying.” No. It’s not.
I tried to stop him, tried to refute, “I wasn’t-”
To both of our surprises, he cut me off, “just know I’m here for you okay?” He was practically pleading and god the tears were back and pressing at my eyes even harder. I tried to blink them back as he continued, “I know I haven’t been before, haven’t been here for you I mean, and I’m really sorry about that, really really sorry,” his eyes looked almost glassy too, “Just, Barley you’re always here for me, let me be here for you too.”
Of course now is the time my eyes decide they can’t handle pressing in the tears any longer, as if I don’t hold them in every time I need to cry. Even my eyes are weak.
His mouth gaped a bit, like he didn’t expect me to actually start crying. I can’t blame him really, I’m not sure the last time he saw me cry.
Has he ever seen me cry?
I quickly wiped the stupid tears away, even though I knew he saw, I still hoped he hadn’t. Though he then finally completed the distance between us and maybe for the first time ever he actually hugged me first, “it’s okay, I’m here,” he whispered and a sob escaped my mouth before I could stop it.
This isn’t his job, his responsibility, is it selfish for me to want him to stay? Is it wrong? Either way, I did not have the heart or strength to push him away or tell him to leave.
He just held me tighter, I pressed my face to his shoulder, partly to stifle the ugly sounds and partly to just soak in this rare affection from Ian , as sob after sob shook my body but he didn’t let me go.
He’s never seen me like this before, so broken. But he’s still here, he’s still staying.
Even after I ran out of tears, he did not let me go.