He was drenched in rain as he stood in her front porch light, knocking on her door. It was the same house he'd known since childhood. All the people in there he knew well, he loved them still. They were practically his second family, taking him in as their son when his parents' marriage got rocky. They believed in him, unlike his own father.
He'd had so much potential, as everyone who knew him said. So much potential to become something, someone.
This was how he ended up here.
After his junior year, he fell behind in classes, dropped out of high school. Without her to guide him, everything just felt hopeless; a lost cause. There were days where the very taste death seemed so close, like if he just were to aim that blade where it struck - his sorrow and suffering would be over.
He didn't know how he'd even gotten this far.
All of his friends had moved away; done something with their lives. Red and Ashlyn married after college, started a family, and moved to the Redonovich pizza chain in Italy. Gina ended up pregnant after senior year, and no doubt the child was EJ's. Her strictly Catholic family had went off on a tangent about "sex before marriage" and thus, she went to live with E.J. and he married her following that chain of events. The Caswells and the Porters did not want their children to remain in Salt Lake, so the two were forced to make a living somewhere out east. Carlos and Seb did end make it to Broadway, where they sold out Dear Evan Hansen tickets for sky-high prices. Miss Jenn and Mr. Mozzarella - well...lord knows where they ended up.
...and here Ricky was. Right where she'd left him all those years ago when she accepted that record deal with TheMusicMan and moved to LA to chase her dreams.
Here he was. Waiting tables with ten dollars in his pocket to live through the days, wasted all his potential on drinking, spent the overnights at various hookups, and that resulted plenty of fights, ranging from petty squabbles to his throat nearly being slit.
He had words. Words, words he once used to write the most beautiful love poems; when his heart was full of life...love. Yet, everywhere he went these days, he felt like an open wound, his shallow heart still wrung over the lovelorn romance he'd suffered from in his teenage years.
She was nothing more than a flashback, he tried convincing himself. He tried to forget her. However, when he'd find himself listening to one of her songs in the car radio, that ever so familiar sense of melancholy heartbreak; that metaphorical open wound felt fresh again.
He wondered whether she'd open that door. If she was even here.
If she ever was, he'd be waiting.
-
I'm ending this faster than the Titanic because I've lost motivation and all but abandoned this fanfic. Plus, I'm actually dealing with this. Or rather; the feeling of this because of a certain unibrowed Ayse, or a blonde girl who always made me doubt (Hallie, speaking to you)
Keep reading. Keep writing. Keep dreaming.
-V
P.S. a meme to make you feel better
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P.P.S. I've decided to start tagging!! (If this disrupts you, feel free to ignore.)
