What's wrong with us when happy hurts

I know I'm not my thoughts

Notes:

I struggled once again with a chapter, what a shocker, lol. Writing Laurel is always a struggle for me. I hope I got her right and did her justice. Let me know if I didn't.

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Chapter 22

I know I'm not my thoughts but my thoughts don't know that yet, running from something that I can't really explain

Laurel

Laurel wasn't sure what she thought about her mom and Thea's idea of Sara coming over for tea after she and her mom were done with their shopping trip. There had been a reason why she had mostly avoided both Oliver and Sara while she had been at their place. She hadn't been sure what she would do or say if she saw them. She hadn't had said much when Oliver had told her about her sister's pregnancy. She had been in too much of a shock at that moment. Everything had sunken in for a while now and she hadn't known... She hadn't known what she would do, what she would say to Oliver if she saw him, even less her sister.

So, she had avoided them.

Part of her felt horrible about that. And her thoughts and her inability to face them. But she didn't know how. Didn't know how she would react. She remembered how she had reacted the last time they had dropped a bomb on her, well not intentionally but still... that dinner after Sara had first come back home was still a vivid memory, just like her reaction to the revelation that Sara and Oliver had hooked up again.

And part of her was scared, scared that she would react as badly as she had back then again.

Even though Thea and her mom had assured her, after she had confessed her fear to Ollie's baby sister and her mother last night after dinner once her dad had left, that it had probably been the alcohol and the pills that had led to her extreme and violent reaction. She wasn't sure that blaming it on her addiction wasn't just an easy excuse. She had been angry at them long before she had sought comfort and an escape in alcohol and drugs.

She had been so angry at them and the fact that she hadn't given herself permission to be angry at them for their actions because they had died, not having an outlet for those negative feelings, had led to her letting her anger fester. Until Oliver had come back home and she had let it out on him. There had been no addiction then, and she had been harsh and cruel to him. Not considering what he must have gone through or how he must be feeling. And then Sara had come back, and she had been so mad at her. She had always been angrier at Sara than Oliver. She was her sister, for crying out loud. Why would she betray her like that? Why would her own sister hurt her like that? So, yes, she had given voice to her anger as soon as the object of it had come back into her life. So, was it fair to blame her actions towards Sara when she first came back on her addiction, while she had a similar reaction to Oliver reappearing while being stone cold sober?

What if that would happen again? What if it was just part of who she was? What if she would explode at them now too? That was the last thing they needed. The last thing she wanted to do, but still she felt like she needed to give voice to her thoughts, to her feelings. To try and get rid of her anger. And her pain before they would fester again.

And yet she couldn't get her mother's words out of her head:

'Your feelings are never wrong and you are allowed and should feel however you do. All I'm saying is that you should think long and hard about whether giving voice to those feelings in front of your sister and Oliver is a smart choice. Sara is already feeling incredibly guilty and believes that you will hate her for this. I'm just trying to help you separate the past from the present.'