Our Struggle

M is for Messy

I felt exhausted.   

Exhausted. Shattered. Dead.

It as if someone had sucked out all of my energy and I was just a walking bag of skin, flesh and bones.

Quite ironic as I had literally had an iron transfusion to help me with said fatigue.

In fact, the transfusion finished faster than I thought. I didn't once look at the needles, in my mind, I was killing the bug man with a fly swat and watching him squeal.

Asher also kept bringing up the fact that we needed bug spray. And he asked the bug man if he had seen A Bug's Life - turns out the bug man had. This earned a cruel sneer from Asher as he pushed further about the ugly fat fly character in that movie.

I couldn't shove the feeling that maybe Harper had told Asher to be nice to me and that was why he was making so effort.

It wasn't as if he wanted to, or that he cared. He was just listening to Harper. I doubt anyone could genuinely care about me.

But right now, my ankle was throbbing - maybe it was because I had sat, rigid, in a plastic lined chair for the last few hours as my muscles were frozen out of fear.

It was as if someone was squeezing my ankle, squishing my calf muscles with their huge hands.

I opened the van door, trying to hold onto the handle but my ankle snapped to the side as I put my weight on it. And down I went.

Yes, I fell again.

And like some damsel in distress (only less pretty and much more sad), I lay on the pavement, surrounded by polkadots of gum and cigarette butts.

I couldn't be bothered to get up, that or I just didn't want to. It felt like my life was just this one, huge black hole at the minute and everything I knew was being sucked away.

"What the f***." That was all I heard from Asher as he walked around the other side of the parked van.

We were right in front of his house, having just returned from the hospital. The sky was so dark, fast asleep as fading stars were almost extinguished by clouds of pollution.

"You laugh and you're going to hell." I warned, staring at the suddenly very interesting (putrid) ground. My voice was so dry, so tired, devoid of emotion.

Because I just didn't care.

I wanted out of this hellhole.

This was the same ankle that I injured last time I fell in front of Asher - it didn't seem to have healed, obviously, given that my father had broken it a few years back.

He crushed my bone like glass: I was in surgery for hours as they tried to reconnect the tiny bone fragments like some sort of children's jigsaw, except this jigsaw didn't quite fit back together, and so, this ankle has always been weak.

Just like the rest of me.

"Already going," Asher grumbled as he bent down to hook a strong arm around my waist, before easily lifting me up. I wondered if I looked as red as I felt because I was sure that my cheeks were like tomatoes and my ears like chillies.

"And yeah, that was f****** funny." He added, carrying me to the house. "You got a walking issue or something?" He commented dryly before opening the door after sliding the key into the lock with a single, smooth motion.

I envied people who could do simple activities with such ease and confidence - there was just something about Asher and his mannerisms that oozed control, not by being loud like Noah, but by being quiet.